Behavioral Health at Wildwood Clinic

At Wildwood, we understand that your mental health is as vital as your physical well-being.  While brief feelings of worry or sadness are a normal part of the human experience, there can be times where these feelings become overwhelming, difficult to manage, and begin to interfere with our daily lives.  There can be several reasons for this, including work, school, or family stress, life transitions, past trauma, health crises, underlying illnesses, and genetic factors.  It is also well known that conditions such as anxiety and depression can make your physical health suffer as well.

Wildwood’s Behavioral Health Specialists work with you regularly to manage your overall mental health.  They use a number of therapeutic techniques to help you identify the cause of your stresses and help you learn strategies to get you back on the path to wellness again.  No one’s situations are exactly the same and our Specialists use an individualized approach with each patient.  If medication is required, they are able to collaborate with your Wildwood Primary Care Provider for a comprehensive approach or recommend you for more expert consultation if needed.

The decision to seek treatment for stress, anxiety, or other mental health conditions can be a difficult one.  No one should suffer in silence.  Don’t be afraid to take the first step and contact Wildwood today.

 


Our Behavioral Health Therapists:

Natalie Pitroski, MS, LPC, CSAC

For the past 10 years, I have worked as a licensed mental health provider treating people of all ages.  I have experience working in private practice, college mental health, outpatient substance abuse treatment and primary care.  I am really excited to join Wildwood and work closely with family practice providers because it provides patients with collaborative care that treats the whole person.   As a therapist, I often use Motivational Interviewing (MI), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) approaches but above all, I believe connection and collaboration between therapist and client are the keys to successful therapy.  Therapy is not a one size fits all approach, it must be tailored to each person’s unique needs.  I really enjoy getting to know people, understanding their struggles and exploring what they need in order to make meaningful changes in their lives.

  • Professional Areas of Interest:  Anxiety, depression, life transitions, substance abuse, LGBTQ issues, adolescents and young adults
  • School:
    • UW-Whitewater, MS, Counseling
    • UW-Madison, BS, Human Development & Family Studies
  • Personal Interests: Tennis, being outdoors, traveling, arts & crafts, reading and spending time with family and friends.

 

Kris Nilsson, MSW, LCSW, CSAC

Your emotional wellbeing is an important aspect of your overall health. Therapy offers a space to create what we find to be healing.  We may be looking to resolve a concern, build motivation for change, develop skills to cope with stressors, exploring broader patterns of behavior that have come to be ineffective in our lives, or increase our awareness and understanding of self to develop a sense of wholeness and live our lives more authentically.  Our work together can be brief or it can be a longer term relationship. I have worked with worked with teens, adults, couples, and families with various concerns including depression/anxiety, postpartum emotional wellness, trauma and complex trauma, grief/loss, relationship issues, family stress, LGBTQ concerns, women’s issues, affected family members, substance abuse issues and ongoing recovery needs, and life transitional issues. Twenty years of experience has helped me to cultivate an approach that is holistic in nature and brings together different theories and skill sets to meet your specific needs including interpersonal, family systems, cognitive behavioral, mindfulness meditation, motivational enhancement, insight orientated theories, and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR).

  • Areas of Interest:  Postpartum emotional wellness, life transitional issues, trauma and complex trauma, grief/loss, relationship issues, family stress, LGBTQ concerns, women’s issues, affected family members, and ongoing recovery needs.
  • School:
    • UW-Madison, MSW, Social Work
    • UW-Superior, BSW  Social Work
  • Personal Interests:  Hanging out with my kids, going on adventures, traveling, cultural events, hiking, being outside, gardening, and I’m learning to sew