Patricia Feltrup-Exum

Patricia Feltrup-Exum brings a rare mix of training to her work: nursing, human development, family systems and developmental disabilities. She is a Clinical Member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, and she has spent her career learning how children, adults and families grow, change and heal.

Early roots in children and development

Children and early childhood development have been central to Patricia’s work since early in her education. She has studied how children learn, how families shape development and how early experiences carry forward. That foundation shows up in the way she listens to parents, observes children and explains what she sees in plain language.

She has worked in a wide range of settings: as a baker, office staff and receptionist, then as a nurse, clinic coordinator, billing specialist, clinical director, manager at a residential treatment center, review clinician for a major insurance agency and therapist in large group practices. Each role taught her something about how systems work and how people get lost or found inside them.

Theology, formation and children with disabilities

Her graduate work at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary was shaped by world-renowned scholars in theology, marriage and family therapy, death and bereavement. That formation gave her a whole-person view of care: people are not just symptoms or diagnoses, but people with histories, values, relationships and questions of meaning. It also deepened her comfort with grief, loss and the spiritual questions that often surface in hard seasons.

That same thread runs through her work with children with disabilities. She has spent years understanding how children with developmental disabilities, autism, learning differences and early delays experience the world, and how families make their way through evaluations, school meetings, therapies and daily routines. She works to see the child first, not the label, and to help parents understand strengths and needs in plain language.

She collaborates with schools, pediatricians, therapists and other providers so the plan fits the child’s real life. She knows that supporting a child with a disability is also supporting a family, and that practical help, clear information and a steady relationship can matter as much as a diagnosis.

Faith and spirituality are welcome in her work whenever a client requests them. She does not impose them; people of every background receive the same respect. For those who want it, therapy can be a place to hold questions of meaning, hope, grief and purpose alongside the practical work.

Community, prison and research

Patricia has worked alongside MHMR programs in Texas and North Carolina and as a psychotherapist in prison systems. Those settings shaped her understanding of people whose lives do not fit neatly into a private-practice office, and they deepened her commitment to care that is practical, respectful and available.

She has also worked alongside testing research and other clinical research teams, including contributions to the DSM-5 revision and related renorming research. In 2012 the American Psychiatric Association invited her to serve as a Collaborating Clinical Investigator for the DSM-5, and she is published in the manual in that role. In 2021 she received the TAMFT Lifetime Achievement Award for her clinical research contributions. She has also written about the effects of divorce on children.

A practice built over time

Patricia began her own practice in 2003 in a small office down a side hallway. Over the years she built a group practice, and in 2018 she branded it Fair Winds. The practice has grown, but the original idea has not changed: careful work, warm relationships and a clear explanation of what comes next.

Understanding today’s young people

Patricia works to understand the world young people are growing up in now, not only the world she grew up in. She pays attention to the differences in technology, school pressure, family structure, culture and social life so she can meet children, teens and families where they actually are.

Outside the office

Patricia is blessed with two sons and a small zoo of dogs, cats and birds. She enjoys nature, traveling, swimming and time with her family and animals.