Dominique Bressi, PsyD

  Dominique Bressi, PsyD
Licensed CA Clinical Psychologist
PSY 21833
Dr. Bressi has worked in the field of mental health from an empathic relational sensibility for the past 14 years, coupling her work with a deep-rooted practice of spiritual transformation informed by indigenous wisdom. A leader in depathologizing the appropriate distress suffered by those with varying degrees of traumatic experience, she has worked as trauma specialist and Clinical Director for the nation's leading treatment centers, including the founding of her own center for adults with co-occurring trauma-based disorders. She now maintains a private practice in Topanga and Santa Monica, California, just outside of Los Angeles.

Specialties:

Addictions

Anxiety

Childhood Abuse and Neglect

Depression

Disordered Eating

Dissociation

Domestic Violence Victims

Mood Instability

Posttraumatic Stress (PTSD)

Relationships

Self-Harming Behaviors

Sexual Abuse and Assault

Stockholm Syndrome

Suicidality

Survivors of the Sex Industry

Working with Women

I honor the inherent dignity and essential wisdom of each individual. Our wounds are sacred. Within my philosophy and my truth is the knowing that emotional suffering provides a pathway to our healing and our wholeness.

My mission is to provide a holistic healing opportunity within a sacred energetic space for those with co-occurring disorders, with a core understanding of what it means to realize one's authentic self and live an authentic life.

Living authentically requires a capacity to hold and be with the truth of our vulnerability. When emotional pain becomes unbearable, authenticity feels deadly, dangerous and at all costs to be avoided - the way to our heart is shut off. This effort to survive, by denying the vulnerable heart, is not sustainable; it is a prison that slowly kills us. Our survival mechanisms, such as drug and alcohol abuse, the very prison forged to protect, ultimately deadens us: these walls must collapse - one's life must change.

It is this anguish, this essential heartbreak, which opens us to the full expanse of who we are as feeling, loving human beings. The shutdown of our heart denies us access to all experience, including joy and tenderness. We cannot feel our joy or feel our love for and acceptance of love from others unless we also feel our pain; we cannot pick and choose what we feel - either we're open and we feel or we're closed and we don't feel. From a place of openness, learning to hold our vulnerability with tenderness, we can discern what action needs to be taken or boundaries that need establishing to assure an authentic life. Ultimately, it is our anguish that deepens our capacity to feel and hence, it is our anguish that delivers us to the full expression of our heart and to the living of an authentic whole life. The depth to which we feel our pain is equal to the depth with which we can come to feel our joy. Heartbreak is a sacred passage to a beautiful life. 

We must lean into our broken heart and let the leaning break us open, to reveal the true heart within. Successful treatment is based in securing an inner sense of safety, strength in vulnerability, capacity for intimacy, a sense of self-worth and the ability to remain connected in what is necessarily a changing outside world. My approach is based in mutuality, empathy and respect for every person. In a safe and tranquil environment, I will support each individual in choosing to lean into their pain rather than away, as they ultimately discover that the power of their vulnerability lies in their capacity to be with an expanse of feeling from a position of self-soothing and self-love. Each individual is supported through the process of coming into presence with their bodies, their feelings, the realities of their lives, their relations to the larger world: social, political, environmental, natural, and the full mindful awareness of each breath in each moment. This work kindles the desire for wellness and empowerment.

Phone: 310.828.8258
Cell: 310.455.1782
Email: bressi@lotusew.com

For more information about Dr. Bressi visit: www.silencedvoices.com

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