by Susie Rome | Apr 4, 2026 | Article, Depression and Anxiety
Self-Worth Without the Conditions: Learning to Value Yourself Beyond Achievement In communities where achievement is a primary language of value, a particular kind of suffering is very common and very rarely named. It is the suffering of people who have done...
by Susie Rome | Mar 21, 2026 | Article, Family Therapy, Relationships
Blended Families and the Work of Building Something New Together Blended families are among the most complex family systems there are, and yet they are often formed with the expectation that love and goodwill alone will smooth the transition. The couple has found each...
by Susie Rome | Mar 14, 2026 | Addiction Counseling, Article
Addiction Is Not a Character Flaw: Understanding the Roots of Compulsive Behavior If you or someone you love is struggling with addiction, one of the most damaging things the culture surrounding that struggle will tell you is that it is a failure of willpower or moral...
by Susie Rome | Mar 7, 2026 | Article, Depression and Anxiety
Grief Without a Timeline: How Therapy Helps When Loss Refuses to Follow the Rules Grief does not move in the tidy, sequential stages that our cultural shorthand suggests it should. It loops. It resurfaces without warning, sometimes years after a loss, triggered by...
by Susie Rome | Feb 21, 2026 | Adolescent Therapy, Article
What Teenagers Need Most: A Therapist’s Perspective on Adolescent Mental Health in Calabasas Adolescence is one of the most demanding developmental passages a human being moves through. In the span of a few years, a young person is simultaneously navigating the...
by Susie Rome | Feb 14, 2026 | Article, Couples Therapy, Relationships
Love Is a Practice: Building a Relationship That Grows Stronger Over Time We absorb a particular story about love from the culture we grow up in: that it is primarily a feeling, something that either exists or does not, something that arrives unbidden and, if we are...
by Susie Rome | Feb 7, 2026 | Article, Relationships, Trauma Therapy
Attachment and Trauma: How Early Wounds Shape the Way We Love as Adults There is a question that comes up, directly or indirectly, in nearly every therapy I conduct: why do I keep repeating the same patterns in my closest relationships? Why do I find myself attracted...
by Susie Rome | Jan 24, 2026 | Article, Depression and Anxiety
Depression and the Question of Meaning: Finding Your Way Back to a Life That Matters One of the quieter faces of depression is the one that looks, from the outside, like someone who has everything and is still not okay. High-functioning, professionally accomplished,...
by Susie Rome | Jan 17, 2026 | Article, Couples Therapy, Relationships
The Art of Being Heard: What Good Communication Actually Requires in a Relationship Most couples who come to my office in Calabasas or Hidden Hills will tell me, somewhere in the first session, that their problem is communication. They are not wrong. But when we begin...
by Susie Rome | Jan 10, 2026 | Article, Depression and Anxiety, Relationships
Anxiety in Relationships: Why the People We Love Most Can Trigger Our Greatest Fear It is one of the more puzzling experiences in human life: the people we are closest to, the ones we have chosen to build our lives with, often have the greatest power to unsettle us. A...
