Helping those at life’s crossroads

With her life at a crossroads Sandy Klar decided to alter her career path from working in real estate to becoming more involved in helping change the lives of people.

The Lawrence resident enrolled in a two-year program at Brooklyn College for life coaching called Triumphant Journeys. “I woke up day and thought there was more to life than selling real estate,” Klar said. “I was always a very spiritual thinker. I still dabble in real estate, but I felt my mission is to help.”

Klar’s first taste of life coaching was the hands-on pro bono work that is part of the Triumphant Journeys program, where students such as Klar conduct telephone coaching of women in similar situations that their children are gone and now they have “empty nester” syndrome. “It’s mostly women stuck at a crossroad, the kids left home,” she said.

After Klar completed the program last October she began her own company, Crossroads by Sandy, counseling women who are empty nesters. “They are asking, what should I do with my life,” she said.

However, in addition to her paid coaching, Klar volunteers once a week on Thursdays for 90 minutes at the Nassau County jail in East Meadow. She counsels women as part of the Drug Addiction Rehabilitation Treatment program about changing their lives. The women, who are addicted to drugs and alcohol, have a high rate of recidivism.

“I try to get them through the addiction, then what can you do differently when you get out, what changes they can make,” said Klar, who can relate to these women having gone through her own addiction problem with pain killers and coaches these women using the 12-step method in combating addiction.

Lisa Cohen, another woman who changed careers, got Klar involved in the volunteer work. In 2009, after working 30 years in a family communications business, Cohen founded Living Water for Women, a non-profit organization that provides a variety of services, including transitional housing for formerly incarcerated women.

“I had been volunteering at the jail and I kept seeing these women coming back,” said Cohen, who added that a change in perspective is needed to help treat these women. “I try to give them more than a sober home.”

Cohen said she is not reinventing the wheel, but a providing a place for women who most likely take drugs or drink due to the shame of being abused either physically or verbally. “I go further than the twelve steps, I tell them god loves them and help them get rid of the shame.”

Klar’s counseling skills have impressed Cohen, who said that Klar has a genuine interest in recovery and helping women. “She came with me four times and it’s a little intimidating,” Cohen said about entering the jail. “It is her life experience, her flaws, her failures and her honesty that endears herself to the women.”

Rachel Dombrowsky, who introduced her sister to Cohen after meeting her at a luncheon for Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice, said Klar is a down-to-earth person who is at the perfect time of her life to be a life coach and counselor. “I believe it’s about what is real and not real,” Dombrowsky said. “She has her priorities right, what is important, and brings that to whoever she counsels.”

Klar’s website is crossroadsbysandy.com. She is beginning to form groups concerning alcohol and drug addiction, and unhealthy relationships.