Exploring Life & Business with Amy Tierney of Amy Tierney, LCSW – Psychotherapist and Twin Specialist

Today we’d like to introduce you to Amy Tierney.

Hi Amy, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Absolutely, I’m happy to share my story with you. I started my career as a social worker. At the time, I was in my mid-20s—very idealistic and passionate about advocating for disenfranchised populations.

I worked as a medical social worker for many years at several large teaching hospitals throughout Southern California. I jumped right in and was so enthusiastic about my work that I moved up the ladder very quickly. But I didn’t have the tools or knowledge to make the career sustainable. I had always been warned about the high burnout rate among social workers, but I never thought it would happen to me—until it did. And it was only a matter of time before I burned out and felt the need to leave the profession entirely.

Determined to get as far away from social work as possible, I decided to pursue a certification in Pilates. I had always loved Pilates—and still do today—but I quickly discovered that although I loved the practice, teaching it and making a career out of it were two very different things.

Eventually, I hit a point where I just needed a job and to get back to work, so I decided the best way to do that would be to return to social work. I wasn’t enthusiastic about going back, but I knew I needed a job, and that seemed like the most responsible thing to do.bout going back, but I knew I needed a job, and that seemed like the most responsible thing to do.

It was at this time that I decided to return to therapy to unpack and make sense of my career indecision and my resistance to returning to social work. I began working again with a therapist I had seen several years prior—someone I had come to really trust and enjoy working with. Shortly after we started working together, the thought crossed my mind: “perhaps I could be a psychotherapist and open a private practice.” This had never been on my radar or something I had aspired to or ever thought I could achieve. But I took a chance and mentioned it to my therapist one day. To my surprise, he thought it was a great idea. It was at that moment I thought: “well, if my therapist thinks I can do it, then I must be able to.”

This was a pivotal moment for me—both personally and professionally—and it really highlights the power of the therapeutic relationship. Sometimes we just need someone to believe in us before we can believe in ourselves. My therapist’s belief in my ability to be a good therapist opened the door to a career I had never even considered.

I was still reluctant but pushed through my anxiety and self-doubt and opened my private practice. Shortly after, I was introduced to a group of therapists in Orange County who practice at a very high level. I joined a relational psychotherapy consultation group led by a psychoanalyst who’s absolutely brilliant and at the forefront of the relational psychotherapy movement. This group, which I’m still very much a part of today, has been absolutely invaluable. There’s an art to practicing relationally that isn’t taught in school, and yet, in my opinion, it truly brings about the most meaningful transformations.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Absolutely not, but I don’t know any journey that is without challenges. I think the biggest challenge for me was building my practice. I thought I could just hang up a sign and people would come to me, but that wasn’t the case. I had to shift my mindset from being an employee to an entrepreneur. Instead of being ‘fed’ patients, I had to learn how to go out and ‘find’ my own patients. I had to put myself out in the world and be visible in a way I had never had to do before. It was very frustrating, and there was a lot of trial and error. But people would constantly remind me, it’s a marathon, not a race.

What I’ve come to learn is that building a practice really is all about building and maintaining relationships with quality, mutual referral sources. It doesn’t happen overnight, and I really had to learn how to be patient and persistent, even when I didn’t think my efforts were working.

Looking back, I can honestly say I’m grateful it took so much effort because I was able to develop grit. There’s something about being able to withstand a great deal of uncertainty and continue to persevere through it. And this quality transferred over to my work with my patients. As therapists, we sometimes need to sit in the unknown with our patients. There are regressions, and it’s a long process, but we never give up—we persevere, even in the midst of uncertainty.

Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Absolutely, I’d love to tell you more about my practice. I have a private psychotherapy practice in Orange County, where I provide individual therapy to adults and teenagers ages 15 and older. I primarily see patients via telehealth, and I also have an office in Orange where I see patients in person as well.

I practice a type of therapy called psychodynamic therapy. All that means is that instead of simply treating symptoms, we look under the hood—we try to understand the root cause of the symptoms in order to bring about lasting change. We all have a story, and in therapy, we get to unpack your unique story and explore how relational experiences in your childhood may have caused you to become stuck at certain relational levels. The really neat thing about working with a therapist trained in relational psychotherapy is that you get to move through these relational stages within the therapeutic relationship. That’s where the real transformations occurs.

I would say what sets me apart from other therapists is the relational piece that I bring into the therapy room. As I mentioned earlier, I’m part of a relational psychotherapy consultation group with other therapists in the community who practice at a very high level. We’re constantly looking at what’s actually going on in the relationship between the patient and therapist, because that’s where the most profound change happens. There are many different therapy techniques out there, and they all have benefits. The work I do tends to be longer-term, but we get to the root of whatever struggle you’re experiencing. Some of the behavioral and cognitive approaches are very effective at treating symptoms, but the therapy I offer takes it a step further. We definitely want to alleviate symptoms, but we also want to get to the root of them.

As far as specialties go, I work with anyone who has even the smallest desire and willingness to understand themselves better, be a student of themselves, and improve their relationships. Many of my patients seek out therapy when they’re struggling with interpersonal relationships and feel stuck in old patterns of relating that feel confined and constricted. Others begin therapy because they’re experiencing symptoms of anxiety and depression or feel like they’re stuck and unable to move forward in a certain area of life. I also work with people going through significant life transitions. and those who have experienced a loss and are having difficulty navigating the grief process.

I also have a niche specialty that is especially meaningful to me: I’m known for my work with twins, twinless twins, and parents of twins and multiple-birth children. This specialty grew from my own experience of being a twin and a twinless twin. When I was doing my own work in therapy, it occurred to me that there’s a large population of twins and families of twins that experience very unique challenges, and yet there are few therapists who specialize in working with this population. So began my journey into gaining expertise in twin dynamics and serving the twin and multiple-birth community.

Every twin relationship is unique, but twins often share similar challenges, such as issues related to competition, comparison, and identity. Sometimes there’s codependency and enmeshment in the twin relationship—some twins take on the caretaker role, while others become overly dependent on their twin. You can imagine the burden some twins feel, believing they must be responsible for their twin throughout their entire life. And you can imagine the twin who is overly dependent, never getting to experience or realize their own power.

I also work with parents of twins. It’s common for them to feel overwhelmed and exhausted, especially during the early years. Many parents I talk to share how guilty they feel about having to divide their attention between two babies—wanting to give each one their full presence but feeling stretched thin. Raising two children who are at the same developmental stage is beautiful in many ways, but it also brings its own very real and unique challenges.

I also specialize in grief work with twins who have lost their twin, either to death or estrangement. Losing a twin is literally like losing a part of yourself, and the grief process is especially difficult and painful for twins. I also work with womb twin survivors—people who started out as twins but lost their co-twin in utero due to miscarriage or stillbirth. I’m especially committed to working with this population, as there are profound implications of losing a twin prior to birth.

What matters most to you? Why?
I would say, hands down, the relationships I have with people in my life, because it’s really the relationships we have that make life worthwhile. Professionally speaking, a very wise mentor of mine once said, “Amy, you can’t take your patients further than you’ve gone yourself.” So I would say what’s most important is that I’ve done my own work in therapy and continue to do my own work, practice with the highest level of integrity and professionalism, be of maximum service to my patients, live the fullest life possible, and remember to have fun.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.amytierneylcsw.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/amytierneylcsw