Athena Phillips
LCSW, Founder, ITTC, Board Vice President, ITTI
My Bio
My career in behavioral health began in 1995, where I began working with developmentally disabled children and adults. My faith in human capacity and resilience is rooted in this experience; the people I was hired to serve were my teachers. The foundation of ITTC’s current approach to therapy was developed in what they taught me, which is essentially to approach work with people from the assumption of capacity, inherent goodness, and strength. Working with this population prompted me to pursue my Bachelors degree in Social Work, which I completed at Pacific University. I graduated here Magna Cum Laude and was Social Work Student of the Year in 2000. During my internship at the Sexual Assault Resource Center, I helped develop a sexual assault prevention curriculum for children to be utilized within the school system. My interest in the treatment of trauma began to develop here and prompted me to pursue my graduate degree. I completed my Masters in Social Work from Portland State University where I was the recipient of the Laurels Scholarship and graduated Magna Cum Laude.
After working in the field of social work in various capacities including private practice, the demand for a progressive view to working with post-traumatic stress, dissociative identity disorder and related mental health challenges prompted the creation of Integrative Trauma Treatment Center (ITTC). It is our goal to provide a place where people know that their experiences will be acknowledged, that high-quality care will be provided from a progressive standpoint, and that each type of trauma will be addressed in a focused way. It is the goal of our organization to provide integrative & specialized care, training, and research in a multicultural context on a global scale.
Presenter, Attachment & Trauma Congress, Rome, Italy, Fall 2023
Presenter, Global Exchange Conference, Orlando, Florida, Fall 2023
Presenter, Course Creator, Trauma Coach Certification Course, The Orenda Project 2022
Presenter, Developer, & Trainer, Multicultural Trauma Training, Kigali, Rwanda
Presenter 2012 International Study for Trauma & Dissociation Conference
Presenter, World Health Care Student Symposium, 2017, Kigali, Rwanda
Presenter, Multicultural Trauma Training, 2016, 2017, 2018, University of Rwanda, Kigali, Rwanda
Presenter Cedar Hills Hospital Working with Dissociative Disorders & Trauma & the Body
My Focus
Athena is the founder and helps to support our clinicians and student interns – she is unable to take direct clients.
- Global mental health
- Child through elder adults
- Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID/otherwise known as multiple personality disorder)/Trauma & Dissociation
- Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PSTD)
- Professional Consultation for DID & PSTD
- Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence, Political/Organizational Violence
- Vicarious Trauma
- First Responders
- Mental health professionals
- Medical professionals
- Anxiety, Depression, & addiction secondary to trauma
My Training & Approaches
- Certified EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing)
- Certified CISD (Critical Incident Stress Debriefing)
- Dr. David Burns, “Scared Stiff” Cognitive Behavior Therapy for Anxiety
- Internal Family Systems (IFS) Level I & II
- Attendee, Onno Van Der Hart, Structural Dissociation of the Personality, Boston, 2017
- Attendee of International Study for Trauma & Dissociation Conference, 2011, 2013, 2014
- EMDR & Working with Children, Ana Gomez, LPC