Specialty
Domestic & Intimate Partner Violence
For what a relationship did to you, whether you are still in it or long out of it.
My path to becoming a therapist began when I worked with survivors of domestic violence in crisis. It is where this work started for me and it remains a specialty.
Intimate partner violence is not only physical. Control over money, over who you see, over what you are allowed to believe about yourself, does its own lasting damage — and is often harder to name afterwards precisely because there was nothing to point to.
What this can look like
- Managing someone else’s moods as a full-time job
- Second-guessing your own memory of what was said
- Losing track of what you used to like, or who you used to see
- Being out of it for years and still flinching at a raised voice
- Not being sure whether what happened to you counts
How I work with this
We go at your pace, and I will not press you toward any particular decision about a relationship. That is yours. What I can do is help you get your own account of what happened back — which is usually the thing that was taken first.
If you are still in the relationship, we will talk about safety in a practical way, and I will be honest with you about what therapy can and cannot do while it is ongoing.
Approaches I draw on
EMDR Therapy
A therapy that helps the nervous system finish processing experiences that got stuck.
Trauma-Informed Therapy
Working in a way that assumes what happened to you shaped how you are here, and doesn’t ask you to override it.
Relational Therapy
Using what happens between us as real information about what happens everywhere else.
Feminist Therapy
Taking seriously that some of what you are carrying was handed to you.
Questions
I already left. Isn’t it too late to be affected by it?
No. A large part of my work is with people who left years ago and find it still shaping how they are in relationships, at work, and with themselves. Leaving ends the situation; it does not by itself process it.
Is it safe to do this by video?
It can be, and it depends on your situation. You need somewhere private where you will not be overheard, and a device that is not monitored. We can talk through this before we begin, and I would rather you tell me the practical constraints than work around them silently.
Interested in working together?
Online sessions for adults in Pennsylvania and Virginia.