Katy Niles (she/they)

I've been working with teens in numerous avenues for the last 15 years. I assist clients with not only gender identity, but also teen depression, anxiety, and self esteem. Parenting a teen is incredibly difficult, and you know your child best. I appreciate working along side the parents if necessary or desired, hoping to build better relationships and connections between parent and teen.

Having grown up not feeling quite all female, but not quite all male, I understand what dysphoria can be like as well as uncertainty in who you are. It doesn't need to be scary and lonely--whether you're the parent of a transgender, Nonbinary, or gender questioning child or you're the one wanting to identify your gender or transition.

Having grown up not feeling quite all female, but not quite all male, I understand what dysphoria can be like as well as uncertainty in who you are. In fact, I'm still on my own gender journey! I do know, that it doesn't need to be scary and lonely--whether you're the parent of a transgender, Nonbinary, or gender questioning child or you're the one wanting to identify your gender or transition.

Having grown up not feeling quite all female, but not quite all male, I understand what dysphoria can be like as well as uncertainty in who you are. In fact, I'm still on my own gender journey! I do know, it doesn't need to be scary and lonely--whether you're the parent of a transgender, Nonbinary, or gender questioning child or you're the one wanting to identify your gender or transition.

I believe anxiety isn't something to be ignored, pushed aside, or "gotten rid of", but something to be managed and explored that it has a lot to teach us about ourselves. Anxiety is an evolved response to potential danger, and some of us have an overactive nervous system. Once we can look at what it is trying to show us or teach us, it becomes easier to manage.

For those looking for longer term therapy or reasons to the "why" of their behaviors, thoughts, feelings, or experiences, psychodynamic looks at our childhood experiences and our unmet needs. It's not about blaming caregivers, but understanding our younger selves better so we can provide what that part of us needs today to reduce reenactment of unmet childhood needs. This therapy relies a lot on the therapeutic relationship.

When working with anxiety and/or gender identity struggles, DBT is helpful to understand how we think about gender as influenced by society and others. DBT can helps through being mindful of thoughts, feelings, and events, building distress tolerance, exploring current interpersonal relationships, and learning to regulate one's emotions.

EMDR stands for eye movement desensitization reprocessing therapy. EMDR is a great way to approach traumatic events from one's past in a way to reprocess them as no longer threatening and therefore reduce prolonged trauma responses from past events. Sessions are done weekly, can be done in office or virtual. It can be short term or long term therapy.