Individual and relationship therapy
for chronic illness and anxiety
You want to feel at ease, in mind and in body.
Your body is tired and aching, but your mind can’t stop spinning. You use up your limited spoons to show up for others and hope that you'll feel supported in return. Instead, you're feeling anxious and lonely, again. Thoughts like "What if I need too much?” and "What's wrong with me?" gnaw at you. Upsetting memories and fears about the future get in the way of you feeling in control and present, whether you’re with a partner, at the doctors office again, or trying to take care of yourself alone. You want to hide when thinking about bringing up the necessary conversations with loved ones about your changing needs, so for now, those needs go un-expressed and unmet.
You already believe that we all deserve extra support and a safe place to heal, especially when we are coping with changes in our bodies, our sense of identity, and our relationships.
I specialize in helping you riding the waves of change with calm and confidence.
Practice Specialities
Approaches to Therapy
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Using trauma-informed approaches including Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), you’ll build skills to cope with the out-of-control feelings caused by upsetting reminders of the past. You’ll also reprocess traumatic memories that feel stuck in your brain so that you can finally enjoy emotional safety and wholeness.
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Through psychodynamically-focused Narrative Therapy, you’ll challenge the negative, limited, and often downright oppressive narratives you’ve absorbed about your brain and your body that have held you back from trusting yourself. You’ll re-understand yourself as the leader of your life story as we explore how your early life experiences and current interactions with the world inform how you feel about yourself now.
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With Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT), you’ll practice self-acceptance and self-compassion. You’ll learn to gently notice the impact of your thought patterns on your relationships, your physical health, and your self-worth. You’ll see that your reactions aren’t inherently “irrational” when you’re experiencing injustice, exploitation, and macro-level trauma in our world.
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Research consistently shows that, regardless of what specific technique is used by therapists, a genuine, safe relationship between your therapist and you is the most important factor in you feeling better and having a positive experience in therapy. No matter what specific approach we decide works for your goals, we will always be exploring with honesty the way that being in therapy feels to you and make adjustments to our process as needed. We will work in alliance to ensure that you can show up both as a work-in-progress and your most authentic self at the same time.
I'm Alicia.
I’m a therapist who works with anxious adults who want to change their relationship to their health and their self-worth virtually all throughout Pennsylvania. I use she/her pronouns. I accept my clients without judgement and work with humility to learn how my clients experience their world while holding expansive identities.
I’ve been honored to witness the vulnerability and depth of my clients inner worlds throughout 10 years of working with sexual trauma survivors, people with chronic health conditions and their caregivers, queer and trans folks, and people practicing ethical non-monogamy or polyamory.