Anxiety and worry are natural, sometimes protective emotions that all people feel at times. Sometimes, it helps us focus on a big project or prepare for a new transition.

Anxiety disorders, which are the most common mental health disorders, differ from normal feelings of nervousness or anxiousness and involve excessive fear or anxiety or avoidance of situations that may provoke such emotions.

Whether you’re looking for help coping with anxiety about a specific life event or a more long-term, pervasive pattern of worry and avoidance, we can work together to change your relationship with these emotions.

Like anxiety, feelings of sadness or grief are natural and healthy. When we have a bad day, experience a loss, or lose someone or something dear to us, sadness may push us to take action like calling a friend or rest. Watching a sad movie may remind us to appreciate what we have or engage in our values, like reminding a partner you love them.

However, depression causes feelings of sadness and/or a loss of interest in activities you once enjoyed. In an attempt to escape these experiences, people may avoid what’s meaningful to them of necessary, like spending time with loved ones or going to work.

Whether you’re looking for help coping with sadness or grief about a specific life event or a more long-term, pervasive pattern of depression and avoidance, we can work together to change your relationship with these emotions.

Life transitions are changes of any size that impact your life in a significant way. Even when a life transition is something we planned and hoped for, like starting a new job or getting a new pet, they involve change and stress. In all life transitions, there is also an element of loss: loss of the future you hoped for, loss of familiarity and comfort, or sometimes the loss of a piece of your identity. Even if this was a loss that you welcomed, like maybe the loss of being single in favor of being in a relationship, change is hard.

In our work together, we can unpack the experience of past life transitions or evaluate upcoming choices based what options would lead to what you would describe as a more meaningful life.

LGBTQIA+ individuals face a wide range of difficulties that our cis gender, heterosexual peers do not due to societal systems of privilege and oppression (e.g. heterosexism, cisgenderism, racism, ablism). The intersection of identities (e.g. race, gender, sexuality, socioeconomic status) can further exacerbate the effects of oppressive systems on LGBTQIA+ individuals who occupy multiple marginalized social positions. As a result, LGBTQIA+ individuals are expected to cope with an unjust system. We deserve better.

In this queer-affirmative space, we can work on acknowledging and externalizing the effects of oppression in your life, learning to let go and unhook from internalized oppressive messages, and celebrate your identities and strengths.

Successful, meaningful relationships take a great deal of mindful action.

We can explore what makes different relationships (e.g. friends, family, romantic partners) meaningful, what relationships aren’t serving you, and where you may struggle in relationships. In doing so, we can also build skills to strengthen relationships, such as setting boundaries, communicating more effectively, or expressing needs.

While the DSM-5 provides a clear definition for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD; one potential reaction to a traumatic event), the definitions of what constitutes a “traumatic event” vary greatly. Dr. Russ Harris defines it as an event that “involves a significant degree of actual or threatened physical or psychological harm— to oneself or others,” and lists miscarriage, murder, divorce, disaster, violence, and accidents as examples.

Experiencing trauma or related stressors can leave a lasting impact on your life, including your sense-of-self, relationships, and emotional well-being.

In our work together, we will focus on living in the present, engaging in self-compassion, changing your relationship with distressing thoughts and memories related to trauma, and collaborating on practical actions that support a meaningful future and post-traumatic growth.

The way society discusses “careers” or “work” influences how we think about it. We are taught to consider it a seperate part of our life or identity, view it as a part of us, and pay a lot of attention to (especially if you’re proud of it or it’s valued highly by society).

With the amount of time and effort that goes into our work, it makes sense that it’s something that comes up often in therapy. Together, we can explore topics including career identity or transition, difficulty starting or completing tasks, or workplace conflict.