Frequently Asked Questions

Sessions are mostly conversation, but not scripted conversation. I'll ask about what's actually happening for you: what a reaction felt like, what you expected to happen, what came up right before or after something shifted. Sometimes we'll follow a specific moment closely because it seems to matter more than it looks like it should. Other times we'll step back and talk through a pattern more conceptually. There's no fixed curriculum session to session; it depends on what's actually alive for you that day.

Some of what maintains a pattern isn't fully available in words yet. It might show up as tension, a certain kind of alertness, an impulse to look away, or a feeling in your chest before you can say what it's about. I'm not treating the body as a mystical source of hidden truth. I'm treating it as one more source of information, alongside what you think and feel, and sometimes it's the source that has something useful to say first.

This is one of the most common things people bring to therapy, and it makes complete sense. Understanding a reaction intellectually and the reaction itself often run on different systems. You can know you're safe while some part of you continues to respond as though you're not, because that part hasn't yet encountered anything that genuinely contradicts what it expects. Repeating the correct explanation to yourself rarely closes that gap. Therapy is partly about finding what would actually update it.

No. Some patterns do trace back to early relationships, and when that's relevant, we can go there. But I don't assume every difficulty has a childhood explanation, and I won't steer you toward one on principle. The relevance of your history should come from what actually seems connected to your present experience, not from an assumption I walk in with.

Not necessarily. Meaningful trauma work doesn't always require a complete narrative account of what happened. Some of the most relevant material shows up as present-day reactions, sensations, or expectations rather than a story, and we can work with that directly. If going into detail becomes useful later, we'll do it at a pace that makes sense to you, not all at once.

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is an approach I use, particularly for experiences organized more as sensation, image, or emotional reaction than as a coherent story. It's one tool among several, not something I apply automatically. Whether it fits depends on what we're working with and what seems useful at the time.

That's a completely normal starting point, not a problem to solve before we begin. I don't come in with a theory about what's wrong with you and try to confirm it. We look at what actually happens together: when a reaction shows up, what makes it stronger or weaker, what feels threatening about the alternative. Not knowing yet is a legitimate place to start from.

Talking things through with people you trust is genuinely valuable, and I'd never discourage it. What's different in therapy is that the relationship itself can become part of the material. If part of what you carry is an expectation that being fully known leads to rejection, being understood here without that happening is a different kind of information than a friend telling you it's not true. I'm also trained to notice patterns and shifts in the moment that are easy to miss on your own.

Sometimes, if it seems useful, but it's not the core of how I work. I'm more interested in what happens between us in real time than in assigning a standard set of exercises. If something specific would genuinely help between sessions, we'll talk about it.

Say so. Anything I suggest is a hypothesis, not a diagnosis of what's really going on. Your experience has priority over my theories about it, and if something I offer doesn't fit, that's useful information, not something to work around. Therapy works better as an honest back-and-forth than as me delivering conclusions.

If you want that, yes. I'm comfortable integrating Christian faith into our work when it's meaningful to you, though it's never required and won't come up unless you bring it in.

Sometimes a diagnosis is useful, for insurance purposes or as shorthand for a recognizable pattern, and I'll use one when it's genuinely helpful. But I don't treat a diagnostic label as an explanation of why your particular version of it exists. Two people with the same diagnosis can have very different things going on underneath it, and that's usually where I'm actually interested in looking.

That experience is exactly what a lot of my approach is built around. Gaining insight without corresponding change is common, and it usually means the explanation reached your thinking without reaching whatever's actually maintaining the pattern. I can't promise a different outcome, but the aim here specifically is to go past explanation toward something that updates the reaction itself, not just your understanding of it.

It depends on what you're working on and what kind of change you're looking for. Some people want focused, short-term work on a specific pattern. Others are working through something more layered that takes longer. I don't promise a fixed timeline or a permanent resolution, but I'll be honest with you along the way about what I'm noticing and whether we seem to be making progress.

Both. I see clients online across Texas and in person in Arlington, and sessions follow the same approach either way.

Yes, I'm in-network with several major insurance providers. See the Fees and Insurance page for the full list and current session rates.