Mark Melillo, Licensed Clinical Alcohol and Drug Counselor

I am an experienced Licensed Clinical Alcohol and Drug Counselor with 21 years of experience serving diverse members of the human race struggling with addiction with mild to moderate anxiety and depression. I am also a certified clinical trauma professional level two who is an EMDRIA trained EMDR therapist.

I, Mark Melillo, am a Licensed Clinical Alcohol and Drug Counselor in the state of New Jersey and California, a nationally clinically certified trauma professional, a nationally certified yoga teacher trained in Kripalu/Pranotthan Yoga, as well as the Yoga of Twelve Step Recovery as created by Nikki Meters (Y12SR.com). I hold a master’s degree in Human Services from Capella University in Minneapolis, MN and an undergraduate degree in Organizational Behavior and Development with a minor in Addiction Rehabilitation from the University of North Texas. I have been certified as an HIV educator. My clinical experience extends over 21 years in the treatment of substance use and co-occurring mental health disorders. I am trained EMDR Therapist since 2017. A yoga practitioner for more than 18 years and have been teaching on various levels in a therapeutic setting with clients for ten years integrating yoga, meditation, and breathing techniques, as an ancillary relapse prevention tool and holistic lifestyle strategy.
I have worked with clients from all walks of life, diverse cultures, and backgrounds. I’ve spent the first few years of his substance use and mental health counseling career in the traditional clinical setting as both a residential clinician/coordinator, outpatient clinician, and as an intensive outpatient director. It was then I came to realize that the insight gained from my personal and professional yoga practice and training is best utilized and conveyed with the integration of traditional psychotherapy, yoga, mindfulness, and other holistic therapies. Thusly, I discovered that clients benefit from an increased focus on their personal health needs, increased personal awareness, and more appropriately developed and applied self-regulation techniques geared toward self-management.

I focus my therapeutic treatments on the underlying issues causing clients pain, using a combination of talk therapy, EMDR and holistic therapy inclusive of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Pranotthan Yoga and Mindfulness, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Meditation, and movement re-education. Instead of pacifying the symptoms of dysfunction, I can assist the client in restoring the client’s structural integrity required so the mind, body, and spirit can heal itself. Contemporary science finds common ground in ancestral wisdom time and again, and as a practitioner I am honored to be a part of this vital shift as a Licensed Clinical Alcohol and Drug Counselor. In my work, I have been humbled by the results seen from relatively simple, practical, and natural techniques in working with clients.