Unfortunately, they are difficult to find.
Here in San Diego, we are blessed because we have a extremely rare organization called BDI (Behavioral Diabetes Institute). Both psychologists are diabetes psychologists and one of the famous ones is Dr William (Bill) Polonsky, who is a psychologist and CDE plus he does clinical research and also In practice which is unusual. He also wrote a book on diabetes burnout and maybe another book too! Lol Both him and BDI psychologist, Dr Guzman often speak at professional and patient conferences. the TCOYD (taking care of your diabetes) conferences and programs that are held in many locations. They are recently holding some programs online that hundreds attend via zoom. Check out their site if you don’t know about it!
https://behavioraldiabetes.org/about/
TCOYD
https://tcoyd.org/
There is another diabetes psychologist running a organization here in SD. I think it’s new but he’s on a lot of social media platforms… dr Mark Heyman, Also a psychologist anf CDE but also has type 1
https://cdmh.org/about-mark-heyman/
In scripps healthcare, the Endocronology office has a diabetes psychologist too but many don’t know that she is available! I guess the Endocronologists refer people based on emerging issues they are aware of
I’m sure that you can contact these sites or psychologists to see if they know of others. I’m fairly sure they have a lot of connections/resources.
Another option to explore is diabetes psychologists are a sub-specialty of the larger umbrella sub-speciality in Clinical Health Psychology also known as Behavioral Medicine. It’s a branch of clinical psych that many people are unaware of. They are all about the mind-body connection and focus a lot on people with chronic illnesses/pain and research is mostly aimed in this direction although bc NIH, AMA, etc grant funding is primarily working on cancer, it’s lesser focus is on other chronic diseases unfortunately. Just the same, health psychologist and medical social workers too are trained to work with many aspects of diseases…
You are more likely to find a health psychologist than a diabetes psychologist. One of the primary orgs in this field is SBM (society of behavioral medicine)
https://www.sbm.org/
Psychology today has a ‘find a therapist’ database but, of course, only includes those registered there. I’ve never tried searching health psychologists there and I know that many in the public aren’t aware of this branch so not sure how or if it would be categorized as such! I was heading to grad school to become a health psychologist but health got in the way… irony lol… despite being part of a lab doing behavioral medicine research, attending professional conferences in psychology and other exposures, even I DIDNT know that a sub specialty branch exists of Diabetes psychology!!! It was a shock but a welcome one!!
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists
I hope these links and information helps!
I must say that the first therapist I actually felt safe with and trusted was a health psychologist. Eventually she disclosed to me that she also has chronic pain, autoimmune diseases and, in fact, we had some crossover with our diagnoses. I didn’t catch on earlier but I remember being pleasantly surprised that I didn’t have to Teach the therapist, doctor, strangers etc about my diseases and them actually getting it!! She was amazing and snarky and sarcastic too so that, for me, mace everything better!!
Let me know how your search goes
