My Bio

Russell Wilkie, MA, LMFT

Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist

Cell (408) 529-1975

Fax (408) 871-6875

700 Gale Drive
Suite 230
Campbell CA 95008

Office is in the San Jose California area

Biographical sketches (Bio's) tend to be boring, so I'm being original here and, hopefully, not boring. I was born and raised in CanYouAffordItia (California) where I did most of my training and growth, including 8 years of personal therapy looking at me; a few of those years were 2 sessions a week. I moved to New Mexico after completion of #9 below.

1. I started in this field quite young. I was frequently counseling others, be it the poor guy that was teased at school (who I made friends with), or later, my friends who broke up with a girlfriend.
Lesson: Listening is powerful medicine.

2. I tried working with Kindergarteners and first graders in daycare while I was working on my AA college degree. That was too chaotic and I didn't last long doing it.
Lesson: Daycare providers don't get paid nearly enough for what they do (teachers also).

3. I connected up with a "Big Brother" program called Operation Getting It Together and spent a year being a mentor and friend to a 9-year old. He lived in the poorest and most violent situation I've ever seen.
Lesson: When you think things are bad, there's always someone who has it worse.

4. Not having enough chaos, I decided to intern at an inpatient psychiatric facility for 2 years in Sonoma County at Oakcrest. I saw everything from psychosis to suicide. I even saved a woman from taking her own life one evening just before midnight. I learned firsthand about psychotropic medication and its benefits and side effects.
Lesson: Is saving a life always the right thing? She had tried more than 20 times to end hers.

5. Not having enough, I spent another year with the same population, only this time it was outpatient across the street. I also worked with sex-offenders at that point too and it sent me toward writing my Master's thesis about sex-offender treatment.
Lesson: People can fully recover after being in the psychiatric unit. In spite of all of the issues around it, there must be therapists willing to work with sex offenders.

6. Realizing I also needed to know about this thing called chemical dependency/addiction/recovery; I worked in outpatient substance abuse treatment for a few years at Sonoma County Alcohol Services.
Lesson: The twelve-step program developed in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) works really well for a lot of people. There is a twelve-step program of recovery from almost everything at this point, not just alcohol. It gives people a sense of "Identity, Purpose and Direction" (thanks Fred Moore).

7. Back to children, only this time as a family therapist in an elementary school in Petaluma California for 2 years. Lesson: Family therapy can often be more effective than individual therapy. It can really hurt a child to label them as the problem, when the problem is systemic in the family (that was how Systemic Family Therapy was created).

8. Wrapping up my Master's degree in Marriage Family and Child Counseling, I decided to try therapy in a private practice setting as an intern and that was very empowering.
Lesson: Private practice can be very isolating. Those that do it would do well to be part of a consultation/support group with other therapists.

9. Since I moved to San Rafael, I went to work at the famous Ross Hospital (it's actually in Kentfield, next to Ross. Go figure...). There I learned everything you would never want to know about urine drug screening. My clients were mostly physicians and nurses who had taken medication from the work place to fund their addiction. I became licensed as a Marriage Family and Counselor (MFCC) while there. Cutbacks in the substance abuse field began, so I decided to cash out and move to New Mexico.
Lesson: Spending 12 years getting licensed in California and then leaving the state might not be the smartest career move...

10. I spent some time on sabbatical in New Mexico where I learned to chop wood and live in snow and be. For work, I:
-started my private practice again (New Mexico created licensing for therapist).
-ran domestic violence groups for the Town of Taos.
-coordinated an AA college degree program in Human Services and taught many courses at the University of New Mexico from Family Process to Field Placement Supervision.
-worked for the Eight Northern Indian Pueblo Council (ENIPC) providing domestic violence treatment and stress management for police officers (they doubled as SWAT team members and saw a lot).
Lesson: I was doing good work as a therapist and my practice grew quickly because I was taking care of myself. Self-care is important if a therapist is going to be able to provide quality service.

11. I was homesick, so back to California, this time working for the famous St. Helena Hospital in a partial psychiatric hospitalization program. Our team scored a perfect 100% on a JCAHO site review.
Lesson: I am a detail-oriented person.

12. Next was managing a 12-bed residential living facility for individuals with brain injury. It was both fulfilling and difficult because I wasn't seeing change. I see myself as a change-agent.
Lesson: For therapists, working with those that can't change is too difficult.

13. I finally landed and spent almost 4 years doing one thing! I was the Counseling Department Director for the Indian Health Center of Santa Clara Valley (IHC) in San Jose, where I was blessed with the greatest staff.
Lesson: I am meant to be in private practice and speak and write and take good care of myself.

14. So my last move was to build my therapy practice and personal coaching practice and write. To do that, I needed to go part-time with the IHC. So I moved over to Director of Development and Projects, where I wrote grants and handled detail oriented work to further support the IHC.
Lesson: Wait long enough and you will find your calling. Focus hard enough and it will happen sooner rather than later.

15. Stopped working at the IHC and am now in private practice full-time.

16. Served as President of the Board of the Santa Clara Valley Chapter of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (SCV-CAMFT) for 2 years. During 2008, I will serve as the Past President.

17. In 2006, I began supporting the Couples Institute by serving as an associate, continuing the work of Drs Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson, directors of The Couples Institute. They are recognized worldwide for their pioneering work in couples therapy. I am honored to be working with them.

18. Reading, writing, growing...