Who I am
MARILYN LAMMERT, BETHESDA THERAPIST: WHO I AM
I have been in the practice of psychotherapy and healing for 30 years, working with adults and elders facing a wide range of issues: anxiety, depression, relationship stress, work-life balance, illness, transitions, grief and loss including loss of faith and loss of meaning, as well as end-of-life concerns.
Before and during the time I’ve been in clinical practice, I was a university professor, a community organizer and a sixth grade teacher. All of this has provided me with professional and life experience. Naturally, I and my practice have evolved out of many things: my original family, formal education and training, the serious illness I had in my early 20’s, and my own therapy. And my marriage, adopting and raising children, and a ten-year chronic debilitating illness in the recent past have shaped me as well. I’m a strong person and I believe these experiences have made me stronger. I believe we all have such strength in us.
I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) with a Social Work Master’s degree from Washington University and a Doctor of Science degree from Johns Hopkins University.
Gestalt therapy and Integrated Kabbalistic Healing orient my work, and more recently, Appreciative Inquiry: Gestalt therapy draws on Buddhism and includes a cognitive and behavioral focus; Integrated Kabbalistic Healing combines aspects of Jewish mysticism, Buddhism and psychology. Appeciative Inquiry, a non-dual modality, focuses on overcoming the limits we impose, often unconsciously, on ourselves and what we are capable of.
Here are some things about me that may help you decide if I am someone you would like to work with:
People who know me know that I like to learn and synthesize what I learn. This is true especially when what I learn helps me understand why things might happen as they do—between people, in the world, and in myself. So in our work together you will learn new tools, such as your "learning style" and how to access your inner wisdom, as well as other things interesting and useful for your life. I think somewhere in all of us is the yearning to learn and understand ourselves.
Feeling connected to the people I care about is probably what is most important to me. I think connections are deeply important to all of us. From my teens on, I’ve always searched for meaning in some way. Earlier, I wanted to understand why what was happening to me was happening. Later, I wanted to feel my connection to something deeper than my everyday existence. I read, went to see, listened to whatever and whomever felt right to me, i.e., spoke to me. All along, I was organizing and synthesizing my experiences–sometimes I share these with clients when that seems right.
Here is my information about my background:
Degrees and Education
- Washington University, MSW, Clinical Social Work
- Johns Hopkins University, ScD, Health Care
- Gestalt Training Center (Erving & Miriam Polster), San Diego, CA 1978 (300 hours intensive training)
- Integrated Kabbalistic Healing 2005 (350 hours intensive training)
- Continuing Education, 40 hours per year ongoing
Primary Professional Activities
- Private Practice of Psychotherapy, 1979-present
- Consultant, Center for Development/Psych Services Employee Assistance Program, 1986-2005
- Associate Professor, National Catholic School of Social Service, The Catholic University of America, 1980-1988
- Assistant Professor, School of Social Work and Community Planning, School of Nursing, University of Maryland, 1975-1980
- Director, Center for Health Services, The Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, 1974-1975
- Assistant to the Dean, School of Health Services, The Johns Hopkins University, 1972-1974
- Assistant Professor, School of Social Work, Washington University, 1970-1972
