What is therapy?

Therapy (or psychotherapy) is one of many methods for helping people improve upon areas of their lives that are causing some level of distress or impairment. The process of therapy is based on an interpersonal relationship between a trained mental health professional and a person who is experiencing mental health concerns. Therapy is based on your individual needs, and our goal is to provide therapy in an environment that feels safe, personal, nonjudgmental, comfortable, and positive. We believe that therapy should feel challenging but equally rewarding and productive.

Therapy involves a variety of philosophical treatment approaches (e.g., Cognitive-Behavioral, Interpersonal, Psychodynamic, etc.) and includes a variety of formats (e.g., individual, group, marital/couples, and family therapy). The content discussed in session, the frequency of sessions, and the length of treatment are typically determined by what the client(s) present as areas of concern. For certain presenting issues, therapy is best conducted in conjunction with prescription medication.

What kind of therapy do we do?

Though we each employ some variety of treatment approaches, we collectively specialize in the application of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to treat most issues presented in therapy.

What is CBT?

Cognitive Behavioral therapy (“CBT”): CBT combines two highly effective therapies: cognitive therapy and behavioral therapy.  Through cognitive therapy people learn to recognize and change unhealthy or unproductive thought patterns. For instance, thoughts such as “I will fail,” “I am loser,” “I will never get that job,” “I will get sick and die” or, “If I get on that plane it will crash,” are all examples of thoughts that are probably furthering avoidance or unhappiness. Cognitive therapy is designed to help challenge these thoughts to develop more balanced and constructive way of thinking, for instance, “It’s worth a try,” or “This is hard but I can handle it” are more encouraging thoughts. 

Behavior therapy helps a person learn new behaviors to replace behaviors that may be self-defeating. Behavior therapy helps people identify ways they can confront situations (for instance a job interview, a social situation, or going somewhere new) or how to gain more pleasure in their life. Relaxation and breathing training are also examples of behavioral techniques. A goal of CBT is that you are learning new skills and techniques that you can practice with and without your therapist and ultimately apply on your own across different situations in your life. CBT is known to be briefer than other therapies, however for more complex problem, longer treatment may be helpful.

For a broader description of other treatment orientations, we recommend visiting the following web page: http://therapists.psychologytoday.com/rms/content/therapy_methods.html

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