The Therapeutic Triad of Disability (Part 1) – Forgiveness, Self-Compassion, and Resilience with Susan Stuntzner and Angela MacDonald

About this Episode:

The first installment of a two-part conversation with Susan Stuntzner and Angela MacDonald on the intersections of disability and forgiveness, self-compassion, and resilience, barriers to these practices, and how we can work with our clients to cultivate each of these.

About Susan:

Dr. Susan Stuntzner PhD, LPC, LMHP, CRC, NCC, DCC, is the Director of Disability Services and Student Retention at Southwestern Oregon Community College. She works with students and faculty to coordinate academic accommodations, counsels students with and without disabilities, and collaborates with high schools to assist with student transition. She is also a part-time lecturer for the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.

Dr. Stuntzner’s research interests include: adaptation and coping with disability, resiliency, self-compassion and compassion, forgiveness and spirituality, development of intervention techniques and strategies, and mentorship of professionals with disabilities. She has written three books pertaining to coping and adaptation and/or resilience-based skills. Her works are entitled, Living with a Disability: Finding Peace Amidst the Storm, Reflections from the Past: Life Lessons for Better Living, and Resiliency and Coping: The Family After. She has also developed two interventions (i.e., resilience, forgiveness) for persons with disabilities to assist them in their coping process. These works are entitled, “Stuntzner and Hartley’s Life Enhancement Intervention: Developing Resiliency Skills Following Disability” and “Stuntzner’s Forgiveness Intervention: Learning to Forgive Yourself and Others.” Both of these have been approved as a self-study course for CEUs by NBCC [National Board of Certified Counselors]. More recently, she was asked by the Commission on Rehabilitation Counselor Certification to develop an on-line resilience course to educate counselors about resilience and its relevance to persons with disabilities and the rehabilitation counseling process. Information about this course can be found at https://www.crccertification.com/resilience-disability. You can see Susan’s full CV here.

You can contact Susan at susan.stuntzner@socc.edu

About Angela:

Angela MacDonald M.Ed, LPC, CRC, MHCP, CDP-T is a clinician for Frontier Behavioral Health in Spokane, WA. She also is in private practice in Post Falls, ID through Kootenai Counseling Center.  In her spare time Angela is also part of the Board of Directors for the Spokane Center for Independent Living and is a voting member of the Idaho Independent Living Counsel. Her passion in forgiveness, resiliency, and compassion research started in her graduate studies at the University of Idaho, there she had the opportunity to work with her professor on research pertaining to resiliency and coping. Currently she is actively using both the resiliency and the forgiveness interventions in her full time employment through Frontier Behavioral Health and hopes to be able to gather further research on these topics going forward in the future.

You can contact Angela at macd1816@alumni.uidaho.edu

Links and References:

Susan’s website, Therapeutic Healing – https://therapeutic-healing-disability.com

Susan’s CV

Related Books:

Books written by Susan:

• Reflections from the Past: Life Lessons for Better Living
• Resiliency and Coping with Disability: The Family After

Recommended reading on forgiveness:

• Enright, R. D. (2001). Forgiveness is a choice. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Enright, R. D., & North, J. (1998). Exploring forgiveness. Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press.

Recommended reading on self-compassion:

• Germer, C. (2009). The mindful path to self-compassion: Freeing yourself from destructive thoughts and emotions. The Guilford Press.
• Neff, K. (2011). Self-compassion: Stop beating yourself up and leave your insecurities behind. Harper Collins Publishing. American Association of Integrative Medicine, August Issue.

Recommended reading on resilience:

• Horn, Dana (2013). “Chronic Resilience: 10 Sanity-saving strategies for women coping with the stress of illness.”

The APA Citation for this Episode:

Shook, M. (Producer). (2018, February 17). The Therapeutic Triad of Disability: Forgiveness, Self-Compassion, and Resilience with Susan Stuntzner and Angela MacDonald (Part 1) [Audio Podcast]. The Thoughtful Counselor. Retrieved from https://wp.me/p7R6fn-lj

Thanks to the Following:

Photo by Daniel Hjalmarsson on Unsplash