Pat Harvey is a licensed clinical social worker living and practicing in Rockville, Maryland.
Pat’s passion is in helping and supporting parents and family members who love individuals who have emotion dysregulation or mental illness. For most of her professional life, Pat has specialized in work with families and in the treatment of individuals with mental illness. In 2000 Pat was introduced to the Dialectical Behavior Therapy framework which has enhanced her life and her work with parents and family members. In 2001, Pat was instrumental in the design and development of the Grove Street Adolescent Residence, one of the first adolescent group homes in the country to open as a DBT adherent program. In 2004, Grove Street won an APA gold Award for community programming. It was within that program, in Massachusetts, that Pat began to learn about the life experiences of parents and recognized the importance of paying attention to the needs of parents even when working with their children. She developed her first Parent DBT Skills Training group at Grove Street.
PASSIONATE ABOUT HELPING
PARENTS & FAMILY MEMBERS
ABOUT PAT
Since moving to Maryland in 2004, Pat has continued to develop and facilitate DBT Skills Training Groups for parents and, at times, for siblings and family members, who are searching for how they can most effectively help their loved one and also lessen the pain and suffering they are experiencing. These groups have provided support, skills and strategies to parents and other family members and lets them know that they are not alone. Pat now specializes in coaching, providing guidance and supporting parents, teaching them skills so that they can communicate and interact in effective, less emotional, ways with their child (of any age). Pat is passionate in her desire to provide acceptance and hope for parents and to validate the feelings and anxieties they experience when they love someone whose emotions often lead to difficult behaviors and an increase in everyone's emotions.
Pat has co-authored two books for parents, Parenting a Child Who Has Intense Emotions and Parenting a Teen Who Has Intense Emotions. She has also co-written a book for siblings, Hey, I’m Here Too!: A book for Tween/Teen Siblings of a Young Person with Emotional Issues and a book for Professionals, Dialectical Behavior Therapy for At-Risk Adolescents. She has also published articles in magazines and appeared on the local television program, Forward Motion.
Pat enjoys training mental health professionals in the use of DBT and, more specifically, in how to work with parents in a supportive, validating and non-blaming way. She has facilitated seminars and workshops at national and local conferences, at schools, and non-profit and community mental health organizations. She has trained mental health professionals nationally through PESI and has consulted to practitioners and spoken internationally.
She is a member of the Academy of Certified Social Workers and a Licensed Certified Social Worker Clinical in the state of Maryland. Pat is a member of the National Association of Social Workers and the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. She is also a member of DBTNCAA (Dialectical Behavior Therapy National Certification and Accreditation Association) and an active participant on the national DBT listserv.
Pat has attended numerous seminars and workshops on DBT that were facilitated by Marsha Linehan, Charlie Swenson, Cindy Sanderson, Alec Miller and Lane Pederson. She has recently participated in "Advanced DBT Training: Doing DBT to Adherence & with Competence", an extensive course facilitated by Charles Swenson of the Treatment Implementation Collaborative.
Pat’s hope is that her work will enable more acceptance of individuals with emotion dysregulation and more understanding of the lives of their family members. It is her goal to continue to translate DBT philosophy and skills into practical strategies for living, and helping others to live, lives of fulfillment and appreciation for every moment.
Click attachment below to view Pat's resume