professional biography

See Susan’s brief bio (80 words) at the end

Susan Anderson is a psychotherapist who has devoted over 30 years of clinical experience and research to working with the victims of abandonment trauma, grief, and loss. Best Selling author of Journey from Abandonment to Healing, she is also the author of The Abandonment Recovery Workbook, Taming your Outer Child, and The Black Swan: 12 Lessons of Abandonment Recovery. She is founder of the Abandonment Recovery movement, a worldwide program called Akeru that offers techniques and workshops to help people heal their abandonment wounds past and present, overcome their self-defeating “Outer Child” patterns, and find greater life and love.

Her books are translated into German, Japanese, French, Chinese, Turkish, Russian, Spanish, Korean, and sold internationally. Her website reaches out to abandonment survivors, clinicians, and everyday people throughout the world to promote individual and group support.

Through extensive clinical research, group work, and scientific study, she has developed a treatment protocol specific to overcoming the impact of abandonment trauma in adults and children.

Anderson has been collecting anecdotal research data on abandonment trauma and its aftermath of self-sabotaging patterns through submissions to her website, as well as through her workshops and clinical practice.  This compilation of data began in 1999 and is ongoing.  It forms the basis of her subsequent publications (written and recorded). 

She defines five universal stages of grief specific to abandonment – Shattering, Withdrawal, Internalizing, Rage, and Lifting (SWIRL) – which are based on scientific findings related to the psychobiology of separation and attachment.

Through her books, workshops and seminars, recordings, and media appearances, she shares her own experiences with abandonment, grief, and recovery, speaking passionately from personal and professional experience.

Anderson has spent over 15 years working with children, compiling anecdotal data on the impact of primal abandonment scenarios large and small within their everyday lives – ranging from losing a pet or being “new kid on the block” to child abuse or death of a parent. An experienced group therapist, workshop leader, and educator, she developed a parenting education program to increase community awareness about issues affecting children and to strengthen family bonds. This award winning program won an annual $300,000 Federal grant to be replicated throughout the New York State.

She runs Abandonment Recovery programs for lay audiences and training courses for professionals, and makes appearances at universities, conferences, institutes of personal empowerment (including Esalen, Kripalu, and NY Open Center), national radio and television, online summits, and Zoom workshops to increase public awareness and provide support for the far reaching issues stemming from abandonment, including “Shame: the Defining Factor of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of Abandonment” and “Techniques for Overcoming Deeply Entrenched Patterns of Self Sabotage – Abandonment Post Trauma’s Legacy”. She speaks on the related topics of Outer Child, how to increase self-esteem and heal shame, relationship remedy, child abuse, heartbreak, divorce recovery, Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD), bereavement, parenting, addiction, and race – the ultimate human abandonment.

Anderson’s work has appeared in national publications including Oprah’s magazine “O”, People Magazine, Grazia, Psychology Today, Publisher’s Weekly, Women’s Review of Books, Fit, Parents Magazine. She has appeared on ABC and CBS national news programs, God Squad, and other television programs.  

Some of the other experiences converging in Anderson’s work include post graduate training in systemic family therapy, psychoanalytic psychotherapy, addictions counseling (CSAC 1997), and bereavement. She has worked extensively in psychiatric hospitals treating the gamut of diagnostic categories associated with abandonment triggers including addiction, schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder, borderline personality disorder, conduct disorder, anorexia/bulimia, and substance abuse. She has been active in community group work developing clinical programs within agency and day treatment settings; conducting psycho-educational workshops within school systems; providing group supervision to agencies; and providing social work internships for Adelphi University Graduate Social Work Program. Ms. Anderson’s journal article entitled “Peer Model of Adult Education,” published by Jossey-Bass, Spring 1999, shares her expertise as a group therapist and workshop leader.

In addition to her national tours to promote abandonment recovery, she continues in private practice.

brief bio
(78 words)

Susan Anderson psychotherapist is an expert on how to overcome abandonment and its aftermath of self-sabotaging patterns.  Author of four books including the best selling Journey from Abandonment to Healing, The Abandonment Recovery Workbook, and Taming Your Outer Child, she reaches out through her websites, workshops, and media to share her methods of abandonment recovery with victims of abandonment trauma, heartbreak, and loss around the world.  Her groundbreaking program is the product of over thirty years of research and clinical practice.