About Richard 

My Story

Hi, I’m Richard (he, him, his), a clinical social worker, psychotherapist, and writer. I’m a cis-het male, white-bodied, able person who holds and practices anti-oppressive values affirming BIPOC, kink-positive, neurodiverse, and 2SLGBTQIA+ folks. While I am based in San Diego, California, I’m originally from Chicago, where in film school I soon realized I was interested in speaking to people about their stories and how stories tell us who we are and where we want to go. I began studying philosophy and literature and was drawn to finishing a degree in French and a year of study at the Sorbonne in Paris. Once I returned to Chicago I began volunteering as an interpreter for psychotherapy with French-speaking political asylees from Africa who were survivors of torture at the Marjorie Kovler Center. This was the beginning of my path toward becoming a psychotherapist with anti-oppressive values.

In New York City just after 9/11 I did community organizing work with the International Trauma Studies program and the Downtown Community Resilience Project while volunteering as an extern with the Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture.

I continued community organizing as a program director with a non-profit community organizing agency: managing staff, raising money, and building partnerships with government and local organizations. From there I devoted myself full-time to work as a staff psychotherapist with a community mental health center in The Bronx for five years, before moving full time into private practice over a decade ago.

I’ve always been practical at heart, and though I did a lot of theoretically intense psychoanalytic study and practice, my heart always drew me back to “what works” for people, outside of any particular school of thought or dogma. That’s how I put together my approach to therapy, which involves some focus on childhood, a variety of exercises and techniques that are still about story, changing point of view, creativity, and kindness— all within the structure of an evidence based approach.

After 20 years, I have returned to work with survivors of torture and asylum applicants. Donating time to San Diego’s Survivors of Torture International, I conduct forensic psychological evaluations to be used for survivors’ asylum process.

I have a Certificate in Novel Writing from San Diego Writers Ink, and am writing a novel in my spare time. This creative process richly informs my therapeutic work around issues of dealing with self-criticism, avoiding creative time, and setting up a new life routine.

I practice in the Plum Village Tradition of Buddhism, which informs my approach to mindfulness in mental health practice, while respecting the difference between mindfulness as a mental health practice and Buddhism as a sacred practice. I also support the East Bay Meditation Center.