Works with:
Adults
Teens
Children
LANGUAGES: English
EDUCATION:
Bank Street College, MA. in Early Childhood Leadership
University of Minnesota, Master of Social Work
Mt. Holyoke college, BA in English
POST-GRADUATE TRAINING:
Dual program in Family Therapy at The Ackerman Institute.
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) Trauma Institute and Child Trauma Institute, Parts 1 & 2, in progress.
AEDP - Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy , Level 1
Grief Work: Finding Balance and Nurturing Resilience, Center for Complicated Grief at Columbia University
DBT, Experiential CBT & CBT for Couples & CBT for Self Esteem at PESI
Ordination, Psycohtherapy & Interspiritual Counseling Certificate, One Spirit Interfaith Seminary & Spiritually Informed Therapies at PSI
Bibliotherapy at NASW
Wendy Jo Cole, LMSW, MSEd.
Play and community are central to Wendy Jo’s approach. Her attuned, caring style along with playful energy invites clients to engage social-emotional challenges with lightness and acceptance - an antidote to an often harsh, heavy world. Through companioning, co-regulating, listening, encouraging, celebrating - she merges her intuitive, creative and spiritual side with skill, technique and “bookwisdom”, inviting a real balance between gentle invitation, astute leadership and a supportive exploration.
In Wendy’s therapy room, everything is “talk-about-able” - sex, death, shame. She aims to make room for the widest range of experiences and emotions within the therapeutic relationship. She is deeply committed to meeting clients where they are, accepting who they are and expertly encouraging them to become their best selves.
As we heal and grow, we are shaped and reshaped by our relationships. Our stories evolve. We make fresh connections between what’s been hard in the past, who we are in the present and what is possible in future.
With multiple graduate degrees and decades of experience as an educational leader, interfaith counselor and child development expert - she is committed to co-creating just and joyful culture in families and organizations. Prior to becoming a therapist, she has spent two decades as the Director of the Maple Street School in Brooklyn and is also an inter-spiritual minister, counselor and supervisor at One Spirit Interfaith Seminary. Recent clinical training includes completion of the dual program at the Ackerman Institute, Circle of Security parenting mentorship, EMDR with adults and children and AEDP attachment therapy for adults.
Wendy Jo holds deep respect for parents, for our felt sense of our own children and the love fueling our longing to give kids exactly what they need at every moment. The reality is that parenting is complex, full of never-ending demands. She holds space for us to be perfectly imperfect - individually and together. Holding tight during those tough moments she helps kids, teens and parents hang in there. She aims co-create a sacred space for feelings, knowing that hurt or helplessness is often so intense because, as parents, we care so deeply.
In her work with teens and children, she builds awareness of pressures to be what the world needs kids to be, to be polished, attentive and flexible, when inside they might feel fragile, confused, trying so hard, but unsure how to be themselves. She embraces the messy confluence of real emotions, real reactions. The only way to get to a better space is to work through it over time.
Outside of the therapy room, Wendy Jo is a writer, artist, community builder and play revolutionary. She believes kinship extends beyond the nuclear family and spends her free time loving up her expansive LGBTQIA, multi-racial, neurodiverse, inter-generational blended family.
Specialties
Relationship issues and social anxiety
Life transitions and phase of life stress
Trauma, complex trauma & intergenerational trauma
Neurodivergence
Spirituality and faith-based concerns
Family systems, couples therapy
Parenting challenges, child development, attachment & play therapy
LGBTQIA+
Blended families, alternative couples & kinship, multi-racial families and parenting trans kids.