Welcome to my practice! I am a therapist in Eugene, Oregon who specializes in working with treatment-resistant depression, anxiety disorders, and marital therapy/couples counseling. I do this using Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to help you in your struggles with depression and anxiety. For relationship issues, I also use Gottman Method Couples Therapy.
I come from a multi-generational family of therapists and psychologists. I have grown up in this environment all my life and “breathed the air” of psychology, so to speak. This experience has taught me that the hardest part of change for anyone is in getting to know yourself and to face the areas where we feel stuck at in life.
My goal is to help people looking connect with what they have lost in both life and in themselves. I feel very strongly that we can let what happens in our lives make us angry, resentful and afraid, or we can embrace these events as a way to grow stronger, yet softer, and end up being more open to where we need to be in life. This process of personal recovery is amazing to witness and I am always impressed by the motivation of my patients towards change.
Areas of Focus
- Treatment-Resistant Depression: Feeling overwhelming sadness, or simply not being able to enjoy the things we used to; sometimes this comes across as an intense lack of motivation. Getting past a major depressive episode can be very difficult with general “talk therapy” and often requires a structured approach such as Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy.
- Generalized Anxiety: Worry that is persistent, repetitive, and uncontrollable. We try to come up with solutions against the uncertainty of the future, but it doesn’t reduce our sense of unease.
- Panic Attacks: A sudden surge of intense fear or discomfort with physical symptoms, such as chest pounding, feeling disoriented, and shortness of breath. We end up avoiding situations and fear that we might be going crazy, dying, or losing control.
- Social Anxiety: A fear of being evaluated negatively by others. We are anxious about appearing anxious in front of other people and tend to avoid certain interpersonal situations or endure them with a source of dread.
- Marital Therapy & Couples Counseling: The one thing a therapist cannot do is help two people become friends. However, better communication tools and learning to argue effectively in a healthy, productive way are skills that can be taught.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are you accepting new patients? Yes. I am currently accepting new adult patients for counseling, ages 18 and up. I provider both in-person appointments at my office in Eugene, as well as online/video therapy for individuals located in Oregon and Arizona.
Can you bill my insurance? I am in-network and a preferred provider with PacificSource, First Choice Health Network PPO, Samaritan Health Plans, Kaiser Permanente (“Added Choice”), Providence, United Healthcare, and BlueCross BlueShield. You can also be seen as a private pay patient, which has the added benefits of increased privacy, confidentiality, and control.
Can I use my HSA/FSA card? Yes. In addition to being able to accept health-savings/flexible spending account (HSA/FSA) cards, I can also accept checks and VISA, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover cards.
What is the first appointment like? After reviewing your initial paperwork, we’ll spend time talking about what issues you’re facing, what sort of struggles you’ve had to deal with, and what you’re hoping to get out of therapy. This also allows you to get to know me and my style, as it’s important that we both feel that we are a good fit in order for counseling to be helpful.
How long are the sessions? Most therapy sessions generally last about 50 minutes. I generally schedule appointments once every 1-2 weeks, depending on your needs and goals. It’s important to remember that therapy is never a “quick fix”. It requires commitment towards personal growth and change. That being said, most people benefit from having at least 6-10 sessions.
I can only see you on Thursday evenings, I might need to cancel an hour beforehand, and I’ll need to bring my cat… My, that’s a lot of conditions (Yes, I actually got this question once). This generally isn’t a good sign, so we should talk further. My experience over the past 25 years has been that the more conditions we place on ourselves, the less likely it is that therapy will be very helpful or effective.