My Approach

 

My approach to psychotherapy is trauma-informed, depth-oriented, and intersubjective. My style is warm, curious, and nonjudgmental. Together, we will clarify your goals and work toward them. You may be navigating identity issues; suffering with intense and chronic sadness, anxiety, self-doubt, confusion, and/or stress; feeling stuck in one or more areas of your life; or seeking increased satisfaction in key relationships. Psychotherapy is a consistent time and place that is totally separate from the other parts of your life—a place where you can pause, think, and feel in the privacy of a professional relationship.

I begin psychotherapy with one to three sessions to understand what you hope to gain from the therapy experience and to arrive at a mutual understanding of the concerns that brought you to therapy. From there, we will work collaboratively to create a relationship that facilitates deeper understanding of yourself so you can expand your range of feelings, develop a sense of possibility about new ways of being, and clarify your goals about how to live more fully in the present. I work intensively with patients, meaning we meet at least once weekly until you reach your treatment goals.

A key feature of my therapy approach is that we will focus on how you see and feel seen by others. We will discover how your experiences of your earliest relationships show up in current relationships, including the therapy relationship. In our therapy work, we will talk about, discover, and experience what it feels like to be known by another. Does it feel new? Hard? Uncomfortable? Scary? Complicated? When, with whom, and under what circumstances—if ever—does it feel easy or safe? How does this change across contexts and over time?

Areas of specialization include:

  • Complex trauma, PTSD, C-PTSD, and complex grief

    • Human beings need a sense of basic safety and trust in order to grow—something many may not yet have consistently experienced. There are different ways you can grow and come to understand parts of your experience. Therapy is one way to integrate traumatic experiences and make meaning of them, so you can learn to trust your mind & body. Sometimes healing can’t be done alone. Psychotherapy is a place where you can begin to know and say the truth of what happened. The goal of recovery is to be relieved of the terror of the past so you can trust your ability to feel safe in the present.

  • Neurodivergence (autism, ADHD, social communication disorder, sensory processing disorder, giftedness, 2e, etc.)

    • Some things may come easily and others may take considerable effort. How do your differences impact your self-concept and your relationships with others? What messages have you received about your differences while navigating a neurotypically-oriented world? Were your differences chronically misunderstood, misinterpreted, and/or misdiagnosed? Were you blamed and/or accommodated?

  • Anxiety (social anxiety, performance anxiety, climate anxiety, etc.)

  • Depression

  • Identity Issues (gender identity, sexual identity, multicultural identity, professional identity, etc.)

  • Acculturative stress

  • Substance use

  • Attachment problems & relationship issues