Complex Trauma Therapy in Austin, TX
My Approach to Trauma Therapy
My work is grounded in the belief that people already carry within themselves the capacity for growth, and that meaningful shifts often happen through relationships where we feel understood, respected, and safe enough to explore.
I'm interested in more than helping you manage symptoms. I want to understand why your responses make sense, even when they're causing difficulty in your life today.
Together, we pay attention to the patterns that keep showing up, the emotional truths underneath them, and the experiences that helped shape them. Sometimes that means exploring memories from childhood. Sometimes it means noticing what happens in your body, emotions, or relationships right now.
We don't have to approach these patterns as things to fight or get rid of. We can begin by understanding them.
I draw from EMDR, IFS-informed parts work, Coherence Therapy, and other experiential and relational approaches. Each offers different ways of exploring the relationship between past experiences and present responses.
An important part of this work is memory reconsolidation, the process through which emotional learning can be updated through new experiences. It's one reason I believe that understanding ourselves, while valuable, isn't always enough on its own.
Sometimes the ways we've learned to get through life become the very things we're struggling with today.
You may understand a great deal about yourself. You might recognize your patterns, know where they came from, and even understand why you respond the way you do. And yet, that understanding doesn't always change how you feel or what happens in the moment.
Maybe you find yourself becoming overwhelmed by emotions, shutting down when things get difficult, or feeling responsible for keeping everyone around you okay. Maybe relationships bring up reactions that seem bigger than the situation calls for. Or perhaps you've spent so much of your life adapting to other people's needs that you're not entirely sure what your own are anymore.
These responses didn't develop without reason. At some point, they may have helped you navigate experiences that were difficult, unpredictable, or overwhelming.
Therapy offers a place to become curious about those reasons, understand what you've learned along the way, and discover what might be possible now.
I offer in-person trauma therapy in Austin and online therapy throughout Texas.
What is Parts Work?
We all have different sides of ourselves.
There may be a part of you that wants connection and another that pulls away. A part that feels responsible for everyone else and another that's exhausted by that responsibility. A part that understands something intellectually while another continues to feel afraid.
Rather than seeing these experiences as contradictions or flaws, parts work invites us to become curious about them.
What is this response trying to accomplish? What has it helped you navigate? What might it need from you now?
My approach is informed by Internal Family Systems (IFS) and Ego States Therapy. I don't follow one model exclusively, because different people and different experiences call for different approaches.
The goal isn't to eliminate parts of yourself. It's to develop greater understanding, connection, and flexibility in how you relate to your internal experiences.
What is Coherence Therapy?
Sometimes we continue responding in ways that don't seem to make sense, even when we know those responses aren't helping us.
Coherence Therapy begins with the idea that these patterns have an underlying emotional logic.
For example, you may know that you're allowed to disappoint someone, yet still feel overwhelming guilt when you do. Rather than trying to convince yourself not to feel guilty, we might explore what you've learned about disappointing others and why that guilt makes sense.
When we understand the emotional learning beneath a response, we can begin creating opportunities for something different to become possible.
This is where memory reconsolidation becomes particularly meaningful. New emotional experiences can sometimes update learning that has remained unchanged despite years of intellectual understanding.
What is EMDR therapy?
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a therapy approach that helps people process distressing experiences that continue to affect them.
Sometimes we know something is over, but our minds and bodies still respond as though the danger is present. A situation today might bring up fear, shame, helplessness, or a sense of responsibility that belongs to something we experienced long ago.
EMDR offers a way to work with those experiences so they don't continue to carry the same emotional intensity.
My approach to EMDR is collaborative and adapted to the person in front of me. Especially when working with developmental trauma or dissociation, I believe it's important to establish enough internal safety and stability before moving into more difficult material.
Trauma, CPTSD, and Dissociation
Trauma doesn't always come from a single overwhelming event. Sometimes it develops through repeated experiences of uncertainty, emotional disconnection, unmet needs, or relationships in which we had to continually adapt.
Those experiences can influence how we relate to ourselves and others long after the circumstances have changed.
I work with adults experiencing PTSD, complex PTSD (CPTSD), childhood and developmental trauma, and dissociation.
I also have specialized experience working with dissociative disorders, including DID and OSDD. When working with dissociative systems, I recognize and respect the experiences, needs, and perspectives of all members of the system. Our work emphasizes internal communication, cooperation, and safety rather than imposing a particular understanding of how a system should function.
Whether your experiences involve distinct parts or alters, emotional disconnection, difficulty remembering, or simply feeling unlike yourself at times, we can approach them with curiosity and respect.
Moving Beyond Understanding
One of the things I hear from people is that they already know why they do what they do. They've spent years reflecting, reading, and trying to understand themselves.
That understanding matters. It can be an important foundation for what comes next.
But sometimes the next step isn't another explanation. It's having a different experience with something you've understood for a long time.
My role isn't to tell you who you should become or push you toward a particular outcome. It's to bring my knowledge and experience into a relationship where we can explore what matters to you, understand what's been getting in the way, and make room for something new.
Therapy isn't about dismantling who you are. It's about developing a different relationship with yourself.
If you're considering trauma therapy, I offer sessions in person in Austin, TX, and online throughout Texas. You're welcome to reach out to explore whether working together feels like a good fit.