
Dr. Brenda Rambo
Psychologist/Health Service Provider
Providing a safe place for people to face their problems and start the healing process, Dr. Rambo walks people through the complexity of life’s issues to help them find answers and solutions. She believes God restores the soul and godly counsel and wisdom along with decades of clinical experience work together to transform lives.
Law Enforcement
Dr. Rambo offers computerized pre-employment psychological evaluations required for P.O.S.T. Commission Certification. Psychological testing is one component in the process of selecting entry-level law enforcement officers. These evaluations assess the emotional stability and mental health of applicants, determining whether they have risk-prone personality traits, or possible psychopathology. Basic entry-level psychological suitability standards provide a framework for identifying psychological factors that affect job performance or those that could interfere with successful performance.
Fit-for-duty evaluations are conducted at the request of Chiefs of Police or Sheriffs for employees who are going through extreme stress that is affecting their jobs.
Young Adults
Her current practice consists of working with young adults who are trying to find their way. Transitioning into adulthood and becoming responsible for your life requires discipline and a desire for success. Often people need help in making wise choices and decisions that propel them toward purpose and fulfillment. Confusion, hopelessness, and despair can cause young adults to drift into destructive behavior. Making sense and letting go of grief, disappointment, and disillusionment can open up space for constructive thinking and growth. Young adults can find direction and hope for their future.
Relationship Issues
Dr. Rambo walks people through the complexity of relationship and marriage issues and helps them find answers, solutions, and resolutions to conflict. Friendships, relationships of all kinds, and marriage issues can be heartrending and traumatic. Sometimes relationships are seasonal. For a time, a person will be in your life for a reason, and then they drift away almost as quickly as they came. One of the hardest things in life is to learn to guard our hearts, and be wise and discerning in relationships. Not all relationships are good for us and some can wreak havoc in our lives and bring great pain. The therapeutic process allows a safe place to heal and process the hard realities of the conflict, grief and loss.
Personality Types
Personality types matter. The more we understand about our personality type and how we relate to life, the better we understand ourselves and relationships in general. There are many personality tests, measures, or systems of thought that provide insight into personality types and styles that are useful: Myers Briggs and Enneagram are two popular systems of thought that help you better understand yourself and others. Many relationship conflicts are due to differing personality types. When families and couples and friends better understand their personality types, there is more grace and acceptance over differences.
Accepting Life Responsibility
Adults who accept responsibility for all aspects of life fare better than people who do not. In our silent misery, we make choices that create chaos and failure. Through our will we have the ability to accept our hard realities and create opportunities and possibilities in difficult circumstances. We can learn to become overcomers and resilient. Doing the same thing the same way never changes our lives for the better. We must grab hold of the hand of God and allow Him to take us into new and unchartered waters trusting He has a plan for our lives, a hope and a future.
Anxiety, Worry, and Fear
Anxiety, worry, and fear are real issues that trap people in ineffective lives; however, there are ways to get free. These struggles are often birthed out of trauma and desperation that last long enough to make an indelible impression that life and others are not safe. Sometimes we stay in a bad situation too long until it makes us sick. We have to learn new ways to cope with stress and anxiety and exercise our will to slowly overcome the processes and structures that keep these negative thought patterns in place.
Depression
Depression is rooted in hopelessness and despair that circumstances will never change. When depression is a chemical imbalance, finding solutions often take medication as well as various types of therapy. Getting to the root of depression and determining the cause enables people to make necessary changes that can redirect their lives. Sometimes we are trapped in hard circumstances and are forced to bear down and do whatever is necessary for the long haul. As we learn to overcome tough challenges we grow in beauty, integrity, and character. We can find joy in the midst of the most difficult situations.
ADD/ADHD
ADD/ADHD in adults can be debilitating. Men and women struggle with managing life and jobs when this disorder is part of their genetic code. If ADD/ADHD remains untreated, the ramifications can destroy lives and families. Typically, if a child is diagnosed with ADD/ADHD, a parent also has the diagnosis. Many times the parent has been dysfunctional for years, but never knew why life didn’t work well for them. A child’s ADHD diagnosis can force a parent to address their own debilitating behaviors. This disorder destroys marriages if people refuse to get necessary treatment and change dysfunctional behaviors. Group therapy works well for people suffering with ADD/ADHD. Community, accountability, and an exchange of knowledge can encourage people to grow and change and become new and different individuals who take responsibility for their lives in spite of the real struggle they face daily.
Life Transitions
Life transitions are hard and real. A divorce, a birth, a death, a move, a failure, an unwanted pregnancy, betrayal, crises of faith, or a combination of many of these life situations can cause people to need support, wisdom, and counsel to walk out to the other side. Adjustment disorders with mixed emotions are often attached to these difficult seasons of life. Seeking help sooner than later reduces stress and strain and helps makes sense of the new life shift.
Wellness Seekers
Dr. Rambo has always been a wellness seeker. Health and wellness have been significant goals for most of human history. Wellness describes the condition of people who are not only without disease, but are also taking proactive steps to improve their health. Wellness seekers are actively responsible and engaged in all matters relating to their health and wellbeing. Their focus is prevention of disease and increased energy and vitality. Life belongs to those who are willing to accept the responsibility for having it (Louis Armstrong). Health is multidimensional encompassing a state of complete physical, emotional, spiritual, and social wellbeing. Managing your weight, establishing a healthy diet, and regular exercise does wonders for your emotional and psychological wellbeing. Small steps lead to big change and improvement in your overall health. Clients are encouraged to address health issues honestly. Often when physical health improves psychological health improves.
Seniors
Seniors are often a forgotten population. As they age and become less able to manage life, families sometimes ignore them and cast them aside. Many are lonely, hopeless, sick and infirm and have little support to face daily challenges. Their losses are real. Oftentimes seniors outlive their families and friends. They find themselves living in a world they scarcely recognize. Dr. Rambo terms seniors as the “treasure generation.” Their life experiences, decades of work and sacrifice and wisdom gained along the way make them forgotten treasures. If only families could open their eyes and see the gift that walks among them! Dr. Rambo provides a safe space for them to renew, regroup, and if health allows, get back into the game. Their lives can be repurposed for the second half of life, and they can find hope, joy, and redirection in their golden years.
About Dr. Rambo
Dr. Rambo’s career as a psychologist spans almost four decades. Her career started in Community Mental Health where she worked with young children suffering from many forms of abuse. She evaluated these children and went to court and testified on their behalf as a child advocate.
As a psychological examiner, she conducted a variety of evaluations to determine learning disabilities and intellectual functioning, personality assessments, Social Security and Vocational Rehabilitation evaluations, and police/first responder pre-employment certification evaluations and fit-for-duty evaluations. She worked with a general population of patients ranging in age from children to the elderly, men and women’s issues including depression, anxiety, adjustment disorders, work-related issues, couple and family counseling.
Dr. Rambo spent most of her life as a wellness-seeker and taught workshops on Reclaiming Your Health to her clients and to the general public. Reclaiming Your Health offered lifestyle improvement that assisted patients with weight loss, healthy eating, exercise, and accountability. Prior to her retirement, Dr. Rambo worked with patients who had more complicated and debilitating disorders.
She spent almost seven years working as an assistant professor in a large university psychology department. She taught graduate courses training counselors and school counselors, and other general psychology courses. Private practice was her passion, so she returned to full time practice.
Approach & Philosophy
Most people have a story to tell, and they need someone to listen. As she listens to their story, key issues surface revealing unresolved childhood/teenage trauma or difficulty. Root causes of depression and anxiety and other psychological issues are often rooted in unresolved childhood issues. People change their lives through changing their behavior, their thinking (cognitive structures), and/or through their feelings.
We all have a preferred means in which we change. Dr. Rambo believes people who take responsibility for all aspects of their lives have less difficulty. Many people have areas in their lives where they are child-like and enjoy not growing up in certain areas. These child-like behaviors cause trouble in work, family, relationships, and in all aspects of life. Secret addiction takes a heavy toll on individuals, relationships and families. Therapy provides a safe place for people to face their problems and start the healing process.
After so many decades of clinical practice, Dr. Rambo moves in and out of many treatment modalities finding what is most effective for each patient. She believes healthy eating and lifestyles can improve life in general. She believes God is the restorer of the soul, and she helps those who are on an upward path discover their destiny.
Dr. Rambo works from a Christian perspective. She believes God restores the soul, and godly counsel and wisdom along with decades of clinical experience work together to set people free. She is strong in Spirit and personality and will speak hard truth. She has an uncompromising belief that the power of God’s Word can transform lives, restore families and make life worth living. She makes no apologies for her Christian faith. Dr. Rambo believes life is full of opportunity and possibilities, but we have to contend for the blessings. She will walk with you through “the dark night of the soul,” and help you discover a healthier more satisfying life.
Dr. Rambo is an author/writer and has written two books: Understanding the Holy Spirit and Whispers of the Spirit. She has a blog site where she writes about many topics. You can find her blog site at www.drbrendaramboauthor.com.
Since 2017, with no prior training or knowledge, she has become an artist painting in oils. She paints landscapes, seascapes, sunsets, and flowers. Her goal is to see, capture and paint the glory of the Lord.
Brenda Rambo
Dr. Brenda Rambo has practiced for thirty-eight years as a psychologist/health services provider in Brentwood, Tennessee. She has worked with a diverse population including children, teenagers, families, and couples