Dear AEDP community,
On behalf of Jerry Lamagna and myself, it is not only our pleasure but also our honor to share with you the news that Nichola aka “Nicky” Cameron is now a certified AEDP therapist.
Nicky’s path to certification involved individual supervision with both Jerry and myself, as well as a year of the Vision Collective+ Core Training, that core training group co-led by Karen Pando-Mars and me.
. Nicky is a splendid clinician, with unwavering commitment to being the best that she can be so that she can help her patients as much as possible. She learned and made AEDP her own, allowing her to use not only AEDP skills but also integrate her other skills She came to AEDP with a knowledge and competence in other trauma-focused modalities, and yet with a sense that something in AEDP drew her to think that this might be her home model. Among many other things, AEDP gave her a foundation for using her feelings of deep love and care for her patients in the process of their therapeutic healing, her being able to be authentic –in a fashion sanctioned by the model– lending greater power to her interventions. Her AEDP work, especially with Black and Afro-Caribbean clients, demonstrates the power of AEDP to not only heal developmental trauma but also to contribute to the healing of racialized trauma.
Nicky Cameron has already been a guest presenter at both Jerry’s and my Immersion courses, and at a couple of different ES1 modules taught by Karen. She has shown brilliant work and received rave reviews from the participants.
Here is Jerry on his experience of working with Nicky as her supervisor:
“I have had the pleasure of knowing and working with Nicky Cameron since February of 2021. From the first moments I met her, I sensed an authenticity, humility, intelligence, sensitivity and intuitive understanding of what it was to be a healer. Though she was very new to AEDP at the time, I appreciated right away her depth of knowledge in other models and her emphatic drive to learn and grow — transformance on steroids!
It is with great pride that I offer these observations knowing the persistent effort Nicky has undertaken in pursuit of AEDP certification. She brings her own unique view/style to the model, rendering it with a particular kind of warmth, good humor, love and approachability that speaks to her Jamaican heritage. It has been a privilege to be a part of her growth in learning AEDP and helping her integrate its metapsychology and methods into her already rich and varied clinical toolbox.
When I think about Nicky Cameron achieving this level of professional commendation and acknowledgment of her growth and skillfulness in AEDP, I hear Lizzo’s voice singing in my head — “It’s about damn time!”
Congratulations Nicky on your achievement. I’m really proud of you!”
I concur with Jerry and Lizzo: “It’s about damn time!”
The reviewers of her clinical work, submitted as part of her certification packet, were impressed. Here are some of the comments of Reviewer #1:
“Wow what a pleasure to review Nicky’s material. As her patient puts it : “It was nothing short of magic”. Watching her tapes felt like witnessing a professional musician. Her rhythm, tempo, tone, cadence, prosody and the accompanying energy and somatic expression were incredibly attuned, precise and impactful. The spaciousness between the ‘notes’ was equally powerful and seamlessly inviting the next beat. Both patients felt safely held and invited to be courageous in exploring and meeting their core self
Nicky’s sessions show a profound embodiment of the AEDP model. Her very strong presence, deep care and transparent authenticity were of great impactnot just on the clients but on me as well. She is able to work with a slow pace inviting the clients implicitly to slow down. Her consistent checking and asking for their permission with deep humility and respect allowed her clients to feel agents in their own exploration. She is synthetic in her words and seems to consistently choose them well with an organic confidence, ease and flow.
She is able to attune to the clients’ experience in state one and invites their somatic experience to be part of the exploration. She uses instinctively her own body to give rhythm, affirm and express delight, care and resonance allowing anxiety to subside and defenses to give way. She is both creating vast space for exploration and tighter presence and direct work with breath and somatic experience as the patients exit their window of tolerance. This fluid movement betweenspaciousness and tight presence is very attuned and carefully tracking moment to moment her clients’ experience. Her work with state 3 and 4 states were also spacious, relationally explicit and using skillful and precise metaprocessing to allow deepening as well as integration of the work done in the session and the entire course of therapy allowing new narratives to emerge in both clients. While processing state 4 in the second tape Nicky’s body naturally enters a subtle wave-like dance as she receives her client’s experience. This organic, bottom-up deep communication of synchronicity and recognition was beautiful to watch and is of great impact on the client.”
And some of the comments of Reviewer #2:
” My personal experience in reviewing Nicky’s tapes was that it was a pleasure and a learning experience for me. I often feel so fortunate as to review the work of other clinicians and have the ability to learn from them while doing the review. I felt this in a very strong way reviewing Nicky’s work. Nicky has a tremendous presence and even on the screen she exudes a sense of calm capacity and solid strength. She has a glow about her which affected my sense of ease and confidence in her ability to handle whatever she came upon in a very positive way. Nicky’s skills are well displayed in her work. She demonstrates real command of the model while making it feel like she is barely working at all. (Her one client comments on this in a sweet way). Nicky is a transformance detective and fosters glimmers when she comes upon them.
She is respectful, affirming and acknowledges the patients’ work and their budding new sense of self. She carefully tracks her patients and is curious and open, respectful with all of her explorations. She makes good use of somatic interventions and invitations to bypass defenses and invites the client into their experience. Her use of intentional language is also in evidence phrasing questions so they will be answered from experience and not just thoughts.
Nicky does persistent, slow and explicit relational work with her patient who has an avoidant attachment style and who has not felt accompanied and understood before and you can see and hear the way in which Nicky weaves together their relationship.
With Nicky’s client who has a disorganized attachment style and has been subjected to severe abuse we witness the true transformed version of her. She and Nicky are preparing to end treatment and witnessing the explicit growth and change of this person with Nicky is palpable. The explicit relational work again is deeply seen and felt. We see them both delighting in each other and the work they have done.”
Having listened to others extoll Nicky’s AEDP talents and skills, here is Nicky in her own voice, her account of “My AEDP Journey:”
“I am Nicky Cameron, a deeply relational and intuitive therapist who blends science with soul to help individuals heal from trauma.
Through my journey of learning and practicing AEDP, I have experienced profound personal and professional transformation. From the moment I attended my first AEDP seminar four years ago, I knew I had found a modality that not only aligned with my clinical values but also resonated deeply with myessence as a human being. AEDP has affirmed my natural inclination to be relational, curious, nurturing, and fully present with my clients. It has given me permission to bring my whole self into the therapeutic space—embracing my authenticity while fostering deep, healing connections.
Integrating AEDP into my work has allowed me to serve my community—predominantly African Americans and Afro-Caribbean clients—through a lens that honors their lived experiences, validates their cultural narratives, and co-creates safety in a profoundly humanizing way. It has become a vehicle for healingracialize and religious trauma, and other deeply embedded wounds, while also facilitating my own parallel journey of growth. In this work, healing happens reciprocally; as my clients transform, I too am transformed.
What I love most about AEDP is its ability to integrate seamlessly with other trauma- focused modalities that I have long valued—Somatic Experiencing, Brainspotting, EMDR, and EFT Tapping. These approaches complement each other, allowing me to meet my clients exactly where they are, using a holistic framework that honors both mind and body. Through AEDP, I have come to embody a therapeutic stance that places humanity first and professionalism second,where healing is not just about technique but about being present, engaged, and accountable in the shared journey of transformation.
I am deeply grateful to have found this modality that allows me to do this work with both my heart and science—offering not only effective interventions but also love, and profound spiritual, and relational healing.”
Nicky’s personal goals, as we just read, that center on working to heal racial trauma especially in Black and Afro-Caribbean populations, deeply align with the values and goals of the AEDP Institute to work to detail how AEDP can be used to heal racialized trauma. And to learn from the leadership of BIPOC AEDP clinicians in developing this work. Nicky’s certification as an AEDP certified therapist is not only a recognition of all her past work and accomplishments that have led to this point, but a heralding of things to come; I know that we will continue to see great work and contributions from Nicky in this realm and that she will be, as she has already been, instrumental in growing this work, which, in this day and age, is more important than ever.
Please join Jerry and myself in congratulating Nicky Cameron on this important achievement and on looking forward to the next steps in Nicky’s AEDP journey. If you would also like to share with her your personal congratulations, then please do so backchannel at ncameron@dare2emerge.com
with pride and joy,
diana
