Encinitas Counseling

I went to Britta for help when I felt stuck in a cycle of fear driven thoughts when it came to my life and relationship. She is a great listener and really took the time to understand my situation. She gave me perfect guidance and provided some tools that helped me through that part of my life. I am very grateful!

My mother died a year and a half ago… the grief was enormous as she was not only my Mom but my best friend. Britta not only helped me with the grief. As I was her caregiver and my job as caregiver ended, Britta helped me find me again. She totally got me and was an awesome counselor. I’ve been to therapist in the past and most of them were a little too birkenstock for me. Not Britta, she is real! I would recommend her to everyone and I think I have.

First and foremost, I found Britta to be extremely open and nonjudgemental. I had a terrible family experience while visiting Cali from NYC, that felt as though it would damage me for the rest of my life. Ya know the kind– they usually happen at Thanksgiving. Anyways, I was visiting some seriously intense relatives for far too long of a visit, and if it weren’t for some friends recomending Britta, I might be estranged from my family permanently. I saw her in person twice, and then continued online when I got back to New York. I have to say she was one of the best listeners I’ve ever met, I don’t know if I would have survived the visit had it not been for the perspective she helped me with. She emanates compassion and gave me some unique insights into myself and how to have compassion for others when they seem to want to harm us, as well as helpful tools for coping and protecting myself when in those toxic family dynamics. She also seemed very intuned with my artistic sensibilities and the chaos that comes with that, which I especially appreciate. She is one of those total Gem therapists. I wouldn’t normally write such a personal review, but I just feel this is a truly healng person and others should know it.

I make no secret in my Unilocal reviews that I am what may be euphemistically called one of the ”worried well”, and have been a consumer of mental health and self improvement services since age 15 — ranging from psychiatrists (who are MDs), psychologists, social workers, marriage — family therapists, and ad nauseum.
The therapies I’ve tried: gestalt, drama, art, cognitive, insight oriented (used to be the gold standard), psychotherapy with emphasis on childhood and dream work, then my own training in meditation and mindfulness, nutritional/​supplemental approaches, acupuncture, yoga, breathwork, hypnosis, hyperbaric oxygen therapy, hormone therapy, light therapy, conventional pharma, and physical exercise… and of course voracious reading in the self help genre? Have I left anything out? Am I ‘done’ yet? :)
Many of the things I tried worked (gestalt/​drama therapy especially — also biofeedback and hypnosis), some had lasting effects, most however were really not effective in making me ‘feel better’ long term.
People of ‘artistic temperament’, ie finely tuned, (sometimes anxious), usually go one of two ways — substance abuse (which can include food as well as the usual suspects of alcohol and drugs) — or the obsessive compulsive *OCD, route. There ARE much healthier coping methods to avail yourself of, be they exercise, mindfulness, nature, volunteer work, or the most obvious, competent counseling.
So! where Britta with Encinitas Counseling comes into is — she is NOT the run of the mill.
First she is wonderfully compassionate, with a spiritual approach (no proseltyzing and you can be any faith and feel comfortable with her — I just get the impression she takes her work as a sacred vocation, and not just a way to make a buck or feed her ego).
I am sad to say that to find a REALLY good, effective therapist is not easy and if you do find one, you only hope they don’t move away or change careers.
I have seen countless mental health practitioners over the years, I see no shame in that. Here in the San Diego area she is only the 3d I’ve met that is worth her salt, IMO. The other two were physicians, who I already reviewed here on Unilocal.No offense to the many good ones who may be out there.
The most important quality in a therapist, aside from integrity, is that you can ‘connect’ with them — that their approach to life aligns with yours, and that they are intuitive, superb listeners, and not entrenched in textbook dogma. (I have found the more secure and emotionally mature any professional is, the less hidebound and rigid they will be.)
Sorry I’m so wordy here, but because this sort of service is SO personal, and what will work for any individual is so varied, a few lines would do the reader a disservice. And my goal here on Unilocal is to help people, not tout anyone or trash needlessly.
Britta is mature in years (I personally prefer my counselor on the mature side, with rich life experience — no offense to 20 or 30 somethings in this field but that is just me!). She doesn’t just have the post graduate training, although she has that, but she is amazingly tuned in and intuitive, she reacts to your situation in a personal and customized manner, like she really ‘sees’ you… not the one size fits all that makes you feel like a ‘case’ instead of a human being.
Also she practices mindfulness and that resonated with me. But if you don’t, you will still benefit.
Aside from her MFT training, she also has a background in nutrition, and implements the latest findings in neurobiology and mental health research.
One of the most interesting things she does (aside from classic type counseling), is with a device that is like a biofeedback machine — (I also had biofeedback back in the early 90s, related to an injury and pain control), this machine connects your hands to a computerized program that analyzes your voice and detects what tones might be missing (which correlates with emotional well being), and feeds back the missing tones you need… then you repeat your triggering ‘story’ in the mouthpiece and it helps remove the ‘charge’ from the memory.
I know it sounds wild but it did help! I had a certain embedded belief about myself that no longer has the same hold on me that it had prior.
This is not the only tool in her arsenal but it is an interesting one.
She also does EMDR (eye movement reprogamming), woo –woo as it sounds, is pretty mainstream in resolving painful memories.
(update) Oh and she does hypnotherapy also now — and this is a tool that can really unstick some entrenched ‘stuff” ! I had a session and I found it deeply relaxing and felt a shift with my issue.
Good luck in your search for health and wholeness!