I have a B.A. in psychology from Hope College in Holland, Michigan, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Delaware, where I worked with emotions theorist Carroll Izard, Ph.D., to study the development of emotion knowledge in preschool- and elementary-age children. I received specialized training in pediatric and early childhood interventions (for disruptive behaviors, feeding issues, sleep problems, and enuresis/encopresis) at the duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Delaware and completed my internship at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. There, I was trained by nationally recognized sleep expert Jodi Mindell, Ph.D., and also underwent intensive training in pediatric behavioral feeding, NICU follow-up evaluations, family therapy, and oncology family consultation. I also completed research on the incidence of pervasive developmental disorders in children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome. 

I spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow in the training program at Brown University, focused on work with children under 7 and their families, including diagnostic evaluation, family therapy, play therapy, behavioral parent training, and daycare and preschool/Head Start consultation, as well as further research on young children’s emotional development. 

Prior to moving to the Boston area and starting my private practice, I spent almost a decade at Psychological Centers in Providence, Rhode Island (which was acquired by the North American Family Institute in 2014), directing the Early Intervention Behavioral Health program and then the Center for Community-Based Services. In those positions, I provided family and individual therapy for children under 10 and diagnostic evaluations for children under 6, as well as managing, training, and supervising dozens of clinicians and behavior assistants providing intensive in-home services to families of children at-risk for psychiatric hospitalization.