LCSW, 11 years of experience
Are you feeling stuck or unmotivated? Does every decision feel overwhelming to you? Feeling lonely or isolated? In these modern and disconnected times it’s not uncommon to feel… just not right even in the absence of a major life stressor. Many people enter therapy when it’s hard to even put a finger on what’s wrong but you know you haven’t been feeling right. I specialize in working with clients with anxiety, depression, adjusting to life transitions and new medical diagnosis. I approach therapy with compassion, curiosity & warmth. I believe that through exploration comes greater understanding of ourselves & others. With this new perspective, we can choose how to react more purposefully to life’s challenges. I understand people and their problems using a psychodynamic lens. I also incorporate principles from ACT & Gestalt Therapy.
Therapy is highly individualized, and not once size fits all. Often problems we seek help for have been brewing for a while. Just as these issues didn't start overnight change doesn't always happen as quickly as we'd like. That said, therapy should feel like a safe, comfortable and nonjudgemental space to explore new and longstanding problems and collaborate to help you make some changes to serve yourself better. Over time, I hope you will see a reduction in problems/symptoms that were troubling you, an increase in meaningful activities and connections with people in your life and feeling more comfortable in your own skin. Therapy can't always eliminate life problems but can help bolster you to be more resilient in the face of current and future stressors.
I use a combination of orientations including psychodynamic therapy (exploring how early experiences and relationship patterns impact how you currently see and interact with the world, yourself and others), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (a cognitive therapy that not only looks at your beliefs/thoughts but also how you are relating to them, focuses not only on what you want less of like sadness and anxiety but also what gives your life meaning and purpose and aims to increase psychological flexibility). I also incorporate Gestalt therapy principles focusing on the here and now and incorporating somatic techniques.
A common thread I noticed is a passion for working with people who have been dealt a difficult hand. I believe the work in processing a loss or adjusting to a significant challenge is two fold. People need adequate time and space to mourn a loss, to process what a limitation or new diagnosis may mean for them. Only with sufficient space to process these losses can people tap into their resilience and build a meaningful life with whatever the new reality is. I've seen many people get stuck in fighting against realities and expend lots of mental energy fighting against what is, this can leave people too depleted to imagine what can be.
New and experienced parents, parents of kids with disabilities/medical issues, patients and caregivers impacted by cancer, cancer survivorship, end of life/palliative care, hospice, chronic pain including: chronic back pain, arthritis/ RA, migraines, fibromyalgia, bereavement/grief