Renna Ulvang
MSW, LCSW
Thank you so much for visiting my website. I encourage your curiosity and invite you to ask any questions about me and how I work. If there is something that I haven’t covered here, I am happy to respond in an email or initial phone call.
Choosing a therapist is an important decision and I want to help make it as easy as I can.
About
I have been in practice since 1983. I grew up in New York City and have lived in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1974. I love the American west, especially the Eastern Sierras and enjoy hiking, birding and supporting conservation organizations. My passions include artistic expression and traditional music making.
Qualifications
Wurzweiler School of Social Work, Yeshiva University, New York, New York
MSW 1983
Clinical Social Work License and State: California, 1987
LCS 12706
Professional Affiliations
Clinical Social Work Association
National Association of Social Workers
San Francisco Psychotherapy Research Group
Psychotherapy
Therapy is a very unique process designed to help you identify patterns of behavior, feelings, or beliefs which are getting in the way of your having a happier, more successful and more satisfying life. We will decide together what approaches and tools will help facilitate the change you are seeking.
I see clients with a variety of needs including: relationship issues (friends, significant others, children, aging parents) work issues (including dealing with others, difficulties achieving more success in the workplace and challenges to defining a meaningful career path), maintaining sobriety/recovery, health issues (adjustment to illness in yourself or someone close to you or defining and maintaining important health goals), anxiety, trauma and depression as a result of the above concerns.
We will work to understand your family of origin relationships; noticing how both the strengths and limitations of those relationships influence your connections to partners, friends, colleagues,
children, and your family.
Some of the specific problems you may come in with include but are not limited to putting others’ needs before your own; difficulty taking care of yourself in an optimal way; stifled creativity; fear of being assertive; self-defeating behaviors; procrastination.
My approach is most influenced by the work of the San Francisco Psychotherapy Research Group (sfprg.org), the somatic therapists particularly Stephen Levine (traumahealing.org), the attachment theorists and the Neuroaffective Relational Model (NARM) group. We will look at what conscious and unconscious beliefs might be getting in the way of your feeling deserving of being happy, safe, successful and independent. We can use your embodied feelings to understand the nature of your worries and find ways to transform those feelings into positive ones.
Each person is different and together we will find a mix of approaches that works best for you. My style is interactive and engaging. While therapy involves facing some painful and difficult feelings and insights, I strive to make therapy relaxed and fun. Laughter is an important healing experience. I love being a therapist and derive a great deal of pleasure from my work.
Generally, our therapy sessions will last 50 minutes and occur weekly; however, more sessions are sometimes needed during crisis times or to hasten our work.
Contact
415-298-1649
Due to COVID-19, for the foreseeable future I am conducting Telehealth sessions remotely. If you are a prospective patient, I will let you know how to join me online.
Due to the multiple stresses people are facing at this time (health, emotional, security, economic disruption, worries about families, etc.) I encourage you to contact me for short or longer term work. I am happy to adjust my fee for new patients to allow people to get the help they need.
