Stress, PTSD and Anxiety Therapists in Pleasanton, CA.

In addition to being a licensed Marriage Family Therapist, I am also a ceritified Somatic Experiencing Practitioner as developed by Dr. Peter Levine, and a certified Structural Integration Practitioner as developed by Dr. Ida Rolf. Using these body-based technologies in what we call a "bottom up" approach to anxiety and stress is a lot more effective than the "top down" approach of traditional Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. That's because anxiety and stress are artifacts of the reptillian brain and limbic system not the neocortex where CBT works.

Anxiety and Stress are both rampant in our modern society. It is my belief that relationships are both the root cause as well as the solution to struggles with anxiety. I take a family systems approach to address these issues by raising the functioning of the relationships in my clients' lives and allowing them to regulate and feel more peace day to day.

Experiencing occasional anxiety is a normal part of life. However, anxiety disorders and ongoing chronic stress can appear as repeated episodes of worry & fear, or develop into sudden feelings of intense anxiety with physical sensations, known as panic attacks. Your anxiety may feel related to an event or thought, and other times appear to occur randomly and without cause. Anxiety can develop at any age, when left untreated it may develop into depression. In therapy we will explore how anxiety is affecting your life. You will learn how your physical, emotional and mental health are connected and together create an effective treatment plan specific to your goals to improve your well-being.

Anxiety and stress are like an evil and corrosive thread that work their way through every aspect of a life. It can rob the joy that can make life worth living. I know from both personal and professional experience how anxiety and stress can take the joy out of life and also how to overcome these issues and put them in your past. With the aid of tools like EMDR CBT and guided visualizations I can help you overcome this issue and heal from the issues that drive it. Additionally, I can provide tools, coping skills, and other resources to help you manage this particular issue, and experience increased relief from these symptoms with each session.

The modern world we live in is full of amazing technological advancements and organizational wonders, but it is also more complex and demanding than ever before. The myriad competing demands of our lives, how busy we are, the continual pressure to do and be more creates enormous stress for all of us. This stress can escalate into anxiety and the added strain of these issues easily begins to short-circuit our ability to function at our best, to feel good, to maintain relationships and responsibilities. I can help you understand the internal and external forces creating these negative feelings, and together we can find strategies for minimizing stress and anxiety so you can feel better.

I work with clients using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, mindfulness, Narrative Therapy, Expressive Arts, and psychoeducation to address anxiety and stress. Many folks are experiencing extreme stress as a result of all we have experienced in the last year. I'm able to work with clients experiencing burnout, increased anxiety, and higher stress relying on neuroscience as the guide.