Licensed Professional Counselor, MA, LPC
I view my role as a therapist with humble gratitude for the unique opportunity to bear witness to others’ pain, to help lessen their suffering and to feel less alone in it. I am guided by the qualities that are essential to the job such as compassion, sound judgment, and sincere respect for the privilege to sit with clients at their most vulnerable times when they may be facing some of the biggest challenges of their lives.
I am someone who is deeply committed to my own journey of personal growth and the work of becoming the best version of myself, as I progress through different stages of life. I believe in the value growing gentler and wiser as we go through life. Cultivating an interior life has been immeasurably helpful in getting a glimpse of my true nature.
For me, as an individual, wife, mother, and therapist, my desire to grow and live with conscious intention, purpose, and meaning motivate how I try to live my own life as well as what I try to bring to my work with clients.
My Clinical Approach
My clinical thinking is guided by one broad therapeutic aim: to help my clients come into deeper connection with their mind-body-spirit. Becoming our most true self, I believe, is the ultimate task of life, and therapy can support that most important journey.
My integrative approach draws on various modalities that best serves the needs of each client, but overall I am guided by the four foundational frames of reference: IPNB, Attachment Theory, SE, and spirituality (mindfulness and heart-wisdom).
Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB) – the interdisciplinary approach to understanding the intersection of the mind, brain, human relationships, and social environment and how they influence the development of human function and experience.
Attachment Theory – the foundational understanding of child development based on the quality of the relationship between child and parent (primary caretaker). The theory provides insight into the formation of children’s sense of self in the world and how they come to adapt to the relational dynamics and the relevant motivational forces that drive the psychological adaptation. The childhood experience has an enduring impact on adult life and demonstrates the importance of understanding why history matters.
Somatic Experiencing (SE) – SE is a body-oriented therapy model which emphasizes the mind-body connection. SE’s most significant contribution is bringing the body into the center of therapeutic understanding — of how the effects of trauma and stress get stored in the body. It provides a roadmap to linking the physical to the mental and emotional dimensions of our experience. As a clinician, SE has helped me to understand and appreciate the wisdom of the body and how the body provides important clues about what needs tending and a path towards healing.
Mindfulness & heart-wisdom – I draw on mindfulness and heart-centered elements that are clinically effective in cultivating important qualities such as compassion for self/others, self-observation, courage, equanimity, to name a few — and weave them in when appropriate. Appealing to and guiding clients to listen to their own mind-heart-wisdom can help them experience moments of their core self, beneath the rigid ego-structures and habitual behaviors that keep them stuck in negative cycles.
Professional Training
- Unlearning Racism and Promoting Social Justice Among Therapists, with Kevin Cokley & Germine Awad
- Interpersonal Neurobiology, IPNB Psychotherapy of Austin, with Juliane Taylor Shore
- EMDR Therapy Protocols for Early Intervention and Ongoing Traumatic Stress (Advanced Workshop)
- Eye-Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), with Rick Levinson
- Emotional Transformation Therapy (ETT), Level 1 – Level 5, with Steve Vazquez
- On Grief and Grieving, with David Kessler
- Tracking Neural Networks, with Juliane Taylor Shore
- Healing Adult Attachment: The Three Pillars of Integrative Treatment, with David Elliott
- High Impact Couples Therapy, with Terry Real
- Relational Life Therapy (RLT, for couples), with Terry Real, Level 1
- Somatic Experiencing (SE), Beginner & Intermediate Level
- Non-Violent Communication (NVC), with Dian Killian
- Emotionally Focused (Couples) Therapy (EFT), externship
- Brains in Session, with Juliane Taylor Shore
- Mindfulness meditation, with various teachers (ongoing)
Experiences and Education
Bereavement Counselor, Hospice Austin
LPC Intern, IPNB Psychotherapy of Austin
Post-graduate Intern Counselor, Capital Area Counseling
Masters of Arts in Counseling, St. Edward’s University, Austin, TX (Outstanding Graduate of the Year Award)
Bachelor of Arts in Business, University of Washington, Seattle, WA