Specialities

Dr. Malec works with individual adults, couples, and families. Her experience, qualifications and unique insight into what makes relationships work – or not work – has made her one of Chicago’s most sought-after counselors.

Dr. Malec’s specialties include:

Distressed/unrewarding work and family relationships

When things are not working at home or in the office, the situation can feel dire. When you’ve tried to solve the issues yourself and aren’t sure why your attempts have not been successful, Dr. Malec can help you get to the root of the problems.

Is your work-life balance off kilter? Is your work overtaking your family life, or your professional life suffering due to a distressed relationship? Perhaps you feel like you are not appreciated at work or at home. Dr. Malec can provide you with tools to help you set boundaries, learn when it’s okay to say “no,” decrease conflict with colleagues or your partner, learn how to remain impartial in professional settings, and how to schedule your life and quality time to make it all flow more smoothly.

Just because you have a great career doesn’t mean your relationship has to suffer or vice versa. You deserve to feel good about your work and your relationships. If you don’t, let Dr. Malec guide you towards more fulfilling and rewarding career choices and relationships.


Relationship coaching for executives

There is more to “being the boss” than doing your job, and many people don’t realize this until they take on a leadership role and then find themselves faltering.

Managing your staff, their time, projects and interpersonal relationships is just the tip of the iceberg. If you feel overwhelmed by your management scope and responsibility or feel your team doesn’t respect or doesn’t like you, there are strategies for turning your management style around.

Dr. Malec can teach you how you to mentor and inspire your team instead of just delegating responsibilities. Let Anne show you how to teach and guide your staff, and become the strong and assertive yet sensitive leader they will be pleased to call their supervisor.


Marital/relationship crisis counseling

When relationships are unraveling due to infidelity, life changes, an inability to communicate, or for any number of other reasons, sometimes it’s hard to see the issues clearly. Whatever your issues as a couple, Dr. Malec can help identify the problems, aid each partner in understanding the other’s perspective, and find solutions.

Perhaps you need a moderator, an impartial opinion, a new point of view, or simply someone in the room to keep the arguments fair and reasonable. Dr. Malec is happy to offer supportive and empathetic counseling in your time of need.

Dr. Malec will listen to you and come up with a comprehensive program to help you and your partner get back on track with the relationship you should be having; the one you deserve to have. Anne provides strategies that can help you be more open and honest, set boundaries, heal old wounds, and stay in the here and now of your relationship.


Intensive half-day sessions for couples

If you are going through an immediate relationship crisis and need to delve in more deeply than what is possible in a 50-minute session, or would like more time to deal with a deep-seated relationship issue, an intensive half-day session with Dr. Malec may be right for you and your partner.

Conducted at her Chicago office, via video conference, or, in special circumstances, your home, Dr. Malec can create a safe, hopeful environment for both of you to voice whatever is on your minds. She will offer constructive ideas, approaches and solutions that can bring lasting change to your relationship.

Let Dr. Malec bring her empathy, experience, and knowledge to you. You may be amazed at what can be unearthed in a morning or afternoon, and will leave feeling better about your partnership than you may have felt in years.

You deserve to have peace in your closest relationship, and Dr. Malec can help guide you in the right direction.


Life and career transitions

Significant life changes such as marriage, a promotion, loss of a job, or retirement can be hard to deal with and cause you to question your roles and who you are as a person. Let Dr. Malec work with you to find the right path.

People spend much of their lives defining themselves by jobs and family roles such as child, spouse, parent or another role, but in our deepest places, we are something more essential than that. We are not defined by our roles but by our qualities, wants, needs, desires, and relationships.

It can be hard to remember that when you are going through a difficult life transition. Dr. Malec can provide you with tools to deal with the changes and put you back in touch with who you really are, how to come to terms with your new situation and, most importantly, who you can become.


Prenuptial agreement counseling

Marriage is a serious commitment and there are many details that need ironing out before the big day. Let Dr. Malec help you figure out the rules as well as put your feelings about them on the table.

Prenuptial agreement counseling can cover everything from the who’s and what’s to – most importantly – the why’s. Many couples devote time to hammering out the small print and details about what will go into the agreement, but not enough time discussing the reasons behind what they are doing regarding assets.

Let Dr. Malec help you deal with your feelings about value in the partnership and the motivations of both yourself and your future partner. Dr. Malec can create an environment where it is safe to not simply say “okay” in hopes of keeping the engagement period happy and fight-free, and help you put to rest all your questions so that they don’t resurface further down the marital line.

Don’t keep your feelings inside. Let Dr. Malec help you share them.


Financial therapy

Do you find it difficult to be honest with your partner about your spending habits or debt? Perhaps you find that you are constantly arguing with your partner about money, and cannot find a way to communicate effectively about it. Do you feel like you cannot trust your partner’s financial decisions? Have you struggled to stick to your budget, or perhaps you have never even made one?

Money can be one of the biggest sources of internal and interpersonal conflict we experience in our lives. Research suggests that conflicts about finances take longer to resolve, and if occur often enough in a marriage, can predict divorce. Although talking about money often feels uncomfortable or taboo, it may be exactly what you and your partner need, and a financial therapist can help you begin to resolve your issues. Financial therapy focuses on the problems you experience, both within yourself and your important relationships, related to money and finances. Dr. Malec will help you and your loved ones better understand what has been keeping you from finding satisfaction and happiness with your finances.

This may involve exploring beliefs about money and self-worth that were passed down from parents, ways to self-soothe anxieties that arise about money or your financial struggles, or developing healthier communication skills between you and your partner to reduce conflict when discussing sensitive matters related to your finances. Through this process, you will gain insight into yourself and your partner that Dr. Malec will help you translate into meaningful, healthy changes about how you relate to one another regarding your finances.

Financial therapy is useful for individuals and couples, including those who have been married for many years and those who are planning to get married or commit to a long-term relationship. Financial therapy can be beneficial in any relationship where money is shared, for example with business partners or between parents and their children.

The many potential issues related to money and finances do not need to become a destructive force in your relationships. If you feel that you would benefit from this process, contact Dr. Malec.


Inherited wealth counseling

Do you experience guilt, shame, or confusion about the wealth you have inherited? Does it ever seem like the money you have received has become a burden, interfering with your ability to develop a rewarding career or have meaningful, authentic, and loving relationships? Do you worry about how to raise your children properly, with the correct values, in the context of your family wealth?

Whether you have acquired family money suddenly, married into a wealthy family, or have grown up in a high net worth family, inheriting money can be fraught with a number of issues. If any of the above issues resonate with your experience, seeking the help of an inherited wealth therapist may be a key step to take. With Dr. Malec, you and the important people in your life, like your spouse/partner, children, parents, and siblings, can explore the meaning of the money you have inherited. Both heirs and benefactors can benefit from this process, helping all parties navigate the sensitive areas of the inheritance process. Although Dr. Malec will not provide advice on money management, she will help you explore your values, clarify your needs, and process your feelings about the acquired money. This process will encourage you to make wise and personally meaningful decisions about how to relate to and use these resources. For example, topics you may explore in sessions may include the development of a will, estate planning, or the issue of having a prenuptial agreement.

It is common to have both wealth and problems, and the good news is that help exists for you. Let Dr. Malec tailor your therapy sessions, including topics to explore, who should be in attendance, and the pacing and duration of sessions, around your unique needs and goals. If needed, she can meet you at your office. The gift of wealth can be meaningful, satisfying, and used to create a well-balanced and fulfilled life, and inherited wealth therapy can help you fully realize the potential that your inheritance can offer.


Infidelity counseling

Learning of infidelity in a relationship can be one of the most jarring things people experience. Dr. Malec understands the shock, hurt, betrayal and confusion that come along with infidelity. She is also empathetic to the shame, guilt and confusion the situation engenders.

When the infidelity has just been discovered or is ongoing the wounds can be fresh. Dr. Malec can help you learn how to talk about what has happened and what is going to happen in a safe, supportive environment.

If the infidelity is in the past and has either just come to light, or was never properly discussed and dealt with, there can be ongoing hurt and trust issues that can be just as difficult and immediate as a current affair.

Let Dr. Malec help you and your partner take steps forward in one of your most trying times as a couple.


Divorce counseling

Ending a marriage forces both partners to experience and deal with the spectrum of emotion from sadness and loss to fear and shame. Parting from someone we thought we would share our life with is not easy. Dr. Malec can give you tools to use when you face all of the emotions that come from parting ways with your spouse.

Learn what to do when faced with: denial, jealousy, self-doubt, hopelessness and more. You are not alone, Dr. Malec is here to help and will provide additional strategies you can use if there are children in the family as well.

Divorce counseling is useful not only to learn how to get over your divorce, but also how to transition back into single life. Whether your divorce is pending, current or in the past, let Dr. Malec teach you how to live your life today and build toward a bright, new future.