I consider it an enormous privilege when people invite me into their lives to collaborate on change. Famed marriage and family therapist Carl Whitaker said that clients, couples, and families brought their whole selves into therapy, so it was essential to bring his full self into that space, too. Without our full selves, he felt therapy became a hollow endeavor that failed to enact change. I believe that radical empathy, radical authenticity, and radical acceptance genuinely fuel healing and the telling of new stories.

I have excellent training in family and relational systems. I strive to be a real person who meets my clients where they're at in life. Too often, I find the therapy profession overly focused on insurance, diagnosis, mental health labels, and problem-saturated talk - all while overlooking the incredible human beings sitting right in front of them, full of untapped strength and resiliency. I want to see you and hear you in the way you prefer to be seen and heard. Maybe someone has given you a diagnosis in the past, but I want to know how you experience it, how you would describe it in your own words. I want to stay close to your experience of the world - not mine, not the insurance company's, not the textbook's - but what matters to you most.

The pioneers of the marriage and family therapy field were restless, iconoclastic disruptors. Many of them explored marriage and family therapy, in part, because they felt the estabIished ways of doing things were inadequate and did not serve clients well. There's a saying in therapy that "the map is not the territory." Meaning, there are many spaces to explore beyond the borders of what is presently known. I'm drawn to this exploration with my clients. I am a professional with strong and well-considered boundaries; I am also an open person, a thoughtful and lively human being, who uses these qualities in service of my clients. I am kind, respectful, candid, spontaneous, and believe in the power of humor. Laughter is an invitation to connection. As are tears and pain. My best hopes are that our therapy sessions will make it possible to think, feel, and say things out loud that have never been thought, felt, or said before.

Peeking behind the curtain, I tend towards an eclectic approach, often using a narrative, solution-themed lens, with touches of symbolic-experiential and collaborative therapy. Those are therapies that speak to me most, but I am always open to finding the best approach that speaks to you. I can have many "great" ideas, but if none of them resonate with you, then no change will likely happen. I frequently check in with my clients during sessions to see if we're talking about the right things or if there is something else they wish we were talking about. I get a one-hour snapshot per week of my clients. We all get but glimpses. I hope this snapshot of myself helps you glean some of who I am and my approach. 

Ultimately, I may or may not be the right therapist for you. It's okay if it's not the right fit. Research shows that success in therapy is largely determined by the strength of the relationship between therapist and client. If any of this resonates with you, it would be my honor to be your guide, exploring as many spaces necessary to help you find the one that fulfills you most.