Macy Schoenthaler, MFT (Marriage and Family Therapist), is RSC’s in-house therapist who specializes in third-party fertility and LGBT family building, including the use of an egg donor or surrogate. She
has worked in the field of reproductive health since 2003, and received her master’s degree in counseling psychology in 2012 from the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco.
She originally started at RSC in 2012 as the Donor Program Administrative Liaison, screening egg donors and matching donors/recipients. She has since become a valuable resource for counseling patients who utilize a third party, such as an egg donor, for conception. Schoenthaler assists patients with the transition into the third-party program and for recipient, in-patient psychological consultations.
Schoenthaler works collaboratively with patients and integrates cognitive-behavioral, strengths-based empowerment and positive psychology approaches in therapy. She also has an interest in mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) techniques.
Schoenthaler received her bachelor’s degree in communications and women and gender studies from University of California, Davis in 2003 and her master’s degree in counseling psychology from CIIS in 2012. Her career in reproductive health started at Women’s Health Specialists in Sacramento and working with women and families at the Women’s Resources and Research Center at UC, Davis. She has since branched out to working specifically with infertility patients and is honored to be able to provide counseling specifically for the third-party program.
Schoenthaler interned as a therapist at both the Pacific Center in Berkeley and the Rainbow Community Center of Contra Costa County in Concord, counseling diverse individuals, couples and families. In this work she focused on high-risk youth, the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community and multicultural (culturally sensitive) counseling services.
Schoenthaler is whole-heartedly dedicated to helping RSC patients through the emotional and psychological challenges of infertility’s effect on their desire to have a family. She is here to support RSC’s third-party fertility patients and help them start the healing process so they can move forward with renewed hope and once again find joy in making a baby and expanding their family.
It was Schoenthaler’s passion for reproductive health and family building that led her to RSC. But it was Schoenthaler’s own personal struggle with infertility that has had some of the deepest impact on her work. With the assistance of in vitro fertilization (IVF) and a sperm donor, she and her wife now have two beautiful twin boys.
- Undergraduate degree: The University of California, Davis
- Graduate degree: California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco
- Internship: Pacific Center, Berkeley
- Internship: Rainbow Community Center of Contra Costa County, Concord
- Joined RSC Bay Area: 2012