About Counseling

At AIM Life Solutions, we offer counseling from a distinctly Christian perspective. Does this mean that all clients must be Christian? Of course not! We welcome and strive to serve all who are needing support and guidance through life’s challenges. We are not here to force religious beliefs on any of our clients. For clients who are Christian, we offer counseling services that interweave Christian truths, insights, perspectives, and skills. We believe that spiritual and mental health are deeply intertwined, and we strive to help you live a fuller and more meaningful life by engaging in your God-given identity. For individuals who are not Christian, you are welcome and we will honor your beliefs in the work we do together! Our Christian faith actually calls us to respect your unique personhood and perspective! 

Why Counseling? Who is counseling for?

These are great questions. Life is full of struggles and challenges, pains and suffering, and constant changes. Life is also full of joys and hopes, love and connection, and constant growth. The role of counseling lies between those two truths. If you are struggling with the challenges, pain, and constant changes in your life, counseling seeks to help you navigate the struggle successfully. If you are wrestling with the difference between what you want life to look like and the reality of how it actually is, counseling will help you make the changes necessary to close the gap. Counseling is for people who are struggling with their emotions, have behaviors that they want to eliminate, or want healthier and more fulfilling relationships. Counseling is an effective treatment for anxiety, depression, traumatic stress, OCD, ADHD, bipolar disorder, personality disorders, addictive behaviors such as pornography or gambling, and many other disorders and struggles. There is no problem too big or too small!

Does this mean something is wrong with me?

We believe it does not mean anything is wrong with you. The truths of the pains and suffering of life still remain. Sometimes, the suffering and pain leave marks that are difficult to “shake off”. This is normal and understandable. At the core, we are here to help you experience the healing of these pains and strive toward the positive truths of life and who you are. Lastly, we do not believe that counseling is the only solution. We encourage all our clients and everyone to be engaged in a community, family, and local church. Counseling is an additive to these things, not a replacement.

What should you expect in counseling?

It can be scary and intimidating to even reach out and make the first appointment. AIM Life Solutions works to make the process as smooth and comfortable as possible. The first step really is to simply reach out! Contact AIM Life Solutions by phone at 641-381-5706 or by email at info@AIMLifeSolutions.com. AIM Life Solutions will reach back to you within 72 business hours to help you register as a new client. This process does take some time as we want to ensure you receive quality care that fits your needs. You will be asked to provide your insurance information (if relevant), complete an intake questionnaire, and sign basic office policies regarding billing, scheduling, informed consent, and HIPAA. Once these documents are completed, you are ready to set up your patient portal and be scheduled! Your first appointment is a casual but intentional conversation where you have an opportunity to explain your current circumstances and what you hope to gain in counseling. We will work collaboratively with you to develop a treatment plan that includes treatment goals, a treatment timeline, and the treatment strategies that will be used to address your identified problem. Typically follow up sessions are weekly or every other week for 3-6 months with session frequency decreasing as your insight and skills improve. 

In a world where marriage seems to be constantly under attack, Dr. Vanderhoff and Lucas are passionate about strong and healthy marriages and believe it is possible! It is possible to push back against the apathy, selfishness, hurt, and communication issues that contribute to dissatisfactory marriages. It is possible to heal from the impact of extramarital affairs, lack of intimacy, the impact of addiction, financial infidelity, and differences in beliefs or values around finances, parenting, or future hopes.  

What does premarital counseling entail?

We utilize SYMBIS (Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts) to facilitate meaningful conversations for dating and engaged couples longing to start their marriage off on the right foot. Over 3-6 sessions, SYMBIS encourages conversations about finances, communication patterns, expectations for household chores, managing family relationships, and sexual intimacy. 

What does marital counseling look like?

Marital counseling focuses on the relationship between the husband and wife, and the goals that both people have for the relationship. Whether this means improving communication, re-energizing the relationship with new intentionality, or addressing core pains and issues with intimacy, our role is to help you understand what you want from your marriage and how to achieve that. Marriage was never meant to exist in isolation and often healing involves identifying a core group of supportive individuals to count on. Marital therapy from a Christian perspective involves considering what God says about the marital relationship, seeking to identify and own one’s contribution to the problem, and seeking to be humbler and servant-hearted in the relationship. Dr. Vanderhoff and Lucas utilize evidenced-based marital therapies including emotionally-focused treatments, acceptance and commitment therapy, and Gottman methods. 

Eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) is a specific type of therapy that is evidenced-based to be effective in helping people through PTSD, traumatic-stress, depression, anxiety, panic attacks, phobias, dissociative disorders, addictions, and many more struggles. First discovered and developed in 1987 by Francine Shapiro, EMDR began as a therapy for traumatic stress. Now, through research, evidence is expanding the application of EMDR. There are now over nineteen controlled studies of EMDR, making it the most thoroughly researched method used in the treatment of trauma. The American Psychiatric Association, American Psychological Association, Department of Defense, Veteran’s Administration, and the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies recognize EMDR as an effective treatment for PTSD.

What does EMDR mean?

Taking away all the confusing and big words in EMDR, the goal of this type of therapy is to make emotional responses less intense and reprocess distressing life events so that they do not impact your present life in a negative way. How does it achieve this? EMDR utilizes different forms of bilateral stimulation (physical activity that activates both sides of the brain) to facilitate the natural processing that occurs in the mind and brain. Bilateral stimulation typically includes eye-movements, auditory sounds, or taps that alternate quickly across both sides of the body. 

What does Desensitization mean?

Desensitization is a shorter way of saying that bad experiences start to feel not as bad. In a similar manner to how a battery loses its charge and doesn’t have power anymore.

What does Reprocessing mean?

Reprocessing is another fancy and shorter way to say that the beliefs and thoughts about who you are, how other people treat you, and what to expect the world around you to be like changes to be more based on the present-day and in the truth. With both desensitization and reprocessing, EMDR can help clients be less troubled by bad experiences in their past and build up positive, realistic beliefs about themselves.

What is this “Natural Processing”?

It is widely assumed that severe emotional pain requires a long time to heal. EMDR therapy shows that the mind can in fact heal from psychological trauma much as the body recovers from physical trauma. When you cut your hand, your body works to close the wound. If a foreign object or repeated injury irritates the wound, it festers and causes pain. Once the block is removed, healing resumes. In a similar way, the mind is designed to move toward health. If we experience a distressing event, the mind naturally moves toward making sense of the event so that we can move on. However, sometimes this process is “blocked” by events that are too distressing, painful, or life-threatening to simply “move on” from. EMDR works to remove those “blocks” so that the mind can naturally move toward healing. 

What makes EMDR different from other types of therapy?

While EMDR is still considered a form of “talk-therapy”, EMDR differs from traditional talk-therapy. With EMDR, the reprocessing occurs internally with brief summarizations of your emotions and thoughts with the therapist. This can be beneficial for some people who feel that their trauma or distress is too much to put into words. Additionally, studies of EMDR suggest that clients who use it experience emotional relief faster compared to other forms of therapy and the emotional relief tends to be longer-lasting.

EMDR sounds like hypnosis…how aware will I be?

During EMDR, you will remain in control, fully alert and wide-awake. This is not a form of hypnosis, and you can stop the process at any time. The goal is to be aware of the space around you while you focus on the distressing experiences. Throughout the session, the therapist will support and facilitate your own self-healing and intervene as little as possible. Reprocessing is usually experienced as something that happens spontaneously, and new connections and insights are felt to arise quite naturally from within. As a result, most people experience EMDR as being a natural and very empowering therapy.

Next Steps?

If EMDR interests you, or if you have questions please contact AIM Life Solutions at 641-381-5706 and leave a message for Lucas. Lucas is trained in EMDR, completing his Basic Training in January of 2025. He will help answer any questions that you have and work with you to determine if EMDR is a suitable therapy for you.

Additional Links:

EMDRIA

EMDR

VA-Video