Rita LaBrew
Rita LaBrew, LMFT, licensed in New York and New Jersey, brings extensive experience in foster care, child welfare, private practice, and telehealth. I provide a collaborative, thoughtful therapy experience grounded in clinical expertise and evidence-informed care. Together, we'll work toward greater insight, emotional resilience, and meaningful, lasting change. I work with adults who are ready to move beyond simply managing symptoms and are willing to explore the deeper patterns shaping their lives. Whether you're struggling with anxiety, depression, trauma, relationship difficulties, family-of-origin concerns, life transitions, or longstanding emotional patterns, therapy offers an opportunity to understand not only what you're experiencing, but why.
I use an insight-oriented (psychodynamic) approach to help you understand the roots beneath the pattern—family-of-origin dynamics, protective roles, and the stories you’ve had to live by.
My approach is primarily psychodynamic, integrating psychoeducation to help make complex emotional experiences more understandable and practical. Together, we explore how early relationships, unconscious patterns, protective roles, and present-day experiences influence your emotions, relationships, and decisions. As insight grows, clients often find themselves responding to life's challenges with greater clarity, confidence, and intention. Clients often describe my style as thoughtful, direct, and collaborative. I strive to create a space where curiosity replaces self-criticism, where difficult experiences can be understood without judgment, and where lasting change develops through deeper self-awareness rather than temporary solutions. My practice is best suited for adults seeking ongoing outpatient psychotherapy and is not a fit for higher-acuity or crisis-focused care. I may refer clients whose needs would be better served by a higher level of care, specialized treatment, or services outside my scope of practice. Please note that I do not provide documentation or written support for court, custody, disability, or other legal matters, and my practice is not a fit for individuals seeking therapy primarily for court-related issues. My goal is always to help clients find the care that best meets their needs.
First session
In our first therapy session (intake), I’ll ask structured questions to understand your goals, symptoms, history, and what’s bringing you to counseling. You’ll have space to share at your own pace, and we’ll begin identifying key patterns, stressors, and strengths to create a clear treatment plan for individual outpatient therapy.
Strengths
My strengths include careful observation and deep listening, informed by years of clinical and personal experience. I use these skills to help clients identify patterns, gain self-understanding, and feel supported. I also provide psychoeducation and recommend relevant readings or resources to encourage reflection and growth between sessions.
Ideal clients
I’m going to let you in on a little secret: much of what you truly desire is already within you. And the second secret? Very few people are completely ready to explore the great unknown—which is often themselves. But some people do it anyway. They do it scared. They do it uncertain. They do it while questioning everything they thought they knew about themselves, their relationships, their families, and the lives they have built. That is my ideal client. I work best with adults and couples who are curious about themselves and willing to look beneath the surface. You may be struggling with anxiety, relationship patterns, family-of-origin wounds, trauma, self-doubt, emotional exhaustion, or the feeling that you have spent years taking care of everyone else while losing touch with yourself. You do not have to arrive with all the answers. You only need a willingness to become curious. My ideal client is someone who wants more than temporary relief. They want to understand why certain patterns keep repeating, why particular relationships affect them so deeply, and what may need to change in order to create a life that feels more authentic, peaceful, and their own. You do not have to be fearless. You just have to be willing to begin.
Treatment methods
Psychodynamic
I use psychodynamic therapy to help clients understand how past experiences, family relationships, and early emotional patterns may still be influencing the way they think, feel, and relate to others today. Rather than focusing only on the immediate problem, we look beneath the surface and explore recurring patterns, emotional triggers, relationship dynamics, and beliefs that may have developed earlier in life. My goal is to help clients develop greater self-awareness, understand why certain patterns keep repeating, and make more intentional choices rather than feeling controlled by old experiences. I use this approach in a collaborative, practical way, connecting insights from the past with the challenges clients face in the present.
Couples Counseling
“I’m not perfect, but I’m perfect for you.” Most couples do not struggle because one person is simply “the problem.” More often, they become caught in repeated patterns of reacting, withdrawing, pursuing, defending, criticizing, or shutting down. In my practice, I help couples look beneath the argument and understand the pattern underneath it. We often bring into adult relationships what we first learned about love, conflict, trust, safety, and closeness from our families and early caregivers. Because those patterns feel familiar, we may repeat them without realizing it—even when they are painful or no longer serve us. Couples counseling creates space to slow those patterns down. Together, we look at what each partner is reacting to, what old wounds may be getting activated, how each person protects themselves when they feel hurt, and what keeps the same conflict repeating. The goal is not to decide who is right or wrong. It is to help each partner understand themselves and each other more clearly, communicate with less defensiveness, repair conflict more effectively, and make more intentional choices about the relationship they want to build. Sometimes love is not about finding a perfect person. It is about learning how to stop repeating old patterns with the person you have chosen.
Attachment-based
“Let me go, let me go, let me go, lover... WAIT, COME BACK!” Attachment theory helps us understand why closeness can feel comforting for one person and threatening for another. The ways we learned to connect with caregivers early in life can shape how we approach intimacy as adults. Some people become anxious when they sense distance and seek reassurance. Others may feel overwhelmed by too much closeness and pull away. Some move back and forth between both—wanting connection deeply while also fearing it. In my practice, I use attachment theory to help clients recognize these patterns without shame or blame. We explore questions such as: What happens inside you when someone pulls away? What makes you feel abandoned, controlled, ignored, or unsafe? Do you pursue, withdraw, shut down, become angry, or seek reassurance? The goal is not to label you as “anxious” or “avoidant” and leave it there. It is to understand where those patterns came from, how they once helped you cope, and whether they are still helping you now. With greater awareness, clients can learn to respond differently—to communicate needs more directly, tolerate closeness or distance with less fear, and build relationships that feel safer, more secure, and less driven by old wounds. Sometimes the question is not, “Why am I like this?” It is, “What happened that taught me love had to feel this way?”
Cognitive Behavioral (CBT)
Did it really happen that way? Are you sure your whole life is a mess, or is that the part your mind has learned to focus on? Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, helps us examine the thoughts and beliefs that shape how we feel and respond. Sometimes our minds develop patterns of thinking that are overly negative, rigid, or distorted. These patterns often begin as attempts to protect us. If we expect the worst, stay on guard or assume something will go wrong, we may feel better prepared if it does. But over time, that kind of thinking can become a cage. In my practice, I use CBT to help clients slow down, question automatic thoughts, and look at situations from a more balanced and accurate perspective. We explore questions such as: What evidence supports this thought? What evidence challenges it? Is there another explanation? Am I treating a possibility as if it were a certainty? The goal is not to force positive thinking or pretend difficult things are not happening. It is to help you recognize when fear, past experiences, or old beliefs are shaping the way you interpret the present. CBT can become a key to unlocking that cage—helping you replace distorted thinking with greater clarity, flexibility, and a more truthful view of yourself, your relationships, and the choices available to you.
Narrative
Tell me a story... We do it all the time without realizing it. We create stories about who we are, what our experiences mean, how other people see us, and what we believe will happen next. Many of these stories develop subconsciously and are shaped by childhood experiences, relationships, disappointments, trauma, and messages we have received from others. Sometimes, the stories we carry about ourselves are incomplete—or simply no longer true. Narrative therapy helps us slow down and examine those stories. Together, we explore where they came from, how they have influenced the way you see yourself and your relationships, and whether they still deserve to have so much power over your life. I help clients separate themselves from the problem and recognize that a difficult experience, belief, or chapter does not define the entire person. We look for parts of your story that may have been overlooked—your strengths, choices, resilience, values, and moments when you responded differently than the old story would suggest. The goal is not to rewrite the past or pretend painful experiences did not happen. It is to develop a fuller, more accurate understanding of your life and recognize that you still have the ability to influence what comes next. You are more than the story you were given, and you are more than the story you may have learned to tell yourself.
Location
Virtual sessions
Identifies as
Person of Color (POC)
Woman
Top specialties
Anxiety
Couples Counseling
Trauma and PTSD
Other specialties
Coping Skills
Depression
LGBTQ
Older Adults
Racism
Self Esteem
Sexual Abuse
Women's Issues
Serves
Adults (18 to 64)
Couples Counseling
Elders (65 and above)
Individual Therapy
Man
Woman
Doesn't specialize in
Family Therapy
Gambling Addiction
Medication Management
Parenting
Perinatal Mental Health
Personality Disorders
School Issues
Serious Mental Illness
Sex Therapy
Substance Misuse
Licensed in
New JerseyLicense 37FI00258000
New YorkLicense 002162