SHIRLEY DEANE/MIDYETT is a citizen of both Australia and the United States, speaks with a Texas-American accent, and descends from Welsh and Cherokee Indian heritage. She has been a mental health professional for over 45 years in both Australia and America. She has been a counselor and psychotherapist in early-episode psychosis programs, and with severely mentally ill clients in community mental health and drug rehabilitation centers. She has conducted many training workshops and presented at numerous state, national, and international conferences.
Shirley holds a degree in psychology, one of the first Post Baccalaureate Honors Certificates in Biomedical Communications from the University of Texas, and a post-graduate certification in Myofunctional Therapy. An eidetic neuro-psychotherapist combining art and behavioral psychology, she trained with the Eidetic Research and Marketing Analysis Centre in Toronto, Canada.
Experienced in both in-patient and out-patient settings, she was on staff with five community mental health centers in America and became supervising manager in three of them. She is a certified addiction specialist and served on staff with two rehabilitation in-patient units, working with men and women on probation and parole.
Shirley has worked in Australia since 1986, in both staff and senior-management positions in the mental health field. She served on a team conducting a pilot drug-and-other-addictions program for a major not-for-profit community treatment center, and on a team developing an early-intervention episode psychosis program, and then managed the team that introduced and expanded the pilot program to another region within Western Australia.
In addition to counseling, training, program development, and consulting, Shirley worked as a mediation officer with the Australian Department of Justice. Shirley is experienced in working with people in crisis, including providing support in the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.
Semi-retired from 2010 until 2014, she traveled the Grey Nomad Caravan trail around Australia, continuing during that time to expand her painting portfolio and gathering insight into the challenges facing seniors coping with retirement and aging issues.
In 2015, she returned to Western Australia and volunteered her services to not-for-profit community service organizations, conducting strategic-planning workshops.
Actively retired, Shirley continues to maintain her interest in the multitude of changes impacting society, particularly mental fatigue and stress in corporations and the mental-health community. She has accepted several challenges conducting intensive team-building workshops focusing on human communication, reinforcing mental fitness, and addressing stress addictions. In 2016, Shirley became associated with Louise Rabbone of "The People Catalyst." She developed and conducted two intensive team-building training programs. One of these week-long intensives was with an Aboriginal community in the outback of Western Australia. She says she is semi-retired. NOT!
