The Empowerment Wheel: Helping Clients Heal from Relationship Abuse

Intimate partner violence leaves long-term effects. Survivors often struggle with issues of safety, self-esteem, and trusting their own ability to make healthy decisions and enter future relationships. This revolutionary treatment method uses art therapy to guide individuals through a journey of self-exploration, helping them to re-discover their confidence and grow beyond their experiences.

Each sector of the Empowerment Wheel is supported by a creative project designed to help individuals examine their experience of red flags, boundaries, locus of control, relationship authenticity, self-talk, and integrated self. With this method, clients will learn to recognise the echoes of relationship abuse and begin to rebuild their self-esteem and individual sense of empowerment.

Grounded in the authors' extensive experience in the field of trauma and recovery, the Empowerment Wheel provides a measured, client-directed way to guide survivors of intimate partner violence through the healing process to build a healthy, empowered future.


About the Author

Dr. Astra B. Czerny is a licensed counselor (LCMHC-NC & LPC-PA) and a National Certified Counselor (NCC). She maintains a small private practice for clients and a supervision and consultation practice with clinicians. Dr. Czerny is an associate professor at Lenoir Rhyne University in Hickory, NC, where she is the clinical coordinator and the developer of the Trauma Certificate program. Dr. Czerny is an active presenter at both state and national conferences. Her areas of interest include healing from trauma and empowerment.

Dr. Rachel Brandoff is a Registered, Board-Certified Art Therapist (ATR-BC) and credentialed supervisor (ATCS). She is an Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Art Therapy Concentration in the Community and Trauma Counseling program at Thomas Jefferson University. Dr. Brandoff maintains a clinical practice specializing with individuals who are coming out of crises and coping with trauma. She provides supervision and consultation to art therapists and professional counselors. Dr. Brandoff has served on the boards of various professional organizations and is a regular presenter at regional and national conferences. Her first book, Quick and Creative Art Projects for Creative Therapists with (Very) Limited Budgets, was published in 2019.