Sally Verstraete, LMSW
Master’s Level Clinical Social Worker
Sally is a licensed clinical social worker, who enjoys working with adults who need support during a variety of life stressors. She understands how challenging it can be to trust someone new, so she does her best to earn your trust by being honest, consistent, following through, and prioritizing what you want to get out of therapy. Once that trust is earned, she enjoys the privilege of joining you in exploring your values, identity, habits that work and ones that don’t, skills to manage stressful situations, and responses that help you live a more manageable and enjoyable life. Clients say she is calming, honest, respectful, supportive, and encouraging. She helps people with adjustment to changes in life, anxiety, depression, stress, perinatal mood and anxiety disorders, relinquishment and adoption issues, relationship difficulties, and grief. She values discovering the “Why” and shifting the focus to the questions of “How”, “When”, and “What” to help people move toward what is important to them.
Working with individuals who are adopted is especially close to Sally’s heart because she was adopted at age 5 from Seoul, Korea. She presented on panels and individually at Bethany Christian Services, Korean American Adoptee Adoptive Family Network (KAAN), China Culture Club, Families for International Children (FFIC), Calvin Theological Seminary, Pine Rest’s CPE classes for pastors, Adoption Family Support Network (AFSN), and church groups to help educate and walk alongside adoptees, adoption workers, adoptive parents, pastors, foster parents, friends, and family as they learn to understand and work through the 7 Core Issues of Adoption (Deborah N. Silverstein and Sharon Kaplan, 1982). Since she is transracailly adopted, she also understands the challenges of being racially Asian and culturally white, so enjoys helping other transracial adoptees sort through the layers of their identities and belonging.
She graduated with her Master’s in Social Work from Western Michigan University. Her clinical background includes working with adults at Pine Rest in various areas, such as Spruce Lodge, Mother Baby and Adult Partial Programs, and at the Pine Rest Northeast Clinic as an outpatient therapist for individuals and groups. She was also Executive Director of Ramoth House, an emergency shelter for abused women and children.
Issues
- Depression
- Anxiety
- 7 Core Issues of Adoption
- Issues related to being Transracially adopted
- Perinatal Mood Disorders (Postpartum Depression and Anxiety)
- Loss and Grief
- Relationship issues
- Life Stressors
- Life Transitions
- Peer Relationships
- Racial Identity
- Coping Skills
- Trauma
- Self Esteem
- Codependency
Modalities
- Individual Therapy
- Group Therapy
Contact Sally Verstraete
Call Grand Rapids Therapy Group at (616) 591-9000, or send a message.