LCSW, 19 years of experience
New to Grow
I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 19 years of experience. My therapeutic approach is client-centered, empathetic, and collaborative. My areas of focus are depression, anxiety, crisis management, living with chronic health conditions, grief, and helping clients develop and/or increase their resilience and ability to cope. My therapeutic approach is an eclectic approach that is tailored primarily using CBT, DBT, solution focused therapy, ERP, crisis intervention, and motivational interviewing. I believe that developing rapport and trust are keys to building an effective client-therapist partnership.
The first session is a time to welcome my clients and introduce them to the therapeutic process. I want to get to know you and explore what you want to get out of therapy. I believe it is critical that I listen to my client's story during the first session. We will discuss your priorities to develop short/long-term goals and your desire for change. I will also gather a psychosocial assessment/history and provide psycho-education as indicated during the initial session.
My background in medical social work and working with homeless veterans often involved me working with clients in crisis who had an immediate need/goal that needed to be addressed. I discovered that many clients often had other long-term needs and goals that percolated to the surface once the crisis was resolved. I've been providing individual and group therapy for over 15 years. It's been an honor to be in a profession that strives to help guide others to gain the tools and knowledge to become their own experts. I have an optimistic, glass half full mindset and enjoy helping clients (re)discover what what will provide them the highest quality of life.
I want to acknowledge the strength it takes for people to seek out help. I am comfortable working with a culturally diverse population from ages 13-100+. I have over 20 years of medical social work experience, and I have extensive experience working with older adults, caregivers, and people/couples/families living with chronic conditions (in particular neurocognitive disorders such as Alzheimer's Disease and other types of Dementia). I also have experience working with veterans, people struggling with homelessness, substance use disorders, men's issues, life transitions, trauma, and mood disorders. I work with short term and long term clients and my therapeutic approach is to begin where my clients are at.
I use CBT to help clients recognize and identify unhealthy cognitions and/or patterns that trigger negative thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Clients will develop new skills to improve problem-solving capabilities, learn and practice self-care and calming techniques, and clients will have safe space to process the challenges in their life.
I incorporate core components of DBT to help clients learn to be in the present with mindfulness, develop ways to cope with difficult emotions by developing distress tolerance skills, managing intense emotions by learning emotional regulation skills, and improving communication as well as asserting personal boundaries and self-respect with interpersonal effectiveness skills.
I often work with clients that have specific presenting problems that lead them to seek treatment. This method fosters a short-term, collaborative approach that focuses on the client's strengths, available resources, and goals to promote change. Small, actionable steps are used to help clients construct solutions.