Dear AEDP community,
As Cici’s two primary supervisors, it’s our deep pleasure to announce that Cici Kinsman, a licensed therapist practicing in California, is now certified as an AEDP therapist. I (Jenn) had the pleasure to get to know Cici and witness her attuned and skillful work through the certification process. I’m going to begin this announcement by letting you get to know Cici through her AEDP journey– in her own words. Cici writes:
“I’m thrilled and a bit in awe that this day has come. I’m grateful to Jenn Edlin for her tremendous supervisory skill and generosity, and her stealth way of helping melt self-doubt. I’m also grateful to Ilene Yasemsky for seeing me and helping me get over the finish line with her playful warmth and steady confidence in my work.
“AEDP, and Diana, made an indelible imprint on me when I heard her present while I was in graduate school. I was blown away and felt an immediate sense of resonance, a clear “yes!” My worries that I was going to have to make some big change in my personality in order to become an adequately reserved and detached therapist melted away—Diana laid out so clearly how the opposite was true.
“As I pursued post-graduate training in relational and psychodynamic therapy, I always kept AEDP in my sights as a beacon of what “relational” really felt like. I attended Immersion in 2014 in New York City, at the once-regal Pennsylvania Hotel, where I felt welcomed and at home with others drawn to the model. I had found my people.
“Over the years of training, my work became more grounded in AEDP practice, though I hadn’t yet committed to the certification process. In early 2024, I decided to finally make the ascent.
“Immersing myself in individual and group supervision has profoundly deepened my work with clients. Being met with steadiness, curiosity, and relational support has helped me feel more confident and less alone as a therapist (and a human). In the background, there’s been a quiet but huge impact on my own growth, healing, and my ability to trust myself.
“I’m deeply grateful for AEDP as a living and evolving model, and for the teachers, mentors, colleagues, and supervisors without whose accompaniment and support I would have stayed at the bottom of the mountain—at the gift shop.
“This journey has led me to a “this is me” truth sense—a State Four experience of myself as both a person and a therapist, and I’m full of excitement for what comes next.”
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Cici’s first reviewer wrote the following of her work:
CiCi’s work was brave. What struck me most was her presence and steadfast capacity
to connect deeply to her patients – giving them an experience of secure attachment at
the level each needed. CiCi was skillfull when doing intra-parts work, really helping her patient connect and stay with young and wounded parts…. In particular, her use of self to undo aloneness and privilege emergence was notable.
The second reviewer added: The therapist is deeply tuned in and ready to provide what is needed…. The deep attunement was present in a way that was not theoretical but extremely honest.
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Cici struck us both as someone who has made AEDP their own. From the moment I (Jenn) saw her work her undoing of aloneness and use of self stood out to me. She allows AEDP to flow through her in her unique way that makes me want to find the best in myself and embody that even more (and I think calls this forth in her clients as well).
Cici shows a remarkable ability to meet clients where they are and then disarm their defenses. Using curiosity, her self and attuned pacing, she slows clients down into an experience. Her energy, genuine interest in her clients and her care for them shines through. I’m so delighted for our community that her skill and heart get to now be known more broadly.
I (Ilene) had the pleasure of being Cici’s second certification supervisor. Her tapes were beautiful, deep, and real. What I love most about Cici, in addition to all of what has already been said, is how she would discover something new each time she watched her certification tapes or reviewed her annotated transcripts. And, with each new discovery, observation, or question, I felt the aliveness in her relationships with her clients, with herself, and with AEDP. If you watched her tapes, you too would feel this aliveness in her very-present presence, in the genuine care that comes through in her face and her words, and in her obvious devotion to truly helping. It is very AEDP to always see or feel something else, to imagine other ways of being or intervening, to stay open to all corners of transformance—when I think of Cici, I think of how well she represents this heart of AEDP. I celebrate her certification with much joy and applause.
Should you wish to congratulate Cici, please write to her at cicikinsmanmft@gmail.com.
With warmth and excitement,
Jenn and Ilene
Cici Kinsman’s directory listing- here