About Our Executive Director

Mary Ellen Bertling-Safford, MA, LPC, NCC, CAAC
EMDR Level I and II Treatment Counselor

Mary Ellen established Raybrook Counseling Group LLC to fulfill a dream of creating a place where people can "come as they are" and get the help they need. She believes that the pain and suffering we encounter along our individual paths in life can eventually lead to empowerment, self improvement and ultimately to the person our creator intended us to become. Inspired by the life and writings of Viktor Frankl during the early stages of her professional career, she found her therapeutic ‘voice’ in an approach that begins right where people are and uses life experience as an asset to be leveraged in the healing process. Mary Ellen believes that the road to wellness includes a holistic approach to treatment. She sees her role as a facilitator of your own personal discovery and empowerment. She also believes that we should not take ourselves or the context of our lives too seriously, and has seen how the power of humor can provide perspective and positive release. Each of us is an authentic work of art, shaped and molded by our experiences, both good and bad. Her treatment philosophy includes counseling each and every client as an individual, with care and without judgment, walking along side and sharing in one's pain and suffering, while providing a therapeutic encounter. She works with the biological, psychological, social and spiritual elements presented by each client and designs treatment solution sets that are clinically effective within a framework of hope.