• About Jackie Castro
• Counseling Services
  • Individual
  • Marriage
  • Group Therapy
• Mood Disorders
  • Bipolar
  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • Grief
• Sexual Issues
  • Alternative Sexuality
  • Sexual Fetishes
  • Sex Addiction
  • Porn Addiction
• Articles By Jackie
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Heartbroken? Depression? Anxiety?
I am an experienced psychotherapist who believes in setting goals and achieving results. I am compassionate, dedicated and confident in my ability to help. My methods work.

My areas of expertise include: relationship issues, depression, bipolar, post
traumatic stress (PTSD), adults who were abused as children and grief / loss
issues. I draw from various modalities including psycho-dynamic, cognitive
behavioral, humanistic, gestalt end existential.

Sexual Fetishes and Issues?
I do a considerable amount of counseling dealing with sexuality, alternative
sexual lifestyles, sexual fetishes, transgender identity, sexual addiction and pornography addiction. Unlike other therapists who preach abstinence, I help my clients to manage their sexual issues in a healthy and life-sustaining way.

Affordable and Effective Therapy
My office is conveniently located in Granada Hills just off the 405 freeway. Along with counseling clients in Granada Hills, I also see people from Northridge, Woodland Hills and other parts of the San Fernando Valley. While I have a full roster of therapy clients, I do see new people and my rates are very reasonable.

818-377-4484

11/20/11 - Are You An Adult Who Was Abused As A Child?
How were you treated growing up? Did you have a parent or adult who physically hurt you, called you names or sexually molested you? Many adults vividly remember some awful things about their childhood while others dismiss these memories. They say 'oh it was in the past; No big deal'.

There is no such thing as being abused 'a little' or abused a lot. When it comes to abuse, we can't compare or contrast. The important thing to remember is that the way you were treated growing up has a profound effect on the way you approach your life as an adult.

Those of us who were abused as children, carry strong feelings of depression, low self-esteem and low self worth. Abuse is a very powerful negative message. As children, we needed to make sense over the fact that the adults in our lives were hurting us. Why would someone beat me? Why would someone call me names or embarrass me by touching my privates? The child brain needs to understand the violation. As a result, the child comes to a conclusion that they are bad or wrong and probably deserve the horrible treatment.

This idea becomes internalized and generates into a destructive self-defeating belief. The adult who was abused as a child, may then end up continuing to hurt themselves as an adult. They feel they are bad and do not deserve to be happy. Likewise, other people who were abused as children internalize the message differently. They are resentful towards their abusers and want to align themselves with the people they conceive as being powerful. As a result, these children grow into adults who are vigilante, mistrustful and anger easily. Unfortunately, many continue the cycle of abuse and are unkind to their spouses and siblings.

Therapy is important in order to overcome long imbedded depression, out of control anger and a feeling of worthlessness. People who keep their memories to themselves are often still thinking with their childlike brains. It's essential for you to have compassion for your inner child and understand that whatever happened to you would have happened to anyone who was born into that circumstance. Likewise, it's also just as important to come to the realization that right now, as an adult, you have ability to live a good life. You don't have to be the victim of circumstance. You have the ability to think differently and be the good human being you were meant to be.

9/29/11 - Do You Cut or Burn?
It's very human to do whatever it takes to try to ease the pain we all feel from time to time. When we are deeply depressed or extremely anxious,we often cope by developing behaviors that give us immediate relief. We do whatever it takes to give us control when we feel out of control emotionally. Unfortunately some of these behaviors are detrimental to our well being. Food, drugs and alcohol are common choices since these substances reliably make us feel good. However, some people choose to hurt themselves. To an outsider, that makes no sense. Why inflict pain when a person is all ready in pain. Yet, to the person who engages in cutting or burning it makes complete sense. Physical pain is way more tolerable than emotional pain. Plus, it's a great distraction.

Cutting and burning are very similar to OCD compulsions. All of these behaviors are utilized as a coping mechanism. Instead of focusing on the problem at hand or dealing with inner turmoil, pain or panic, one learns to become attached to some kind of behavior that becomes all pervasive. The problem then becomes the behavior and we forget about the deeper, more complex emotional pain.

If you cut or burn remember that you are doing this as a way to ease the pain. Also be mindful that even though you think you are feeling better, you really aren't. You are feeling different. Not better. That's true for all the things we do in an attempt to self medicate. Even the behaviors that are seemingly healthy can also turn dangerous. Strict diets, heavy exercise and reading are OK as long as they don't rule your life. It's important to always deal with the core issues.

Cutting and burning are dangerous behaviors. These acts can lead to unwarranted accidents and fatalities. If you cut or burn, I know you are probably keeping your behaviors a secret but it's important to talk to someone you trust. A few sessions with a caring, qualified therapist are in order. I deal with cutting, anxiety, depression a great deal in my comfortable, safe Granada Hills office.

9/8/11 - Are You A Perfectionist?
Did you know that your perfectionist beliefs can lead to feelings of sadness and depression? When we believe that "I have to do it absolutely right or it's not worth doing" we set ourselves up to be unhappy.

Many people find themselves in therapy because they are unhappy or depressed. At the root of their depression is a feeling of being worthless. That's because they believe they never do anything right. As a result, they spend a great deal of their day having obsessive thoughts, worrying, and feeling anxious about making a decision.

Here's the truth. When you ruminate about the past and think "oh if only I had done this instead of that", you are guaranteeing that you will experience feelings of depression. If you debate or obsess about the future, you're guaranteed to feel anxiety. It's like standing at a crossroad and wandering whether you should go left or right.. In reality, either route will get you to your destination. When you sit and debate the issue you're left going nowhere. You're perfectionist desire to pick the absolute right path leaves you feeling stuck, anxious or depressed. Even though many of us are taught that perfectionism is a way to motivate, the disadvantages clearly outweigh the advantages.

8/16/11 - Is Your Brain Attacking You? The Horror Of Obsessive Thinking and Compulsive Behavior - OCD
We all have disturbing thoughts at some time or another. When we hear about an earthquake in another part of the world, we wonder when it will strike here. When we hear about someone dying of cancer, we worry that we or someone we love could also be inflicted with that disease. When we're faced with a challenge at school or at work, we fear that we will fail. All of us have obtrusive thoughts when feeling stressed out or under pressured.

Most of us have the ability to push these thoughts out of our head. Some of us just can't do it. So we worry and worry and the anxiety builds to a crescendo. That's when we suffer from severe anxiety or panic attacks.Some of us worry obsessively and imagine every minute possible out come. Some of us even engage in compulsive behavior in order to distract ourselves from the issue at hand. That's where OCD behaviors come into play. The compulsions are distracting and are used to deal with the anxiety. Though the anxiety is relieved by distraction, the compulsive behaviors often blossom into yet another thing that gets in the way of living a healthy life.

Intellectually, we know that worry gets us nowhere. I always tell my clients you have a choice: you can sit here and worry, we can strategize if appropriate or we can simply let go of the thought. Worry for the sake of worrying accomplishes nothing. We can worry about whether or not we will lose our job. Worrying in an of itself will not do anything; especially if the issue isn't job performance but a poor economy. The best and only thing that worry sometimes does is motivate us to think about alternatives if the worst should happen.

There is one large advantage to worry that is in fact crucial: worrying keeps us feeling attached to the issue. Some of us subconsciously believe that if we worry enough, we will magically accomplish something. We stay in close contact with the worry at hand and we don't let go. For example, if someone worries about breast cancer, she may remember to do self exams every month and that's a good thing. If she worries obsessively, she will be checking her breast every day and maybe even a few times a day. Soon this obsessive worrier is checking her breasts every ten minutes, she's imagining lumps that don't exist and soon this excessive checking will turn into a compulsive behavior that is interfering with life. Worrying and the ensuing compulsive behaviors that we perform to self soothe can eventually be life destroying. Just ask anyone who suffers from obsessive compulsive disorder.

Be careful when you notice your brain attacking you. Remember that your thoughts influence how you feel so be careful of your thinking. There are definitive, effective tools to deal with anxiety, panic and obsessive compulsive disorder. You don't have to suffer alone.

7/14/11 - Do You Have A Broken Heart? Dealing With Grief.
One thing is certain. We are guaranteed to lose someone or something we hold dear during the span of our lives. The complex and often conflicting feelings associated with loss are defined as grief experiences. We usually associate grief with death or divorce. In reality there are over forty recognized grief experiences.

Some of these experiences are not necessarily associated with sadness such as moving, getting a new job, graduating from college and having a baby. Yet, we often feel strange or unsettled even during these happy times. That's because grief is defined as the conflicting feelings we feel when we are faced with a change in a familiar pattern of behavior. So we'd be happy to graduate because of a major accomplishment; sad that we are moving away from our carefree student days. Happy to be moving into a new and bigger house but sad to leave our old, familiar neighborhood.

Grief is also about having a broken heart. Death is always shocking even when we think we are prepared. At the moment someone goes, we always wish we had said something more, had more time or done something different. Divorce is also extremely painful. Oftentimes divorcing a long time partner is even more difficult than dealing with death. We enter into marriage with the idea that it's forever. No matter how much we think the divorce is necessary it is still a heart wrenching event.

I am a trained Grief Recovery Specialist. Generally we don't use the terms recovery and grief in the same sentence yet this program really does help you complete the pain from all present and past loss experiences. This work will enable you to get rid of the excess baggage and pain that prohibits you from having joy in your present. The Grief Recovery Program takes about six sessions. It's a fast, effective therapy that provides positive results. Many patients say that they feel like a huge weight has been lifted off their back once they complete The Grief Recovery Program.