I show up as myself, present, direct, warm, curious, and honest. I listen closely, and I say what I see. I care deeply, and you’ll feel that. I don't sound like a therapist (at least I hope I don't).
Oh, and I curse. I might reference a poet, a podcast, or something unexpected that makes meaning click into place. I welcome you to challenge me. I'm not passive ,although sometimes I'm silent. I will check in with you along the way, making sure that this is the space you need.
I challenge myself to grow consistently, as your therapist, and consult with both my supervisor and other therapists.
I've done my own work and continue to do so.
Learn more about the work.
I’m trained in Existential Phenomenological therapy (yep, a mouthful), Buddhist Psychology, somatic practices, and Internal Family Systems. I don’t believe in cookie-cutter therapy. Instead, I tailor our work to you. At the heart of my work are a few core beliefs:
Here are the beliefs that guide me:
Your thoughts and feelings always make sense when we see the bigger picture.
True change grows from compassion, not criticism.
We’re wounded in relationship; it takes a relationship to heal.
Humaning is hard—and that’s not a mistake
Being able to be with your internal life brings freedom
We exist in systems, the past and present create all you experience.
Although we haven't met yet, I trust you have the capacity to heal, grow, and come alive.
The systems I draw from that frame my therapeutic work:
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This approach recognizes that suffering is part of being human, not a mistake. Through mindfulness, attention, and compassion, we learn to meet all of life with presence and non-aversion. Noticing what arises—without getting pulled into habitual stories and reactions —fosters freedom. Much of our distress comes from how we relate to our experience.
We draw on awareness and reflection to help you observe patterns, feel sensations, and choose where to place your attention. This isn’t about getting rid of emotions or chasing bliss; it’s about learning to see what's actually here, learning to notice and accept, and from that place, choosing a way forward.
We cultivate curiosity for your inner life—how your body, breath, thoughts, and feelings show up—and create space for self-understanding and healing. These methods don’t erase suffering but shift your relationship to it—helping you stay grounded, make wise choices, and live with more peace, presence, and purpose.
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Though, Existential-phenomenological therapy , we look at how you experience the world, your relationships, your history, your identity, your body. And the meaning that you make from it.
We looks at how you meaning is made and unmade for you. We notice how your body holds truth. We pay attention to what's happening between us in the room. And we work toward helping you live with more agency, honesty, and connection—with yourself and with others.
This approach sometimes asks big questions: Who am I, really? What matters to me? How do I live more fully and truthfully, even with uncertainty or loss?
This is a therapy that honors your complexity, invites you to show up exactly as you are—and from there, find your way home to yourself. Therapy becomes a space where you learn to trust yourself more—your perceptions, your values, your inner compass. From that foundation, real change becomes possible: in how you relate, how you make decisions, how you show up in the world.
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Parts work starts with the idea that you're made up of many parts, each trying to help you survive in the best way it knows how. Some parts carry stories that never got to be heard. Others step in quickly to manage or avoid pain some may act out in ways you don’t understand yet. But all of them belong, all have had a purpose, even if that purpose no longer serves you. In this approach, we don’t try to get rid of anything—we make room for it, listen, and help it shift.
Therapy helps you build a relationship with these parts, so that instead of reacting from them, you can respond to them—with curiosity, compassion, and choice. We get curious about these internal voices to learn from them.
When we can notice a part—rather than be swept away by it—it means we're not fused with it. That simple shift creates a safe and spacious ground from which we can relate to ourselves differently.
Underneath it all is your core self—the part of you that is whole, wise, and capable of healing. When we connect to that grounded self, we gain more access to choice, calm, and clarity. The chaos softens. We become more able to meet life on life’s terms, with compassion, strength, and spaciousness.
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At its heart, relational psychodynamic therapy is about the healing power of relationship—both the ones you've lived through and the ones we build together. Much of our wounding happens in relationship—early dynamics, family systems, cultural messages about who we’re allowed to be pattern our feeling of safety or disconnection. It makes sense, then, that it’s in relationship that repair becomes possible
We’ll pay close attention to what unfolds between us. Not in a distant, clinical way—but with curiosity and care. The patterns that shaped you often show up in the therapy space, and that’s a gift. When we notice them together, something begins to shift.
This isn’t surface-level work. It asks for honesty, presence, and the willingness to look at what’s underneath. I’ll bring warmth, and I won’t shy away from what’s hard. We build something real between us—and that realness becomes a place where insight, clarity, and change can grow. I’ll show up as a real person—curious, present, and engaged. I’ll invite you to do the same, at your own pace.
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In my work with couples and relationships, in addition to the modalities above, I also draw from Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) and Nonviolent Communication (NVC).
At the heart of every meaningful relationship is the need to feel seen, safe, and understood and we get stuck not knowing how to achieve this.-One person pulls away, the other reaches harder. Someone gets loud, the other goes quiet.
EFT helps us understand the deeper emotional currents at play—what drives our reactivity, our silence, our need for control or closeness. NVC gives us language and structure to express these tender places without blame or collapse.
I also tend to be more direct than some therapists, which draws on RLT, Relational Life Therapy. I believe directness is essential in couples' relationships.
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The struggles we carry don’t exist in isolation. I bring a systemic lens to therapy, which means I’m always considering the larger forces that shape our lives like, culture, race, gender, class, religion, family dynamics, and intergenerational legacies.
I also work from a deeply trauma-informed orientation. This means I move at your pace, pay close attention to safety and nervous system regulation, and trust that your responses—whether that’s freezing, fawning, dissociating, or shutting down—make sense in light of what you’ve been through.
These framing sees you not just as an individual, but as someone shaped by—and still navigating—a larger web. Together, we create the conditions for healing.
Some last thoughts
Sometimes the work is about creating change, finding new ways of being, solving problems, and reshaping what no longer fits. Often, it's about changing perspective on what we focus on, how, and when. Other times, it’s about shifting how we relate to our inner experience and to the world around us: all matter, and open space for transformation.
When we change our internal experience, our external experience changes as well. Learning how to be with what’s here—grief, shame, loneliness, fear, It’s about staying in relationship with the parts of life we’re usually taught to avoid.
Whether we can or can’t change our external circumstances. We can learn to meet our internal experience with more kindness, care, curiosity, and compassion. This shift can transform how we move through the world, how we relate to others, and how we experience being alive.