Services
- Individual
About My Clients
My clients and I often have shared identities - disabled, queer, trans/agender, neurodivergent (AuDHD), and more. My clients often struggle with eating disorders and substance use, are looking for harm reduction support or abstinence. My clients are often activists and organizers, with a strongly held value for social justice. My clients want an active, engaged, and collaborative therapy experience and often ask to be provided things to consider, or work on between sessions aka “homework.”
My Background and Approach
The primary philosophy and therapeutic lens I utilize is social justice therapy - this is focused on the understanding of intersectionality - yours, mine, & ours. It considers how these identities show up in our work, & how various societal systems are contributing to what you are bringing to therapy. This also includes working to flatten the hierarchy between therapist and client; I acknowledging we cannot fully achieve this, & I actively work to ensure you have power and choice within our relationship. This also means that you get to know me as a human - I am a very interactive and engaged therapist, so if you are looking for a “blank slate” therapist, I will not be a good fit! While I do bring my own lived experiences into my work, I also hold that your experiences are your own and work to have a shared understanding of your unique experiences. I also utilize harm reduction, fat positive/weight-neutral care, values work, abolitionism, somatics, disability justice, & more.
My Personal Beliefs and Interests
I believe that everyone is the expert of themselves and their lived experience. I believe that the society that we live in and the systems we are trying to survive under often create what we call “mental health disorders.” Diagnosis can be affirming and important, and it can also help be utilized to pathologize human experiences. I believe there is wisdom in how people try to cope (substance use, eating disorders, etc) but that coping can turn against us and we need to be supported to learn new ways of coping and survival. I believe we keep us safe. I believe access to choice helps to heal experiences and trauma where choice and power were taken away. I believe that our bodies hold our stories, and through learning to be embodied, we can heal past harms, that may even be intergenerational. I believe in affirming care, in all areas - sex/kink, non-monogamy/expansive relational structures, neurodivergence, gender, sexuality, disability and more.