QUALIFICATIONS
Sheffa is licensed as a Marriage and Family Therapist in both North Carolina (LMFT #1647) and California (BBS MFT #47600). She graduated with a Master's degree in Counseling Psychology in 2004, with specializations in somatic psychology and group process, from John F. Kennedy University in California.
Sheffa completed five years of post-graduate internship in the somatic psychotherapy practice of Kim McCourt, MFT. She has also worked as a counselor in a public school, as a therapist and group leader in a low-fee clinical setting, and as an HIV Counselor and Health Educator within the women's health clinic of the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinics in San Francisco.
Before becoming a therapist, she worked in the start-up bioscience technology world in the Bay Area during the dot-com boom within marketing and human resources, while maintaining a small side business as a Certified Massage Therapist and attending births as a Certified Doula, primarily within the volunteer program of San Francisco General Hospital with low-income women and families.
She has more than 20 years of experience working as a psychotherapist in private practice with individuals, couples, and groups, specializing in relationships outside of traditional monogamy and common relational paradigms, including open relationships, polyamory, consensual power dynamics, platonic parenting, mixed-orientation marriages, and cross-cultural relationships. In recent years, she has also been developing her expertise in issues specific to transgender clients.
Sheffa has 25+ years of experience in facilitating group process, particularly in therapy groups, women's spirituality circles, and expressive movement groups, including groups for infertility grief and growth, and circles centered on Judaism, paganism, and pantheic study.
Sheffa completed 2.5 years of training in trauma work with the Somatic Experiencing® Institute and continues to engage in trainings in polyvagal theory, complex PTSD, and regulation strategies.
Sheffa is committed to doing her own work around being a white person benefiting from white supremacy in this country. She strives to continually challenge herself to examine and dismantle the structures that oppress and endanger BIPOC.
She is a professional member of MAPS (Multipdisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies) and is experienced in helping clients with psychedelic integration. She cannot currently lead guided experiences with entheogens or empathogens, nor can she acquire such medicine for clients.
Sheffa is the co-founder and co-facilitator of the Triangle Poly- and Kink- Friendly Therapist group, which offers education, social networking, and a referral network for licensed therapists.
In her free time, she is involved in Southeast Regional Burns and is organizing Sanctuary for the Bliss Boogie Festival. She is an advocate for dance and yoga as forms of healing and maintains a regular personal practice of both.
Sheffa identifies as a queer, pansexual, cis-gendered, kinky woman. She is a relationship anarchist and a sex geek. She is also the mother of an amazing 17-year old human. She brings a wide range of personal and professional life experiences to her work as a therapist. Sheffa prefers the pronoun "she/her" for herself and encourages you to self-identify in whatever ways work for you.
Specialties
non-monogamy and polyamory
gender exploration and transitioning
GLBTIQQA issues
sexual exploration and discovery
somatic psychotherapy
trauma
self-assertiveness
parenting
divorce and conscious uncoupling
grief
InterviewS
Listen to Sheffa’s podcast interview with Kitty Chambliss on Loving Without Boundaries:
Loving Without Boundaries podcast interview
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