ABOUT BRITTANY QUAGAN
My name is Brittany and I have worked in mental health and wellness for over ten years. I have a Masters Degree of Science in Clinical Counseling and Human Services, as well as a License in the State of Connecticut as a Professional Counselor. I am an anti-racist and LGBTQIA+ affirming therapist.
For most of my young life, I struggled with debilitating anxiety, panic disorder, depression, and low self-esteem. In my 20s, I had to do a tremendous amount of healing work after escaping an abusive relationship. I spent much of my life feeling stuck, lost, and convinced that I would never find happiness or peace.
Once I hit rock bottom, I knew that I had to do something. I started reading self-help books, working with mindfulness, meditation, focusing on my mind-body-spirit connection, and finding the right support system through community,
therapy, and life coaching.
My journey led me down paths I never anticipated I would take. I went from being scared to drive, having to drop out of my freshman year of college due to panic attacks, and going to weekly doctors visits for my health anxiety to writing books, speaking in front of large audiences, and helping others on their journey. In 2016, I opened Journeys: School for the Soul where I offered life coaching, spiritual development classes and mentorship, Reiki as a Master/Teacher, meditation groups, manifesting workshops, and intuitive healing sessions. Journeys expanded and became the home of 7 amazing womxn who all offered a variety of healing services. I was humbled to be named one of the top 10 life coaches, and top ten Reiki healers in Connecticut in 2018 and 2019.
During my time at Journeys, I completed my masters and began my training in clinical care at Yale University School of Medicine's PRIME Clinic where I served as the Associate Clinic Coordinator and as a clinician for kids and young adults who were identified as being at high risk of developing a more serious mental illness due to a variety of experiences such as voice-hearing experiences and distressing thoughts. I also served as co-director of the Yale COPE Project--an international research project aimed at understanding atypical perceptual experiences such as hearing, seeing, and feeling things that others might not be. As a person with lived experience and with deep roots in spirituality and spiritual healing, I worked alongside neuroscientists, therapists, psychic/mediums, spiritual healers, parapsychologists, advocates, and other persons with lived experience to learn from one another, from the experiences others have, and how we can use the strengths and skills that those doing well use to help those who might be struggling with distressing experiences.
I believe we all have the ability to heal from the obstacles we face as humans--we just need some guidance and support. We spend our lives creating stories about ourselves based on who and what we are taught we are "supposed to be." Those stories are often full of negative commentary and details that keep us stuck and hold us back from living a happy, healthy, and fulfilling life.
It takes time.
By taking the necessary steps, you can rewrite your story, and continue to live an empowered, magical, and happy life.
In my sessions, I use the tools and techniques that I have collected over the years--both in my personal life and in my professional training to help you. I take a holistic approach (mind-body-spirit connection) to helping my clients and incorporate mindfulness along with EMDR, CBT, DBT, and positive psychology. Together, my clients and I explore belief systems they have learned over time that can be causing them blocks or distressing symptoms today. Through this exploration, we break down those belief systems and build up healthier, more empowering beliefs.
I spend my free time hiking, writing, practicing martial arts, and being with friends and family.
PUBLICATIONS
Quagan, B., Woods, S. W., & Powers, A. R. (2021). Navigating the Benefits and Pitfalls of Online Psychiatric Data Collection. JAMA psychiatry, 78(11), 1185-1186.
Quagan, B., Mourgues, C., & Powers, A. (2020). Direct and Indirect Coping Strategies Used by Voice-Hearers to Control Their Experiences. Biological Psychiatry, 87(9), S162.
Powers, A., & Quagan, B. (2021). The Yale Cope Project. Yale COPE Project. https://www.spirit.research.yale.edu.
Mourgues, C., Quagan, B., & Powers, A. (2020). Development of the voice hearing control scales: and instrument to assess control and efficacy over voice-hearing experiences. Biological Psychiatry, 87(9), S159-S160.
Mourgues, C., Negreira, A. M., Quagan, B., Mercan, N. E., Niles, H., Kafadar, E., ... & Powers III, A. R. (2020). Development of Voluntary Control Over Voice-Hearing Experiences: Evidence From Treatment-Seeking and Non-Treatment-Seeking Voice-Hearers. Schizophrenia bulletin open, 1(1), sgaa052.ckly.
Kafadar, E., Quagan, B., Hammer, A., Jaeger, H., Mourgues, C., Sibarium, E., ... & Powers, A. (2021). Parsing the Mechanistic Heterogeneity of Hallucinations Using Theory-and Data-Driven Computational Approaches. Biological Psychiatry, 89(9), S337-S338.
Kafadar, E., Fisher, V., Quagan, B., Hammer, A., Jaeger, H., Mourgues, C., ... & Powers, A. (2021). Conditioned hallucinations and prior hyper-precision are state-sensitive markers of hallucination susceptibility.
Barron, D. S., Heisig, S., Agurto, C., Norel, R., Quagan, B., Powers, A., ... & Krystal, J. H. (2022). Feasibility Analysis of Phenotype Quantification from Unstructured Clinical Interactions. Computational Psychiatry, 6(1).
Barron, D., Heisig, S., Norel, R., Agurto, C., Quagan, B., Powers, A., ... & Krystal, J. (2020). Preliminary phenotypic feature capture during clinical interaction. Biological Psychiatry, 87(9), S212-S213.
Mourgues, C., Hammer, A., Fisher, V., Kafadar, E., Quagan, B., Bien, C., ... & Powers, A. (2021). Measuring Voluntary Control Over Hallucinations: The Yale Control Over Perceptual Experiences (COPE) Scales.
Barron, D., Heisig, S., Agurto, C., Norel, R., Quagan, B., Powers, A., ... & Krystal, J. (2021). Preliminary Evaluation of Phenotypic Features from Clinical Interactions. The Journal of Pain, 22(5), 594.
Kafadar, E., Fisher, V., Quagan, B., Hammer, A., Jaeger, H., Mourgues, C., Thomas, R., Chen, L., Imtiaz, A., Sibarium, E., Negreira, A.M., Sarisik, E., Polisetty, V., Benrimoh, D., Sheldon, A.D., Lim, C., Mathys, C., Powers, A.R. (2022). Conditioned hallucinations and prior over-weighting are state-sensitive markers of hallucination susceptibility.
Biological Psychiatry.
MEDIA
