Dr. Sandra Georgescu is a twice immigrant - she moved from Romania to Montreal, Canada at the age of 10 and then to the Chicago, IL for graduate school. As a result, she speaks three languages (none of them perfectly), has learned to leap, and stay, and live with purpose and integrity, in various contexts - personally and professionally. Learning to live and living to learn with what she has been afforded has been her life motto.

Professional Development/Training

  • Cognitive Processing Therapy for PTSD - Provider Status

  • University of Nevada Reno - Sabbaticant in the Department of Clinical Psychology

    • Sabbaticant in Dr. Steve Hayes (ACT), Alan Fruzzetti (DBT) and William Follette’s (FAP) labs and/or clinical supervision groups

  • ACBS Peer reviewed trainer

Formal Education/Training

  • Doctor of Psychology (Psy.D.) - Illinois School of Professional Psychology - Argosy University, Chicago, IL (APA Accredited)

  • Graduate Diploma in Adult education- Concordia University, Montreal, Canada

  • Bachelor of Arts- Concordia University, Montreal, Canada

    • Major in Psychology

    • Minor in Political Science

 

 With over 20 years of professional experience and formal training in the fields of education and clinical psychology,  Dr. G. is the founder, trainer & licensed clinical psychologist for the Contextual CBT Center.

Dr. G began her career working in a shelter for women who were victims of domestic violence in Montreal, Canada. Through these years, she realized that the models used were overwhelmingly ineffective in helping women bring any kind of meaningful change into their and their children's lives. This inspired her to seek out a graduate training that would deepen her understanding of the contextual, emotional, and behavioral difficulties many of them faced.  She also sought to learn about technologies that would foster real-life, concrete change in an accepting yet empowering way.

Having bumped into Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) - the gold-standard treatment for individuals who struggle with emotional dysregulation - she finally found an approach that balanced awareness and mindfulness/acceptance processes alongside active behavioral change. Her subsequent 5 years of DBT practice naturally led to the discovery of Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT), which became a home base for her clinical and academic work. The contextual behavioral framework of these two approaches, set the context for in depth functional analysis during the assessment phase that is followed by the development of a process based treatment plan. One can expect that therapy will expertly incorporate all the relevant technologies that behaviorism has to offer (acceptance, mindfulness, exposure/response prevention, skills training, telephone coaching, contingency management etc) to help and support clients in their chosen pursuits.

After 8 years of full time academia and a move across the country, Dr. G’s emphasis has shifted entirely to clinical practice and expanded her repertoire to include CPT for PTSD. Following the evidence base, this treatment focuses on treating the meaning that the brain creates of traumatic events and the hoops it jumps through to prevent further injury. As such, focusing on “here/now as a result of then/there” seemed like a natural choice given the exceptional outcomes in resolving PTSD and associated problems in other related areas. Adding CBT as a general treatment option for individuals who prefer a more cognitive lens seemed like a natural extension.

Her past professional work as a Chair and member of multiple committees inside the Association for Contextual Behavioral Sciences (ACBS) contribute to the well rounded, flexible expert that you will be working with. Her penchant for proper contextualized work and the cultural sensitivity that fosters stand out in this domain. Some of her interests include burnout, women’s issues, diversity work and gate-keeping to the profession. She is also a regular trainer for various organizations and inter/national conferences and has written a few articles/chapters on various topics in the Contextual CBT area.

Select Publications :

Georgescu, S. & Hayes, S. C. (2019). Burnout: Psychological flexibility and work related stress / Burnout: Uma abordagem de treinamento de aceitação e compromisso para estresse relacionado ao trabalho. Chapter in A. Vaz de Carvalho (Eds), The burnout syndrome: Critical review and interventions / Terapia cognitivo-comportamental na síndrome de burnout: Contextualização e intervenções (pp. 270-302). Novo Hamburgo, Brazil: Sinopsys.

Georgescu, S. & Brock, M. (2016). A Contextual Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy Approach toClinical Professional Training: Inside the Classroom. In Block-Lerner, J. & Cardaciotto, L-A. The Mindfulness informed educator: Building Acceptance and Psychological Flexibility in Higher Education, Routledge. (p. 59-77).

Georgescu, S., Bolduc, M-F & Holmes, E.P. (2010). La Thérapie Comportementale Dialectique (Tcd): Mouvement Vers L’acceptation Intégrale Des Expériences Privées (Dialectical Behavior Therapy: Moving towards full acceptance of private events). Revue québécoise de psychologie, 31(3), 105-126

Holmes, P., Georgescu, S., Liles, W. (2006). Further Delineating the Applicability of Acceptance andChange to Private responses: the Example of Dialectical Behavior Therapy. The Behavior Analyst Today, 7(3), 301-324.

Select Presentations:

Georgescu, S. (2017, February). Self-Care in graduate school: An Intro ACT Experiential Workshop. Workshop given for the Clinical Psychology Department first year studens of The Chicago School of Professional Psychology at Xavier University, NOLA. 

Georgescu, S & Farhadi-Langroudi, K. (2017). ACT for Migrants: Fostering Resilience in New Waters. Webinar presented for the ACBS Student SIG.

Georgescu, S. (2016, December). Two day Intro ACT Experiential Workshop. CE workshop presented for the ACBS Chicago Chapter, IL.

Sawyer, M, Georgescu, S. & Brock, M. (2016). ACT against professional burnout. CE Workshop presented at the ACBS Annual World Conference 14, Seattle, WA.

Zurita One, P. & Georgescu, S. Mission impossible: From troubled teens to thriving Families. CE Workshop presented at the ACBS Annual World Conference 14, Seattle, WA.

Holmes, E. P. & Georgescu, S. (2016). DBT in the light of the Psychological Flexibility Model: Increasing flexibility as means of developing a meaningful life. CE Workshop presented at the ACBS Annual World Conference 14, Seattle, WA.

Georgescu, S. (2016, March). Introduction to Acceptance & Commitment Therapy. Presentation given to the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee Counseling Students Organization. Milwaukee, WI.

Georgescu, S. (2016, April). Mindfulness & Acceptance for Clinicians. CE presentation given at Allendale for Kinds, Lake Villa, IL.

Niolon, R. & Georgescu, S. (July, 2015). ACT, willingness and the ethics of informed consent. Presentation at the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS) World Conference 13, Berlin, Germany.