Here to Offer Help & Hope

Life’s challenges often require the guidance and knowledge of a counseling professional, who has the training and experience to help you navigate through difficult situations, recover from grief and loss, find relief from anxiety and depression, or intervene in a crisis.

Asking for help isn’t easy for most of us. But no matter the situation, having someone to walk with you can help.

My Work at Safe Passages

At Safe Passages Counseling, previously named Steffens Counseling Services, I provide general mental health and pastoral counseling for individuals as well as groups.

Much of my work is focused on serving and advocating for those wounded by relational betrayal and addiction. If you're a partner of a sex addict, you've found a safe place of hope and encouragement, where you can recover from the shame and heal from the trauma.

You’ve just taken an important healing step by reaching out for the information and support you need to restore your life.

Your Questions Answered

All of your questions may not be answered here, so I encourage you to contact me by phone or email. It will be a privilege to serve you.

- Barbara Steffens, PhD, LPCC, CCSAS

From an Email Sent to Safe Passages Counseling...

"After working with you I began to realize the importance of spouses telling our own story. It dawned on me that the prevailing theoretical concepts about spouses of sex addicts was formed from the viewpoint of addicts themselves or people committed to working with addicts, As a consequence, our story is being told to the world through words that are not our own. This makes what you do so very important. Without you and your work, spouses would continue to be viewed through the eyes of addicts and their support groups, as opposed to being shown through our own eyes and the eyes of those dedicated to our recovery."

 

High Praise from Omar Minwalla, PsyD

"Dr. Steffen's book, Your Sexually Addicted Spouse, has emerged through the disorientation of the field of sex addiction treatment and initiates the professional articulation of the clinical symptoms of sex addiction-induced trauma as experienced by partners and spouses impacted by sex addiction and compulsive sexual behavior patterns. What most people do not recognize, is that the sex addiction field is still very much invested in "educating" partners and spouses that their trauma symptoms are actually "symptoms of her own disease called co-sex addiction or co-addiction", while ignoring or minimizing the diagnosis and treatment of her trauma. This is an alarming and disturbing reality that requires serious academic, clinical and professional action. This book has become my primary text that I recommend to patients and clinicians alike for understanding the impact of sex addiction on a partner or spouse. I have seen first-hand the profound benefit a partner experiences when her internal experience is recognized and validated. Dr. Steffen's book has provided this validation for many, many women and partners of sex addicts." Omar Minwalla, PsyD