Meet Our Staff

Rachel Richardson is a Clinical Social Worker, Psychotherapist, Individual and Group Therapist at Hamm Clinic. She completed her Undergraduate Education at Wesleyan University, 1987 and her Graduate Education at University of St. Thomas/St. Catherine University MSW Program, 1993.
Rachel is involved in a variety of aspects of Hamm Clinic’s work. Primarily she sees individual clients. She also facilitates an interpersonally-focused process-oriented therapy group once a week. In addition, Rachel is one of the social work supervisors, so she provides supervision to social work interns and/or social work fellows each year. In addition, she is involved in supporting some Hamm Clinic events, both internal and external, and serves on the Events and Outreach Committee.
Theoretically, Rachel sees herself grounded in contemporary psychodynamic or relational therapy, meaning that she sees our early relationships, patterns of interaction and experiences as critical pieces of information for understanding our present-day behavior. Rachel integrates theories and therapies to serve the client best. These modalities include cognitive behavior therapy, psychodynamic therapy, mindfulness-based therapy, systems and feminist therapy.
Rachel wants to be open and available to the needs of each client, while trying to hear their needs, both implicit and explicit, and working to understand their story while having them feel her presence, interest, concern, and compassion. Rachel works to develop understanding of their history so that she can serve as a reference point for them as they try to understand their contemporary situation, its historical antecedents and the pain it is causing or creating. When it is working best, Rachel sees therapy as advancing both insight for the client and mobilizing change in their lives. Whenever either insight or behavioral change is stuck, Rachel collaborates with the client and seeks consultation to understand how the therapy needs to change.
Rachel has strong interest in mindfulness and DBT. She has done workshops in both topics over the years and uses both in her therapy work regularly. Rachel has been at Hamm since she interned here 1992-1993; she was then hired in May 1993. Rachel has also worked part time at Augsburg in their Wellness Center.

Chiara lived and practiced in Italy, Germany and Austria before coming to the United States. Therefore, she is able to provide therapy in English, German and Italian.

She studied at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milano in Italy and graduated in 2011. She continued her education through specialized courses in chronic pain psychology, forensic psychology, in addition to cognitive behavioral therapy. Chiara had the opportunity to work in hospital settings, in correctional facilities and forensic psychiatry.

In her career, she has worked with individuals and groups from various racial, social, and economic backgrounds with diverse mental health issues. Her areas of expertise are stress, anxiety, depression, personality disorders, health psychology, psychosomatic dysfunctions, trauma and anger-management.

For Chiara, the relationship with clients is the most important tool in therapy; she considers it essential to offer her clients a safe and understanding environment. Chiara believes in working WITH her clients, not only for them. With the help of the therapist, she believes that change happens when clients take control of their lives and do something good for themselves.