Individual Counseling

I practice Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (IS-TDP). The therapy suggests that mental health symptoms come from the defensive ways in which we have learned over time to manage inner conflicts between: our emotions, our sense of ‘right and wrong’ and our environment.

We will focus on the problem(s) that bring you into counseling as well as how you experience your emotions, what you do with your emotions and how to understand yourself in deeper and meaningful ways.

We do this by noticing what happens in your body to bring awareness of your feelings. We will process and link things together to understand its impact on the present conflicts and problems you are faced with.

In therapy we encourage you to work through these internal conflicts experientially in the present moment, with me (your counselor) as a guide to help you heal from your past to revive healthy emotional connection and expression with yourself and others. The therapy can be uncomfortable at times because of the nature of seeing what you have been through during difficult moments in life while allowing your therapist to help you heal from the inside out.

IS-TDP is good at helping with:

  • Personality disorders

  • Treatment resistant depression or anxiety

    • This is when therapy or medications dont alleviate the depression or anxiety symptoms sufficiently.

  • Anxiety disorders

  • Trauma/PTSD

  • Substance/Alcohol abuse

  • Medically unexplained symptoms (also known as Somatic disorders)

  • Chronic pain

  • Spiritual issues

How long is IS-TDP treatment?

Treatment can be as long as you need it to be, but most people are engaged in therapy for a year to sustain inner healing forever. Therapy sessions can be held online or in-person or a mix of both modalities to help you meet your mental health goals. IS-TDP treatment for each person looks different and is highly customizable based on your emotional, relational and mental health goals. Some people report significant changes as soon as the first session, most within a month of starting counseling that solidifies as character change after a year.

In most cases I suggest we meet for 3 hours (180 minutes) for our first session so that we can learn quickly what your needs are and if you think we can work well together. Then most sessions are 45 minutes to 90 minutes and repeat weekly for 20-40 sessions for best results.

You can get more information about costs related to therapy here.

Nobody accomplishes anything significant alone.

But nobody accomplishes anything significant by accident either. Just because you need others doesn't mean you can wait for others to make it happen.

You have to act as if you are a force of nature and try to bend the universe in your desired direction—while remaining pleasant and open to help along the way.

James clear, 2022