I am a New York University-trained therapist who is passionate about helping individuals, couples, and families uncover and process what experiences lie at the root of their suffering. Symptoms do not exist in a vacuum and are frequently the product of a singular event or, more often, an accumulation of experiences that cause emotional pain. I refuse to offer a band-aid solution that minimizes the infinite complexity of each unique life. Instead, I collaborate with patients to discover and work through what is underneath their struggles so that they may find true healing.
Formerly providing therapy for individuals from different cultures at NYU and developing resources for trans and non-binary youth in the foster care system, I have witnessed the transformative power of building a relationship with a therapist in which there exists genuine curiosity. I seek to learn who people are fully rather than reduce them to a set of problems or symptoms. This includes getting close to an individual, couple, or family’s pain, which requires honesty, bravery, and love from both patients and me. While confronting suffering can be uncomfortable, including discussing topics that have been stigmatized, shamed, or rendered taboo like race, sex, sexuality, gender expression, and class, I work actively alongside patients so that they can understand these emotional experiences and gain the relief and freedom that knowing oneself provides.
As a couples therapist, I look at a relationship in the big picture rather than a narrow view of one issue a couple faces. Committed to the health of all partners and the relationship in general, I am cognizant of the ways in which relationship dynamics can create and enable more visible conflicts. I act as an honest mirror for the relationships I see in couples therapy to help partners see one another and the relationship dynamic with more clarity. In some cases, this dedication means being unafraid to offer insights that might be difficult to hear in order to prevent reinforcing a dynamic that is damaging or unhelpful.
I similarly approach families with the perspective that there is no one “problem” in a family, but that each family member plays an integral role in upholding a family system that is no longer working. My job as a family therapist is to reveal all these roles within the system. I help families identify the patterns of interaction that play out and how and why these dynamics have originated and developed over time. By managing competing narratives, feelings, and personalities, as well as supporting family members to see how they impact one another, families can then disrupt these patterns to create a system that is happier and healthier for everyone.
I believe in the potential of creativity to allow for different aspects of individuals (some even previously unknown to them) to emerge, which can assist in the process of understanding themselves more thoroughly. In particular, influenced by my previous work as a teacher in a New York City high school, I use creativity to connect with kids and teens who can sometimes feel hesitant in the therapy environment. By developing a sense of comfort and safety through play, they are better able to push deeper into nuanced feelings that they may otherwise be unable or uncertain about expressing. While play is present quite literally in my therapy with young people, I also weave creativity into my therapy with families, couples, and adults in more subtle and specifically tailored ways as a means to open up vulnerability, build intimacy, and explore.