Make today your first day to being more empowered! 

"In that brief moment, I saw everything fall in place. It all made sense to me. I was ready to deal with the rest of my life after that!"

In 2016, I developed my own private practice Growth Rings Relationship & Family Therapy, Inc to focus on providing brief and longer-term therapy that is trauma -informed, LGBTQIA+ and gender afforming, as well as creative expressive and play - based therapies to change relationship structures both within self and with others. 

LGBTQIA+ and Gender Affirming care: With a focus on working with people who identify as LGBTQIA+, I specialize in helping people of all ages from children to adults who are dealing with identity issues, traumas like grief, loss, resolving childhood abuse and neglect, other family conflict, adjusting to a medical condition, isolation and abandonment as a result of coming out, and coming to terms with other negative life events.

Trauma - Informed Care: I provide several methods to address and resole life traumas, including EMDR, Brainspotting, Cogntive Processing Therapy, IFS, Traumaplay, sandtray and others. 

I specialize in helping members of the LGBTQIA+ communities with gender - affirming care and supporting the life you want to live. 

I also specialize in neurodivergent-informed care for autistic and ADHD clients, from children through adulthood. I offer play therapies to support adjustment and growth as well as improve family relationships.

Bad things happen to all of us, but we don't need to let these make our lives bad. Bring your life into balance. Change begins when you choose to find help, and I am very willing to help you build a more positive life and make change happen.  

Don't lose your self in today's problems. Find youself again instead! I offer both brief and longer term therapies with a systems-focused approach to help individuals, couples, families and groups in many ways. I work with people from diverse backgrounds and orientations, as I believe everyone is valuable. I also use playful, creative approaches as well as evidence-based practices to help you find your "self" again.

I am also very interested in supporting parents and children to address and resolve adjustment and emotional issues, and develop stronger attachments.  I work with families and couples who are facing gender identity and adjustment issues. If you are looking for a therapist who will consider your needs and preferences in a nonjudgmental and accepting manner, I am available for you. We can work through life -stressing issues together and make life - changing happen. 

I have experience working with relationship issues, coming to terms and adjusting to disability, accepting and reclaiming your self in spite of a medical condition, becoming comfortable and feeling valued in life when facing difficult challenges, and with issues common to LGBTQIA+ identifying people, people with HIV, autistic clients, and people with ADHD I have worked extensively with PTSD symptom resolution.  

CHILDREN, PRE-TEENS, and TEENS: Anxiety, Grief/Loss, Trauma, and/or Medical/Disability Issues

Growing up can be very stressful for everyone nowadays, especially if we experience depression, anxiety, low self esteem, traumatic events, negative thoughts about ones self. When grief and loss or medical trauma happens, it can be especially difficult to work things through. Sometimes, those big feelings get the best of us, and we can't do our best because we feel powerless to manage them. Let's play it through! Play therapies offer a natural way for children and teens to explore, create change, develop, and grow.  

I use creative expressive therapies and other playful therapy approaches to help children, pre-teens, and teens resolve symptoms and issues, adjust, find their voice, increase self-belief and develop a functioning self. Let's work together with you and your family so I can help you become a more confident, capable, and happy child or teen. 

HOW DO WE START?
Send me an email and let me know what you would like to work on. We will complete a free initial phone consultation to briefly discuss your needs and make sure that I am a good fit for the type of help and support you are looking for. Most of my sessions are provided through Telehealth using Doxy.me, a HIPAA-compliant app. For limited sessions, I do see younger children in the office. Depending on the time period, I may be able to set up an appointment pretty quickly, or I may need to add you to a short wait list. I am licensed in California as a Marriage and Family Therapist, License Number MFC #38843. I also have earned a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology and a Master's Degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. I consistently train in many evidence-based practices to stay up on the best ways to help others. I can be reached by email at [email protected] so let me know you are interested.  For younger clients seen in the office, I am located near the 101 and 134 freeways in Burbank/Toluca Lake just north of Hollywood. It is within easy access to many areas of Los Angeles, Burbank, and SFV, and the location is fully ADA accessible.  I look forward to hearing from you!