About Us

If you have OCD, Body Dysmorphic Disorder, or Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors, this section is for you.

Working with OCD and related disorders is my greatest therapy passion. As you likely already read, I have struggled with severe OCD too. My own experience with OCD gives me a deep understanding of my clients, and of how OCD functions. I also have thousands of hours working with clients. I’ve worked with individuals of all ages, and with very severe cases. I know that struggling with this disorder can feel very isolating. People often have a lot of shame about what their OCD latches onto or what OCD causes them to do. Hear me when I say that there is hope. I’ve healed so much, and I’ve watched my clients heal greatly too. There’s no fear or obsession that OCD could latch onto that would be too big

The foundation of my OCD therapy approach is Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP). The most important brain-changing techniques for OCD come from this modality. ERP shouldn’t feel like relentless torture while you face your fears. I will work with you at your pace to learn to live what I call an “ERP lifestyle”. I draw upon ACT principals a lot as well in my approach. OCD therapy should be about helping you live a meaningful life, with less time spent giving OCD power, and more time living towards your values.

Additionally, I love to finally be able to work on all of the other “stuff”. People with OCD are also just regular people. All of the other approaches and techniques I mention below also apply. OCD doesn’t exist in a bubble. Oftentimes past experiences, traumas, attachment, and many other factors combine with obsessions and compulsions and need a combined approach to be addressed.

We discuss the nervous system a lot in therapy; think fight-flight-freeze-fawn. It turns out our brains and our bodies are not separate but one-in-the-same. Based on Polyvagal Theory, which is a collection of neuroscience, evolutionary, and psychological research, we now know that the nervous systems that run throughout our body are involved in nearly every aspect of our mental health. I help all of my clients understand how to regulate their nervous system and understand the factors impacting their nervous system’s lack of regulation. Some of these factors can include stress, traumatic experiences, childhood upbringing and attachment, neurodivergence such as OCD, ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, and so many other things. To sum it up, many of the mental health diagnoses that are talked about are truly the nervous system getting stuck unregulated.

I rely heavily upon an approach called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). I find that everyone benefits from learning from this mindfulness based approach. It focuses on helping people learn to be more resilient, understand how to detach from their suffering, and live a life of meaning. This leads to being more psychologically flexible. And who wouldn’t want to have more of that in their life?

I think that we can all agree that humans are relational creatures. Whether we believe it or not, connection or attachment as we therapists call it, is a need just like safety, or nourishment. Attachment Theory has helped us understand that this attachment system is developed from birth. Right from the beginning of our lives, we are learning how to connect with our parents so that we will be able to get our needs met. This is often where things start to go wrong. Our early relationship experiences give us the blueprint for our attachment in our adult lives. Often, this is where shame starts to develop. Thankfully, we humans are also hardwired to heal. Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT) is an approach that is rooted in attachment theory. This is the approach I use when working with couples. Not surprisingly, our attachment system is most obvious in our romantic relationships. 

You probably have recognized conflicting aspects of yourself from time to time. We call these aspects, our parts. Each of us has many parts with different roles. This idea sounded very strange to me at first, but the experience with my different parts felt intuitive to me. IFS can be a powerful healing tool. It is truly  more of an experience and feeling-based therapy than it is a thinking-based therapy. I find that this helps people to heal from deep emotionally traumatic wounds, move out of strong defenses, and access the true self within all of us.

It would be wrong of me not to mention these extremely important factors. My approach consists of also encouraging clients to go out in nature, get enough movement/exercise, sleep well, eat balanced meals, drink water, limit screen time, and address spiritual needs. Sometimes these factors alone are what’s necessary.