Taeko Yamada (MSW, CPP)

Taeko Yamada has over 15 years of experience working as a social worker in Australia and Japan. Her fields of experience include suicide prevention/intervention, sexual health especially HIV/AIDS, family violence, human trafficking, mental health and transgender healthcare. Taeko has also worked with, and advocated for specific target groups such as youth, women of color, people living with HIV/AIDS, and the LGBTQIA+ community.

Taeko obtained her Master of Social Work from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia in 2007, and also completed a Graduate Diploma in Family Therapy in 2012. Taeko also became certified in hypnotherapy in 2021 both as a hypnotherapist and a hypnotherapy trainer. In 2022, she was also registered as a Certified Public Psychologist in Japan.

Her clinical interests include adolescent mental health, trauma, anxiety and depression, family/intimate partner violence, grief and loss, chronic pain and stress management, cultural adjustment, and sexual and gender identities and sexual health issues.

Her approach is integrative and holistic, and she hopes that every client can feel empowered, resilient, more loving towards themselves after therapy. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Cognitive and Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Solution-Focused Therapy, Hypnotherapy are Taeko’s main therapeutic modalities.

Taeko is a member of the Australian Association of Social Workers, Japanese Society of Gender Identity Disorder, Japan Board of Clinical Hypnotherapists, National Guild of Hypnosis, American Board of Hypnotherapy, and a past member of the World Professional Association of Transgender Health.

資格：ラ・トローブ大学先住民族学学士、モナッシュ大学ソーシャルワーク科修士、家族療法グラデュエート・ ディプロマ（豪州）、公認心理師、NGH米国催眠士協会認定ヒプノセラピスト、ABH米国催眠療法協会認定トレーナー

所属学会等（2022年9月現在）：Australian Association of Social Workers、日本臨床ヒプノセラピスト協会、ABH米国催眠療法協会、NGH米国催眠士協会、日本GID学会

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Key Concepts: bilingual, social worker, therapist, suicide intervention, sexual health and HIV/AIDS counselling, family violence, human trafficking, target groups, youth, women of color, SOGI, LGBTQIA+, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Solution-Focused Therapy, Family Therapy, adolescent mental health, trauma, anxiety and depression, family/intimate partner violence, grief and loss, chronic pain and stress management, cultural adjustment, identity issues, trans and gender diverse individuals, domestic violence, same-sex couple counseling, LGBTQIA+ family therapy.

o Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT): a type of therapy focused on actively rejecting the denial of internal thoughts and feelings, and recognizing them as reactions to situations one has experienced. This allows the individual to process such thoughts and feelings, and work to move past these obstacles blocking them from healing.

o Solution-Focused Therapy: a type of therapy that analyzes an individual’s current situation and encourages finding concrete solutions to confront problems and improve quality of life.

o Family Therapy: a type of therapy based on the idea that actions by each individual in a family system influences the rest of the system. Working not just with individuals but with the family unit, each member of the family is encouraged to work with one another to improve family dynamics and understand how their role in the system influences the others involved.

o Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): a type of psychotherapy (talk therapy) that has a solution-oriented approach and aims to help process patient struggles from both a cognitive and behavioral perspective. The goal of CBT is to address negative thoughts (cognitive) or behaviors (behavioral) that are causing distress and focus on encouraging practical steps toward solving the problem at hand while tackling the anxiety that it may be causing. The basis of CBT rests on the idea that thoughts and feelings are what influence behaviors.