Dr. Patrice Wolters has been a licensed psychologist for over twenty five years, specializing in relationship therapy. She received her B.A. and M.A. from the University of Minnesota. After earning her Ph.D. from the University of Oregon, she became licensed as a psychologist in California. Dr. Wolters currently practices in Campbell California, where she treats adults, couples, children and teens. Her second specialty is in the early identification and treatment of mental health issues in young people. A third major area of interest in writing mental health lyrics to promote resiliency, therapeutic thinking and identify the red flags for mental health challenges. Dr. Wolters is a member of the California Psychological Association, and the Santa Clara Psychological Association.
Experience
Early in her career, Dr. Wolters taught preschoolers and worked with families at the Martin Luther King Center in St. Paul, Minnesota. She later consulted to Head Start centers in Oregon and California, also teaching educational psychology at the University of Minnesota and child development at the University of Oregon. While training at the nationally recognized Oregon Center for Social Learning, Dr. Wolters learned a model to help parents successfully manage behavioral problems with their children.
Dr. Wolters developed her ability to connect with young people with a variety of experiences, driven by her interests in the performing arts and athletics. She worked as a sports psychologist to football players, has taught Salsa lessons to teens, and made radio presentations on depression and the holiday blues syndrome. In 2000, she did contract work for Stanford University developing a program for teenage mothers, with the goal of helping young mothers to develop secure attachments with their infants, and to develop support networks.
In 2012 Dr. Wolters became an associate at The Couples Institute in Menlo Park, CA. and enjoys helping couples develop healthy relationships. She enjoys teaching effective communication skills, intimacy skills, and conflict resolutions skills. Dr. Wolters work with couples from a wide variety of ethnic groups and uses an active goal oriented approach.
Music and Mental Health
With a strong commitment to the early detection of mental health challenges in young people, Dr. Wolters began working on the Music and Mental Health Initiative in 2006. The M+MH initiative is an innovative project where appealing young artists perform mental health lyrics to music from several different genres. A major goal is to use music to gradually change the landscape of mental health. Dr. Wolters writes mental health lyrics and has Library of Congress copyrights on over 25 songs.
“My interest in writing lyrics in a rhyming format was really a progression that began with my work with juveniles placed by the courts in residential treatment facilities,” she says, “they taught me about their lives through their hip hop music.”
This interest in music was further sparked by her active involvement in ballroom dancing for years, where she performed to a fusion of Latin and hip hop. Her love for writing lyrics in a rhyming format also evolved out of her personal use of journaling and poetry as forms of self-expression.
“The young people I’ve worked with since 2004 motivated me to write about their life struggle in hip hop verse as this was the music they loved,” says Dr. Wolters, “I just found myself making up verses as we worked together and it made the therapy progress.”
“I think my love for writing lyrics grew out of my desire to provide positive coping tools for young people and from a natural desire to express myself. It also came from having natural rhythm, love of music and dance and enjoying classical, jazz, Latin, rhythm and blues, hip hop, among many other types of music.”
Dr. Wolters was primarily raised in Minnesota, living in Chicago for about one year. Growing up in a musical family, she was exposed to all types of music from an early age. She loved hearing her mother sing, and she took piano for several years, receiving high scores in national piano auditions. Encouraged by her family, Dr. Wolters has traveled throughout most of Europe, Guatemala, British Columbia, and many parts of the U.S. She graduated with honors, and has a deep love for learning. Early on, Dr. Wolters was active in such sports as tennis, river rafting, skiing and basketball. Her natural athleticism keeps her active in weight-lifting, various forms of aerobic exercise, yoga, dancing and recently Chi-gong. She is a strong advocate of living a healthy lifestyle and exercising and has developed a program to help people make exercise a life long habit. Extensive clinical experience with mental health disorders and years training with masters in her field provides the solid foundation for Dr. Wolters’ mental health lyrics. A synthesis of natural rhythm, a deep passion for self-expression and a commitment to master her clinical skills make her mental health songs “educational, empowering and entertaining.” She delivers her mental health lyrics with a unique flow and depth from her life-journey.