Rhinebeck Child and Family Center, LLC

Rhinebeck Child and Family Center, LLC Child Therapy Techniques - The Center for Practical Tools for Child and Adolescent Therapists Dr. David A. Crenshaw, Director	NEWS Upcoming Presentations (click)
	For Dr. Crenshaw's Amazon.com Blog, click here.
For certified translations in any of 8 languages, click here for details.	"Heartfelt Feelings" Coloring Card Strategy. Click here for details.
	Dr. Crenshaw's latest book 20% discount Code # 4W9CAPBK. Click for details and to order.
Dr. Crenshaw's book Bereavement: Counseling the Grieving throughout the Life Cycle is so successful that it is now in its third printing and earned an average customer rating of from Amazon.com
*Read Dr. Crenshaw's articles in Play Therapy* magazine by clicking on title: "Should I Be Worried?" "Selective Mutism" "Preverbal Trauma" "No Time or Place for Child's Play" "Sounds of Silence" "Symbolism of Windows and Doors in Play Therapy"** with permission of Play Therapy Magazine.
Books below are available in paperback at 20% discount. To order click on the book images below or simply call 1-800-462-6420. Code # 4W9CAPBK. If you want to read reviews first, click on book title under the book image.

Home
Consultations
Presentations- Including Upcoming
Testimonials from Presentations
Books
Dr. Crenshaw's Publications
DVD on Grief
CHILD THERAPY TECHNIQUES:
...Heart Symbol Strategies
...Heartfelt Feelings Coloring Card Kit
...Party Hats on Monsters
...Anger Modulation Drawings
...The Ship Prepares for Voyage
...The Magic Key
...The Fair Trial
...The Tree at the Top of the Hill
...Falling Leaves
...Holiday Writing Exercises
...Three Doors
Articles for Parents and Teachers
Article: Empathic Healer
Article: The Fawns beneath the Gorilla Suits
Article: The Hidden Dimensions
Article: Sounds of Children's Silence
Article: Windows to the Child’s Soul
Article: Selective Mutism
Article: Sealing off the Fountain
Article: by Liana Lowenstein, MSW
Poetry... Musings of the Soul
...Multicultural Language of Healing a Child
About Dr. Crenshaw
Translations

Mailing Address P.O. Box 286 Rhinebeck, NY 12572

Office Address 23H East Market St. Rhinebeck, NY 12572

Phone: (845) 876-3400

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"The Empathic Healer"

By David A. Crenshaw, Ph.D., ABPP

Are the days of the empathic healer numbered? Is the empathic healer an endangered species? This question was raised in the title of a thought- provoking book by Harvard psychiatrist Michael Bennett (2001). In a fast paced world seeking quick fixes to all that ails them and a managed health care system forever trying to squeeze the health care providers and patients to wring out costs to maximize corporate profits, has the heart gone out of the health care system?

My colleague Kenneth V. Hardy, Ph.D., Director of the Eikenberg Institute for Relationships in New York City and I (2005) have addressed this issue in a recent book chapter on traumatized and aggressive youth in the child welfare system. We do not deny that a significant number of people are helped by psychiatric medications that have been developed, especially in the last two decades, and we recognize these medications have relieved the mental suffering of countless people. We believe with great conviction, however, that children and youth (not to mention adults) still need and perhaps, more so in today’s world, an empathic healer to listen to their story.

We have learned through our clinical experience that children, adolescents and families will only tell their story in the presence of an empathic healer. Children, and even animals, can tell when someone really cares and when they don’t and they are never fooled. As far as we know there is no pharmaceutical remedy, no pill of any kind that can heal a hole in the heart of a child, the crushing of the spirit of youth, the most devastating of all injuries. We believe as long as there is violence in our world, hatred among humans, poverty, crime, racial, class, and gender bias, there will remain the need for an empathic healer.

References:

Bennett, M. (2001). The empathic healer: An endangered species. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

Crenshaw, D. A. & Hardy, K. V. (2005). Understanding and treating the aggression of traumatized children in out-of-home care. In N. B. Webb (ed.), Working with traumatized youth in child welfare, pp. 171-195. New York: Guilford Press.