My Treatment Approach:

Every person comes to therapy with a unique history, personality, and set of life experiences that shape how they move through the world. Because of this, I tailor treatment to each client’s specific needs and goals. Together, we work to identify the patterns that keep you feeling stuck and create meaningful cognitive, behavioral, and emotional changes that support the life you want to build.

While we focus on challenges in the present, we also acknowledge and honor the influence of past experiences. My approach balances compassion and validation with evidence-based treatments that are grounded in research and designed to create lasting change.

I also understand how overwhelming it can feel to search for a therapist. There are many approaches, treatment names, and acronyms that can make the process confusing. Below, I provide high-level explanations of the treatments I use to help demystify therapy and give you a better sense of what working together may look like.

I offer a complimentary 15-minute consultation call where you can ask questions, learn more about my approach, and determine whether we may be a good fit.

What I treat:

  • Anxiety and OCD Spectrum Disorders

    • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

    • Specific Phobias

    • Panic Disorder

    • Generalized Anxiety Disorder

    • Social Anxiety

    • Body Dysmorphic Disorder

  • Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors (BFRBs)

    • Skin picking (Excoriation Disorder)

    • Hair pulling (Trichotillomania)

  • Life Challenges

    • Adjustments to life changes (breakups, attending college, switching careers)

    • Relationship conflict

  • Emotion Dysregulation

    • Difficulties managing intense emotions

    • Experiencing constant negative emotions (e.g. depression) or unpredictable mood fluctuations

    • Impulsivity

    • Difficulties in relationships

  • Trauma

    • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

    • Childhood abuse

Evidence-based Treatments

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

CBT takes a present-focused approach to change. The basic premise is that our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors interact to make up our experience. For example, how we think about a situation, ourselves, and the world impacts how we feel and how we behave. We can target change by identifying and challenging negative thought patterns, learning skills to cope with our emotions, and changing our behavior. CBT helps people understand and break, maladaptive self-perpetuating cycles. 

Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP)

ERP is the gold standard treatment for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and involves approaching feared thoughts, images, or situations (exposure), while resisting urges to engage in compulsive behaviors (response prevention). In doing this treatment, individuals learn they are capable of experiencing distress without having to do compulsions to move on. The more individuals disengage from the OCD cycle the more they can engage in their lives. I also use this treatment approach to target other anxiety-based challenges. 

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

ACT helps individuals cultivate psychological flexibility which is the ability to stay in contact with the present moment regardless of unpleasant thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations. ACT supports clients in choosing their behaviors based on personal values. I bring in ACT techniques with almost every individual/mental health struggle I am working with.

Habit Reversal Treatment (HRT)

HRT is used to treat skin picking or hair pulling. These treatments help individuals gain insight into their patterns of behavior by identifying sensations, cognitions, emotions, motor movements, and situations that initiate and perpetuate your cycle. Next, you will determine different strategies to interrupt the behavior.

Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT)

DBT helps individuals cope with emotion dysregulation and interpersonal difficulties. DBT is focused on building skills in the following categories: mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness. These skills help individuals build a life worth living. DBT balances acceptance and validation with change and problem-solving. 

Prolonged Exposure (PE)

PE utilizes exposure to treat PTSD by systematically and gradually approaching memories, feelings, and situations that have been avoided. This work decreases symptoms and promotes healing from traumatic events. 

Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT)

CPT focusing on challenging unhelpful thought patterns related to traumatic experiences to treat PTSD.  Through this work, individuals develop more adaptive cognitions, process emotions, and overall decrease the impact of the trauma in the present.  

Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions (SPACE)

SPACE is a parent-based treatment program for children and adolescents with anxiety, OCD, and related problems.

 
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