Serafin’s Qualifications And Experience

I’ve worked in New Zealand and Australia as a mental health clinician and family and couples therapist and for over 20 years. On top of my extensive experience and qualifications, I have also trained under world-renowned sex and relationship therapists Esther Perel and Terry Real – the only NZ-based therapist to have completed their training.

Specialities: 

• Licensed child and adolescent mental health clinician

• Sex + couple therapist

• Open relationships/polyamory

• Rainbow communities

• Complex trauma

• ASD/ ADHD / neurodiversity

• Child + family therapy

couples therapy approach based on the work of

• Esther Perel

• Terry Real

• Stan Tatkin

Qualifications: 

• Masters in International Relations & Human Rights (Masters dissertation on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child)

• Masters in Social Work

• Graduate Diploma (Psychology)

• Graduate Certificate (Psychotherapy) 

• Bachelor of Arts  

• Completion of RELATE (Sex & Power Relationship Therapy training with world-renowned therapists Esther Perel and Terry Real)

• Qualified Yoga Teacher

“Serafin was recommended to me by my sister, who had worked with her previously and found her to be very effective.  She was easy to contact, and made the appointment process stress-free – I have really appreciated the option of online sessions.  Serafin has been amazing – she is supportive, caring, and has a great sense of humour. She has a special ability to ask the right questions to prompt deep self-reflection and has helped me to address several issues I have faced recently. I would highly recommend Serafin and her services.”

Timothy – Auckland

“Serafin was recommended to us as a young, switched on, highly educated psychotherapist to help bring our relationship back on track - and that she is doing.  We both have learnt how to ‘dance again’ meaning, working with each other and not against each other.  With the expert guidance from Serafin, who has an amazing ability to see situations from both sides, we have got to know each others’ love languages and what makes us who we are.  We can’t speak highly enough of Serafin and we continue to grow and learn new skills to even better our relationship with each other and others around us.”

Michael & Sharon – Nelson

“I began seeing Serafin for issues I was having with anxiety, which was negatively impacting on my personal relationships and my studies. Through working with her I was able to identify the source of my anxiety and develop strategies to manage it. She also helped me to work through past trauma, and learn to be more comfortable and compassionate with myself. I feel like this was only possible because of the relationship and trust she built with me, through her gentle kindness and sense of humour. Overall, while beginning therapy was a daunting prospect, Serafin managed to make it seem easy by taking it one step at a time. I am so grateful to her for all her work, as she helped me get to a much happier and healthier place than I had ever been.”

Charlotte – Auckland

“I engaged Serafin to facilitate my team and I to critically consider gaps and disconnects arising from data and qualitative conversations we had undertaken of a population group we are charged with providing a prevention initiative to. From this, we would build a tactical action plan and ensure that our focus had an evidence base - especially critical to ensure our resource is applied most effectively.  We were able to do this with Serafin’s guidance as well as building trust within the Team, which at that time had been together for less than four months. I would engage Serafin again to do similar work or anything that enables a Team to become high performing. I believe that her strengths-based approach, in particular, helped to address and overcome some unhelpful perceptions the Team had of one another.”

Tracey – Christchurch