MY APPROACH
Therapy is my life passion. My objective is for you to feel seen, heard, and understood by me. I begin the first few sessions with the goal of creating safety and comfort between us. It is a time to get to know each other where we can begin to understand your reason for seeking treatment. Along the way, we will collaboratively establish goals that are tailored to your needs and preferences and change them as we see fit. Therapy is a place to learn about important connections between your actions, thoughts, and feelings. I use a combination of practical problem-solving skills, as well as methods that delve deeper into an understanding of historical and current life challenges.
TYPES OF TREATMENT
Harm Reduction Psychotherapy is a practice that provides practical strategies to reduce harm from a substance or any problematic behavior. This therapy treats all people with care and respect. It is a philosophy that is focused on reality and includes a spectrum of treatment from safer moderation to abstinence. Using this approach, we focus on the reasons and consequences of a behavior and not just the behavior itself. This compassion filled approach allows for an increase in choice and agency.
Psychodynamic Psychotherapy is an insight-oriented approach to understanding symptoms. This technique allows us to gain insight in to our suffering that is often maintained by past and current relationships. We often operate using outdated patterns of behavior that were learned early on in childhood, but are no longer useful for us. By learning about these patterns in a compassionate way, we can move away from these ways of acting, allowing for a greater sense of freedom and an improved way of relating to ourselves and others.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is a type of treatment that focuses on changing patterns of unhelpful thinking and behavior in order to improve our mood. By zooming in on our thoughts and feelings in the moment, we are able to acknowledge what is holding us back and promote what can drive us forward.
Mindfulness-Based Therapy teaches compassion and acceptance of our thoughts and feelings without judgment. It allows us to stay in the moment without having to change anything about it. This helps us regulate intense emotions, provides us with new solutions, and allows us to respond effectively to conflicts.