Welcome to your Raleigh, Cary, and Apex-area mental health blog!

An introduction:

I am Mary Anne Etheridge, a licensed psychologist with offices in Raleigh, NC and Cary, NC. I provide counseling as well as psychological assessment and evaluation for children, adolescents, and adults.

As a therapist, I take a targeted, solution focus. Solution-focused therapy is a type of psychotherapy that aims to start working toward solutions to your problems right away in the therapy relationship. We will spend the early part of our sessions identifying the problem areas in your life: defining the problem and discussing how it has affected your life in negative ways. What makes my approach different than "traditional" psychotherapy is that we begin working toward your goals very early on. Change begins to happen with the very first session. We now know that therapy does not need to go on for many months or years to bring about relief and positive changes. Healing the hurt and righting the ship of your life can happen in less time than you may think! Despite being solution-focused, I take the time to get to know you and help you get to know yourself better. We will work through your hurt feelings or difficult situation as a team.

In addition to providing counseling, I also conduct psychological evaluations and assessment. I can test you or your child to determine the presence of a mental illness like Bipolar Disorder, Panic Disorder, Schizophrenia, or Major Depressive Disorder. Other common disorders I test for are ADHD (Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder), Autism, Asperger's Disorder, and personality disorders. I offer psychoeducational testing, which includes testing for learning disabilities, intelligence or IQ, giftedness, kindergarten readiness, early entrance to kindergarten, and academic achievement (grade-level functioning). Because mental health is important for a good outcome to certain surgeries, I assess people's mental functioning prior to undergoing procedures such as cosmetic surgery or bariatric (gastric bypass) surgery. Finally, I provide forensic assessment for individuals who have a psychological issue related to some aspect of the law or court system.

My aim for this blog is to write about various mental health topics in the hope that readers will be able to apply the information to their own lives or the lives of someone they love. Please feel free to visit my practice website, www.etheridgepsychology.com and I welcome emails regarding my blog posts or if you wish to make an appointment. I look forward to hearing from you!