Annalise Castro
Art & Trauma Therapist
Annalise Castro, MAATC, is an Art and Trauma Therapist at Resilience who prioritizes safety, empowerment, consistency, and collaboration for/with survivors. Annalise believes that every person she encounters is unique and deserves specially tailored, quality care that best suits their needs and respects that they are the expert of their own lives. Annalise values collaboration between client and therapist in order to meet these needs and ensure that clients have a meaningful therapy experience as they actively take part of guiding the treatment they receive. She supports her clients in navigating self-disclosure, self-awareness, and intentionality in order to explore what it can look like to process traumatic experiences together. Annalise follows a non-judgmental and options-based framework in order to uplift personal strengths, find deeper understanding, expand new perspectives, and see possibility for change. Annalise uses mindfulness, somatic, relational-cultural, and person-centered approaches in therapy to provide psychoeducation, reflective listening, art therapy techniques, containment, and affirming care to her clients.
Experience
Annalise has experience from a variety of art-based, advocacy, and clinical sites including community-based art groups, group art therapy in intensive outpatient and inpatient psychiatric settings, as well as individual counseling outpatient services. Annalise has worked with adult populations including survivors of sexual and domestic violence, veterans, adult with disabilities, and adults living with mental illness and dual diagnosis.
In addition to counseling services, Annalise is also passionate about community event planning to promote awareness on social issues and is involved with training other professionals and the public on issues pertaining to sexual violence, suicidality, harm reduction, and art-based intervention. Annalise’s visual art practice is grounded in painting, ceramics, fibers, and text-based mixed media to explore expressive modalities of storytelling.
Approaches to Counseling
- Expressive Art Therapy Continuum
- Person-Centered Therapy
- Dialectical-Behavioral Therapy (DBT)
- Relational-Cultural Therapy
- Narrative Therapy
- Experiential Therapy
- Emotionally Focused Therapy
- LGBTQ+ affirming
Specialized Training
- 40-Hour Sexual Assault Crisis Intervention Training
- 40-Hour Domestic Violence Advocacy Training
- Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
- Mental Health First Aid
- Art Therapy
Education & Credentials
Master of Arts, Art Therapy and Counseling | School of the Art Institute of Chicago
Bachelor of Arts, Psychology BA and Studio Art BA, Human Relations, Social Work | University of Iowa