About Me

 As a social worker, my practice as a psychotherapist means that I consider each client not just someone with emotional problems, but someone who has a job, a family, a neighborhood, responsibilities, struggles, hopes and dreams: all of which affect our physical and mental health.  

 My post graduate training includes but is not limited to:

 -  Post Graduate Certificate, Child & Adolescent Therapy, Fordham University

 -  Registered Play Therapist & Supervisor, Association for Play Therapy, Inc.

 -  Post Graduate Certificate, Field Instruction, Fordham University

 -  Graduate, Non-profit Leaders Program, Fordham University

 -  Traumatic Stress Studies, The Trauma Center at the Justice Resource Institute

 -  Certified EMDR Therapist, EMDR International Association

 -  EMDR Recent Traumatic Episode Protocol (R-TEP)

 -  EMDR Child Specialist, Agate Institute

- EMDR Parent-Child & Attachment Specialist, Agate Institute

 I love learning & teaching and have been honored to present educational programs at:

-        Western Connecticut State University

-        Archdiocese of New York

-        Connecticut Association for Play Therapy

-        New York Association for Play Therapy

-        Family Center of Greenwich, CT

-        Family Centers of Greenwich, Stamford, Darien and New Canaan, CT

 As Consulting Editor of the journal Social Work, I conduct editorial peer review of articles submitted for publication with a recommendation to publish or not.

 My Publications:

Tonning Louise M. (1999). Persistent and chronic neglect in the context of poverty: When parents can’t parent in Nancy Boyd Webb (Ed.) Play Therapy with Children in Crisis: A Casebook for Practitioners. Second Edition. New York: The Guilford Press.

 Van Dyk, Alison and Tonning, Louise (2002) Report From the Front Lines: Two play therapists share their crisis intervention work with pre-school through eighth grade after 9-11. East Coast Sandplay Journal, July. 33-45.