CLINICAL EXPERIENCE

Colleen began her career with American Indian urban and reservation treatment centers in 1995. She has lived on American Indian reservations designing culturally appropriate alcohol and domestic violence therapeutic materials. She was a court advocate for ICWA, the Indian Child Welfare Act.

As a clinician, she was the first Clinical Director of the CAST program in Santa Monica. Kelly has also consulted with Jean Campbell, MFT at the Action Institute of California, in working with corporate clients to facilitate team building, strategic planning, crisis intervention, and role training workshops. She worked at Mt Sinai Hospital in NYC as a member of STAR Sinai Teen Aids Resources, providing education to teens and college students across the US.

Kelly opened a group practice with Dr. Reza Nabavi in Santa Monica CA in 2007. This group grew to be Resolutions Therapeutic Services where she was a therapist for 5 years. Nabavi and Kelly also owned a women’s sober living in Santa Monica CA for years together.

As an educator, she was adjunct faculty at Pepperdine University and Antioch University teaching substance abuse courses. She has published dozens of articles and online content on addiction in addition to Continuing Education Courses over the years for MFTs and LCSWs.

As an Independent Behavioral Health Care Contractor, she began working with Jeri Davis International, a health care recruitment and consulting firm in DC, and Gregory Consulting providing direct sales to treatment centers and medical providers, strategic planning, promotional events, and advertising.

In Europe, she provides clinical supervision for Connections in Recovery and runs aftercare groups for CATCH Recovery in London and Castle Craig Hospital, Edinburgh. She has been a keynote speaker in Europe on Trangenerational Grief in the Irish, American Indian, and Palestinian Communities at conferences in Paris, Edinburgh, London, Dublin, Stockholm, Rome, Amsterdam, Iceland, Dubai and Turkey. She lectures on Attachment Family Therapy techniques at treatment centers across the USA and most recently at Castle Craig Hospital in Scotland and Smarmore Clinic in Ireland and at iCAAD conferences across Europe.

She also recently joined Dr. Steve Dansiger as the European representative for MET(T)A Protocol, Mindfulness & EMDR Treatment Template for Agencies in association with Droplabs wearable technology who are now part of a 3 to 5 year incubator program with the Dundalk Institute of Technology in Ireland collaborating on outcome studies, technology applications, manufacturing capacities, and employment projections with DkIT.

As a human rights advocate and therapist she works with Palestinian, Syrian, and North African refugees doing asylum interviews and advocating for civil rights and services. She was a Southern Californian Ambassador for UNRWA (the United Nations Relief Works Agency). She is a member of the Syrian Medical Association providing therapy to refugees and debriefing relief workers in Syria and Lebanon. In 2015, she set up an exchange working with MDs in Los Angeles delivering expired medications that could be used in dire situations, suture kits, and quick clot kits to hospitals in Syria.