Pamela Gagnon da Silva, LCPC: "We truly believe in the principles that guide our work."

Pamela Gagnon da Silva, Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor(LCPC), serves as NextStep’s staff clinician and offers individual and group psychotherapy to survivors of domestic. Pam also provides education about the intersections of mental health and domestic violence and offers consultation to staff and other mental health professionals in the community. Pam, who has worked at NextStep since 2013,  entered into the helping field in 1987 focusing her career on institutional change, equality, and resiliency. She is the 2015 recipient of the John D. Burchard Award for her contributions to the field, and for her work with teenagers seeking to end dating violence. 

Pam is passionate about institutional and systems advocacy as a vehicle for social change.  Her work at NextStep allows for opportunities to be in involved in big picture thinking and planning. “What I love about working at NextStep is that we truly believe in the principles that guide our work.  We honor and benefit from one another’s unique skills and expertise while working together toward the common goal of eradicating domestic violence. We are able to respectfully challenge and guide one another; appreciating that we are all skilled advocates with a valued and important role to play.”

In 2015, after becoming licensed as a clinician in the State of Maine, Pam designed and piloted a clinical professional counseling program at NextStep to address an unmet need for people without the financial and community resources to access DV sensitive psychotherapy services.  This program is unique in that clinical counseling services are provided in-house at NextStep, while typically domestic violence resource centers in Maine refer people to clinicians in the community that are knowledgeable about domestic violence.  

“We all deserve to be treated with dignity, and to be seen from a strengths-based perspective.  When we encounter domestic violence, we are too commonly seen as weak or damaged by our loved ones, community, and the professionals that we seek support from. This can create a lot of shame. When we lose the opportunity to decide how we want to be defined in relation to our experience, this limits what we might achieve.”

The most common reason people come to NextStep for psychotherapy is to work with a clinician who is educated about the impact of domestic violence. People find it helpful to have counseling, advocacy, and legal services under one roof.  Many of the people using this service are not able to access psychotherapy because they cannot afford their co-pays or spend downs, or they have lost their health insurance.  Some people are not safely able to access their health insurance without the offending partner’s knowledge. 

“At NextStep I provide approximately 750 hours of  psychotherapy per year to adults of all genders and orientations who may not otherwise have access to counseling services.  We give priority to people who do not have the financial resources to access psychotherapy elsewhere. We believe everyone should have the opportunity to receive support and opportunities for personal growth.”

“As a feminist therapist, I strive to bring as much equality to the counseling relationship as possible, by sharing responsibility for and collaborating on the direction we take, by promoting informed choices, and by honoring the unique voice of each person I work with.  In return I also learn about myself through the process of helping others.  This is interdependence, the foundation that makes living in community successful.”

Pam is also proud of her contributions as an educator and peer consultant.  She recently had the opportunity to collaborate on the standardized domestic abuse training curriculum for Maine mental health providers along with other professionals from various disciplines, brought together by MCEDV to meet the 2020 mandate requiring mental health professionals to be trained in domestic abuse competencies.  She and Education and Prevention Advocate Cheyenne Bauman-Robinson now co-facilitate this two-day course bi-annually in Hancock and Washington Counties.

As part of her role as a NextStep educator, Pam also facilitates the course Intimate Partner Violence Dynamics and Coordinated Community Response as an adjunct professor at College of the Atlantic (COA). “It has become a popular class I believe because of the transformative nature of the coursework.” Pam said. “Once our eyes are open to patterns of power and control, we begin to see the role we play through those patterns.  In this way the topic is challenging and so very hopeful because we are learning about tangible ways that we can effect positive change.”

Executive Director Dorathy Martel affirmed Pam’s work at COA. “Pam goes above and beyond both for the class and for each and every student. She is academics and advocacy all rolled into one! The connections she has with her students is extraordinary, and then they take the connections back home with them, sometimes to countries far away. Her course is incredibly valuable.”

The course has been so well received that COA has invited Pam to offer another course.  This spring Pam will offer Introduction to Feminist Therapy: Practices and Principles, highlighting the model used in the clinical counseling program at NextStep.

“I appreciate knowing that my work has value, and that there are things that I do every day that help to make our world a safer and kinder place.”

In addition to her work at NextStep, Pam is mother to two children. She is a wife, a daughter, a sister, and friend; she is an avid outdoors person, animal lover, and artist.  She has a passion for reading and learning new things.