About
Who I am, what I do, and why I do it
A few things we can take as given
I’m childfree and a nonspiritual atheist. You won’t need to spend your sessions explaining why you don’t want children or wondering whether an interpretation owes something to astrology, manifestation, or a higher plan. These are useful starting points, though they tell me very little about what has brought you here or how you experience your life. That is what we get to investigate.
Hi, I’m Malka; I’m pleased to meet you
I’m a certified (neuro)psychoanalyst with a PhD in evolutionary anthropology and an MSc in psychotherapy science. I offer online psychoanalysis for nonspiritual atheists, with a particular focus on childfree adults. Our work takes place through sustained, in-depth conversation, starting with your experience and examining the unconscious processes that shape how you feel, think, and act. As these gradually become more accessible to awareness, we can begin to understand what keeps a difficulty going and work toward changing it. This takes time and usually involves returning to something you thought you’d already understood, sometimes more often than you’d like. The aim is lasting change in how you experience and live your life.
How we work together
Individual psychoanalysis takes place through regular video sessions. You speak as freely as you can, while I ask questions and offer interpretations for us to examine. We pay attention to the feelings and expectations that emerge, including those you experience in relation to our conversations. Alongside individual work, I offer ongoing analytic groups of up to eight people. Members join when a place opens.
My practice is an inclusive space
Within my practice for childfree, nonspiritual atheists, I’m LGBTQ+ affirming, kink-aware, sex-positive, weight-inclusive, and neurodivergence-informed. Your relationships and ways of living are welcome on their own terms. Sharing a worldview leaves plenty of room for differences in how we live.
You like to read the fine print?
I appreciate that. Here’s the slightly less tidy account of how I got here.
The prelude
My professional path was anything but straight. It involved changing courses and collecting degrees in fields that sometimes had very little to do with one another or with what I do today. I studied language and literature, journalism, advertising and marketing, and got certified as a personal trainer and a clinical ethologist. My work took me through education and advertising, television, HR, business development, and academic research, among other fields. Inside and outside work, I’ve moved more times than I care to count and pursued enough interests to make a short biography inconvenient.
My training and work
Psychology was something I kept returning to, so eventually I committed. I completed a BSc and an MSc in psychotherapy science, alongside a clinical qualification in psychoanalysis and neuropsychoanalytic training. I later completed a PhD in evolutionary anthropology and am currently undertaking the extended clinical training offered through the International Neuropsychoanalysis Society.
Alongside my studies, I worked in clinical practice and research, contributing to public and private projects on mental health and well-being. In private practice, I worked with people whose lives looked enviably successful and others trying to put theirs back together (sometimes the same people).
What you get from all that
That background gives me several ways to approach a question and a broad range of experience to draw on as we look for explanations that fit. I’m interested in how your patterns developed, what they accomplish for you, and why they may persist after you’ve decided you’d prefer something else. We examine our explanations against your experience and explore what happens when you try things differently.
I’ve spent years working with emotional difficulties and studying what feelings do for a living being. Evolutionarily, feelings evolved to organize attention, thought, and behavior; their learned associations help explain why the same situation can produce such different responses in different people. In analysis, that knowledge helps me notice what a feeling is doing in your life and where there may be room to respond differently.
Why Work With an Atheist Therapist?
I’m a nonspiritual atheist and childfree, and both have remained consistent throughout my life. I know the value of working with someone whose judgment you can trust, including from experiences with clinicians who had some rather singular opinions about both. That experience is part of why I’ve chosen this specialization. I want you to have access to thoughtful, knowledgeable support without having to defend your decision against parenthood or wonder whether an interpretation comes from magical thinking.
What would you like to discover?
Perhaps something keeps happening despite your efforts to change it, or you’ve reached a point where your usual explanations no longer satisfy you. You may simply want to understand yourself better. You can arrive with an unfinished thought; finding out what you mean is part of the work.
In a first conversation, we’ll discuss what brings you and what you want from our collaboration. You’ll also have a chance to find out how it feels to talk with me, which tells you something no amount of fine print can.
See session fees and practical information, or contact me with a question.
