Couples Counseling Therapists in Southwest, Portland, OR

You came here because you have a desire to deepen your relationship with yourself and others, you feel stuck in patterns you hope to change, are processing trauma, or are looking to reclaim lost parts of yourself. You have come to the right place. Working with adults with childhood trauma/complex trauma, couples/relational systems, chronic pain/illness, and queer/trans/non-binary individuals and relationships, I create spaces for care and collaboration. I hope to assist you in building a bridge to yourself that unlocks your inner wisdom and weaves together the vast embroidery of stories, sensations, and emotions in your life.

Our relationships can provide us feelings of connection and safety, and give our lives meaning and purpose. They can also bring us pain and disappointment. Is your relationship in trouble? I specialize with issues that can result within relationships, from premarital to divorce, as well as blended family concerns. Whether communication issues, unresolvable conflict, infidelity/affair, addiction, abuse or mental health issues have affected your connection and attunement, I can give you the tools to turn things around in the present and the techniques to provide consistent connection in the future.

I work with individuals and couples struggling with a wide variety of concerns such as anxiety, depression, life transitions, and relationship difficulties. My therapeutic style is gentle, warm, and relaxed. Often, sessions with me include laughter, celebrating your successes, and encouraging your efforts for change. I will empower you as you explore what changes you want to make in your life, help you build the skills you need to make those changes, and support you as you build the life you want to live.

My focus as a therapist is cultivating an environment of acceptance and warmth so that my clients may feel empowered to engage in self-exploration and develop additional ways of coping. I facilitate self-exploration aimed towards increasing client's sense of joy, creativity, self-forgiveness, perspective, confidence, warmth, compassion, and desire to heal. I have experience providing therapy for clients experiencing postpartum depression and anxiety, infertility, and mental health issues in pregnancy. I also have experience with generalized anxiety, depression, stressful life transitions, grief, trauma, and relationship issues.

Life is too short to feel so stuck. I believe that anyone can make change in life when they are ready. I have extensive experience as a therapist and my clients often report feeling better after just a few sessions. I believe that through approaching change in a holistic manner, addressing both mind and body in an atmosphere of trust and collaboration healing can occur. It takes courage to seek counseling and ask for help. I am active, engaged, and supportive in my work with clients.

Therapy can offer hope in the midst of depression, anxiety, trauma, stressful challenges in work, relationships, health, or other arenas of life. It can also help us respond thoughtfully and creatively rather than anxiously or destructively. I am a firm believer in learning to be open towards yourself, your relationships, and life transitions. This is a more powerful motivator than mentally beating yourself up. We'll work together to identify strengths you can use towards making important life changes, and to build coping skills to deal with difficult emotions, trust, relationship issues, and negative thoughts you might have about yourself.

I work with adults and young adults facing difficult passages in their lives. I've learned that there is always opportunity in crisis, and development when things feel stuck. It means a lot to me to help people feel understood and to find meaning in their lives. I work with High functioning adults, young adults and couples.

Your mental health is important! Connecting with family, friends and the world around you can be difficult if you are struggling with worry, extreme sadness, stress or trauma. Counseling can lessen the burden of your daily struggles and foster a healthy life.

From the very beginning, I work to build trust and a foundation for my clients that allows them to feel safe to share and explore their personal narrative. I empower individuals to recognize that they have the ability to change negative ways of thinking, create new patterns of relationships with themselves and others, and set boundaries that allow them to move through the world feeling supported. My main focus is treating eating disorders using the HAES foundation. I am a certified clinical trauma professional currently working on my EMDR certification. Other modalities I utilize are CBT, DBT, IFS, Solution Focused, MI, and more.

I AM NOT PRESENTLY TAKING NEW CLIENTS. In therapy, I work to develop a relationship where you can both specifically explore the issues that have brought you to therapy- depression, anxiety, relationship struggles, lack of purpose, trauma, drug and alcohol issues-- and your life, in general. This atmosphere allows you to gain more self-knowledge and self-acceptance as well as to see fresh perspectives on your troubles and desires. You can then begin to find a way through some necessary changes. An important aspect of my therapy approach is encouraging clients to take steps to live life in more alignment with who they are.

My orientation to counseling, psychotherapy and hypnotherapy is essentially a strengths perspective with a solution focus. The strengths perspective acknowledges all the strengths, resources and instinctual imperatives within an individual that have helped the individual get to the present moment.The strengths perspective helps me scan for the resources needed to resolve or modfy the treatment concern.

There aren’t many things in life that are as satisfying as feeling “at home” with your partner. You feel safe, comfortable, and connected. You feel like when you express yourself, you’re being heard, and you’re being given the benefit of the doubt. Alternatively, there aren’t many things in life that can feel as miserable as feeling disconnected from your partner. You constantly feel uncared for, misunderstood, unheard, defensive, angry, and resentful. And it feels like there’s no escape.

Despite what Instagram, TikTok, or an opinionated in-law may have us believe, none of us are born knowing how to parent, and many of us are actively working on changing intergenerational patterns in our own families in order to better support the growth and development of our children, in essence, reparenting ourselves. This process is a difficult one, and not meant to be done in isolation. Together we can look at how you were parented, how you want to parent, and how to bridge any gaps in between.

Life can hurt. Set-backs, emotional pain, social awkwardness, fear of anger, shame or rejection can block that which we desire most-loving nurturing relationships, affirmation from others, and self-valuing. I have been helping individuals and couples better achieve those desires for 40+ years. I bring a long history of a variety of skills to a mutually created process.

Have you been through a difficult experience? I specialize in emotional and relational disorders arising from trauma, sexual abuse, attachment disruptions, and less-than-optimal early childhood experiences. These types of experiences can create life-long distress and difficulty with relationships. Finding the right therapist is an important first step in healing from trauma. My orientation integrates modern neuroscience with relational psychotherapy. In addition to traditional methods, I utilize expressive approaches such as sandtray, play therapy, psychodrama, movement, and art therapy in my practice. I will tailor your sessions to meet your unique needs and ways of expressing yourself.

Hi! I love working with individuals, families and human beings in all types of relationship structures. Many clients have worked with me on anxiety, healing from trauma, navigating relationships, family conflict, parenting challenges, LGBTQ+ issues, depression and improving their relationships with themselves. My counseling is about supporting you in the way that you need to be supported while empowering you to deeply tune into your authentic self. In my practice, I strive to co-create a compassionate, non-judgmental, open space in which we can collaborate to clarify goals, build healing, strengthen skills and cultivate resilience.

About Me: I am a compassionate and dedicated CSWA with a passion for helping individuals navigate life's challenges and achieve their full potential. I will be working through Mindful therapy services. With a Master's degree in Social work and 6 years of experience in both clinical and private practice settings, I provide a safe and supportive environment where clients of all ages, race, gender, and sexual orientation can explore their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors in a safe space.

I support individuals, couples, and families who want to reconnect to themselves and each other. Many clients come to me to learn how to identify and communicate their needs, understand recurring patterns in their life, process difficult experiences, and connect to their intuition and authenticity. So often in life we have to hide certain parts of ourselves to be accepted. In therapy together you won’t need to filter or mask yourself to be respected or understood. I love working with all types of people and have additional experience working with adults on the spectrum and those in mixed neurotype relationships.

As a second-generation Chinese/Korean immigrant, I intimately understand the experience of being “othered.” It’s from this deeply personal place that I developed a passion to support individuals and couples with marginalized and intersecting identities. I am committed to supporting clients with processing and healing from challenging experiences, strengthening a sense of identity, and cultivating self-compassion.