What is STAAR DBT? Seattle Training in Adult, Adolescent & Relationship DBT: a collaboration between Dr. Miga(The Seattle Clinic, Balance Psychotherapy) & Dr. Michonski(Balance Psychotherapy Collaborative) that provides high touch training of students on the applications of DBT for teens/adults and families, couples and parents. Dr. Miga & Dr. Michonski have enjoyed collaborating in DBT training together for the past 6 years. We offer behaviorally precise and high-quality supervision, delivered with compassion, flexibility, humor and kindness. We offer a supportive environment to our trainees, during which we recognize our fellow’s strengths, shape necessary skills, and help fellows cultivate community and connectedness with their clients, and within the training program.
We have new students entering in this Summer! Please contact us via webform if you are interested in working with one of our practicum students as soon as late July 2024! We are currently screening for teen and adult DBT cases, as well as DBT-informed couples cases. You can contact the postdoctoral fellows directly at their emails below.
Madelaine (Laina) Keim earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Washington in June 2023. Laina joined The Seattle Clinic(TSC) under the supervision Dr. Erin Miga in September 2023, and was recently accepted into TSC as a full member!
Laina is currently accepting new client inquiries for adolescents seeking DBT & CBT (aged 14 and older), adults seeking DBT, and parents seeking parenting support for teens. Laina works with individuals across the lifespan seeking support for difficulties with mood, anxiety, OCD, emotion regulation, trauma, interpersonal relationships, and parenting. She is committed to delivering treatments that honor each individual’s unique set of strengths and challenges as well as the latest in clinical research establishing empirically validated therapeutic strategies. Her approach flexibly draws from range of cognitive behavioral and third wave treatments including Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Behavioral Activation (BA), behavioral parent training, and exposure-based therapies (e.g., Exposure and Response Prevention for OCD, Prolonged Exposure for PTSD). Before making her way to the West Coast, she completed her undergraduate studies in Sociology and Psychology at The Ohio State University and worked as a research coordinator at Nationwide Children’s Hospital Center for Biobehavioral Health. During her six years of doctoral training in Seattle, she worked as a therapist for both children and adults at Seattle Children’s Hospital, The Evidence Based Treatment Center of Seattle, The Seattle Clinic, Child and Teen Solutions, and The King County Sexual Assault Resource Center. Currently, Laina is in the process of completing her clinical internship in General Child and Adolescent Psychology at the UCLA Semel Institute. She remains committed to advancing scientific research and has published more than 20 peer-reviewed articles on topics such as parent socialization of children’s emotions, parent-child interactions, family adjustment to pediatric illness, and post-traumatic growth. Additionally, Laina has taken special interests in the teaching and mentorship of junior clinicians, providing training and supervision to other masters- and doctoral-level students at the University of Washington while concurrently completing her own studies.
Laina treats individuals across the lifespan seeking support for challenges with mood, anxiety, OCD, emotion regulation, interpersonal relationships, and parenting. Her approach draws from a range of evidence-based cognitive behavioral and third wave treatments including Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Behavioral Activation (BA), behavioral parent training, and exposure-based therapies (e.g., Exposure and Response Prevention for OCD, Prolonged Exposure for PTSD).
As a therapist, Laina blends a warm and compassionate interpersonal style with a commitment to challenging clients to confront unhelpful beliefs and change longstanding patterns of maladaptive behavior. She strives to lead with authenticity, bringing humor, playfulness, and her common humanity to each session. She works collaboratively with clients and families to craft individualized treatment plans tailored to each client’s unique goals and strengths. By improving the emotional literacy of the entire family and providing effective psychoeducation that makes principles of treatment transparent, she hopes to effect great and abiding change in the lives of her clients that persists beyond their time-limited sessions.
China Bolden-Jarvis, PhD Postdoctoral Fellow 2023-24 [email protected]
Dr. China Bolden-Jarvis received her doctorate in clinical psychology from Seattle Pacific University. She completed her clinical internship at the University of Washington School of Medicine where her clinical work focused on adolescent and young adult mental health. China will be joining The Seattle Clinic under the supervision of Dr. Erin Miga September 2023-September 2024.
China is currently accepting new client inquiries for adolescents seeking DBT and/or treatment for trauma, & DBT-informed parenting cases. Prior to graduate school, China worked as a research coordinator at UW where her interest and passion for understanding and treating childhood trauma and maltreatment became the focus of her work. In this role she collaborated on MRI studies investigating the impact of early childhood trauma on brain development.
During graduate school, she continued narrowing her focus on the treatment of trauma and suicidality and recognized the complexity and comorbidity of trauma exposure, suicidality and many other mental health struggles. In order to effectively serve clients with complex mental health challenges she pursued training in multiple evidence-based treatment modalities including exposure and response prevention for anxiety and OCD, behavioral activation for depression, trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy, prolonged exposure for PTSD, and dialectical behavioral therapy. Recognizing the impact of generational trauma and the importance of healthy and supportive families, Dr. Jarvis also has received extensive behavioral parent management training rooted in the principles of positive parenting.
She is able to provide general parent training, dialectical behavioral parent skills training, as well as the Incredible Years intervention. Dr. Jarvis strives to meet each of her clients where they are at and to provide effective treatment to better lives in an authentic and collaborative way.