Nicole Pickering, Psy.D. (PSY26487)
Dr. Pickering is the founder and director of CBT Treament Center, and has been helping people find wellness through therapy since 2007. She sees patients of all ages, with a specialty in children with anxiety, OCD, trichotillomania, depression, and trauma.
After earning a BA in Psychology from Lee University in Tennessee, she moved back to California to get her MA and Psy.D. from the Rosemead School of Psychology at Biola University. After working at the acclaimed Harbor UCLA-Medical Center and UC Davis Medical Center, she worked on a seminal Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) study with DBT founder, Marsha Linehan. These experiences led her to work with children and adults alike to overcome their problems and lead healthier, happier lives, with a therapeutic approach that is informed by research and experience.
Dr. Pickering is also a well-respected teacher and speaker, helping other therapists acquire skills that they can apply to their practice. She is a www.trich.org certified provider for trichotillomania, and an active member of the Los Angeles County Psychological Association (LACPA) and San Gabriel Valley Psychological Association (SGVPA).
She is a huge dog lover, spending as much time as she can with her all-too-spoiled and lovable friends, Charlie and Peanut. Her guilty pleasures include: going to the beach at any and every time of the day, shopping at Office Depot for pens, Amazon Prime, and binge watching TV shows like Breaking Bad, House of Cards, True Detective, & geeking out to any documentary that Netflix allows.
The Story of the Crane
The crane in our logo is representative of a wonderful lady named Dr. Beth Brokaw, who was a mentor to Dr. Pickering. In 1999, Beth was diagnosed with cancer, which had already metastasized in her bones. She was only 44, with a husband and two young children that she very much wanted to see grow up. She was determined to defeat the cancer, and sat on her porch, looking for a sign of hope. A crane landed nearby (and she had never seen a crane from her porch prior to that day), and stared at her intently, before flying away. She continued to pray for a sign of hope, and the crane flew back, and eyed her yet again, before flying away. After this happened a third time, she took it as the sign she was looking for, and cranes became an important symbol of the battle that she was about to face.
Against all odds, and against all doctors predictions, Beth went on to live another 14 years with the metastasized cancer, before leaving to “drink heavenly wine”, as she would say, in 2013. In those 14 years, she was able to touch the lives of countless future therapists, including Dr. Pickering, and got to see her children grow up, which was all she wanted.
Beth was a deeply caring individual, who had the incredible ability to make everyone that she spoke to feel like they were the only other person in the world. She had hundreds of “best friends”. The forward-flying crane is a way of saying that we plan to carry on her legacy of kindness, compassion, and healing.