Professional Treatment with Compassion
Life can be painful. Sometimes we are forced to face and adapt to things that have happened outside of our control. Sometimes our own thoughts, feelings and behaviors can feel overwhelming and cause us distress.
Your Guide Toward Change
Tailored For You
Asking the right questions and then really listening to someone’s experience is vital in gathering the information needed to provide the best help. I seek to work as a team with each client in creating an individualized treatment plan and meeting their needs.
Best practice
Best practice always includes using evidence-based treatment. I use researched treatment methods that have been shown to have the best results in addressing what my clients are going through.
Connecting
I seek to connect with each client whether it’s meeting in person or via tele-health. Earning and being worthy of my clients’ trust is an honor that I take seriously and seek to protect. It is a privilege to be a part of my clients’ journey.
My Clients and Collaboration
I work with people of all ages: children, adolescents and adults. Treatment is tailored to meet the developmental level of each client. With a client’s permission, collaborating with school personnel and other treatment providers in an individual’s life is included in providing the best integrated care.
Why Choose Briana
It’s important to have a professional who knows what to do and how to help.
With over 20 years’ experience as a licensed therapist, I am committed to providing compassionate care to help each client heal and create the positive change they desire.
Treatment Specialties
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and related Spectrum Disorders
The symptoms of OCD can be very painful and debilitating. Constant intrusive, unwanted thoughts that create high levels of anxiety compel a person to engage in repetitive physical or mental behaviors in order to alleviate the anxiety. Fear of the intrusive thoughts and anxiety often leads to avoidance of any potentially triggering situations and can restrict a person’s functioning. As OCD can take a variety of forms in its presentation and can be complicated to treat, it’s important to have a professional who is very experienced in its assessment and treatment. I am a specialist having worked for over 20 years helping children, adolescents and adults overcome OCD symptoms. (Would like to be able to click on this paragraph and go to another page about OCD and Treatment)
Anxiety
Whether it be extreme states of panic, generalized feelings of worry, or specific worries in certain situations (such as social environments), anxiety can take many forms. No matter what the form, feeling anxious is painful and exhausting. Our natural tendency to avoid things that scare us can unfortunately often make symptoms worse over time. Knowing how to first identify the ways in which a person is unwittingly reinforcing the anxious cycle and learning how to break that cycle is a vital part of the treatment process. As an experienced professional I have been honored to join my clients in this process as they overcome their anxiety and enjoy their life.
Depression
Ongoing feelings of being sad and down, lacking energy for or interest in usual activities, isolating, changes in eating and sleeping habits, difficulty concentrating, and feelings of hopelessness and low self-worth are just some of the symptoms of depression. It’s not unusual for someone with OCD or another anxiety disorder to experience depression. However, depression can also occur on its own, sometimes as a result of difficult life events or sometimes without an identifiable trigger. Having compassion for and appreciating what a person is going through is part of building a trusting relationship where recovery can take place. Within that trusting relationship I help my clients develop healthier thoughts, behavior patterns and effective coping strategies. Being a part of my clients’ recovery in rediscovering the joy, value, and hope in themselves and in life is always my privilege.
Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD)
When someone is struggling with BDD, strong and irrational perceptions and beliefs of being ugly, gross or disfigured in some way can take over a person’s life. The beliefs can seem intractable despite well-meaning reassurance from friends and loved ones or even much evidence to the contrary. At its worse BDD can cause a person to become very depressed, completely isolated and avoidant of being seen by others. As a specialist for over 20 years in treating BDD I know how to best approach and treat the symptoms that can enchain an individual.
Nail Biting, Skin Picking, and Hair pulling are all part of what is referred to as Body Focused Repetitive Behaviors. While an individual may loath the outcome of the behavior (be it painful cuticles and nails, raw sores on the skin, or significant loss of hair) the behaviors are very difficult to stop. I work with clients to identify their patterns of behavior, sit through and resist the behavioral urges while they engage in alternate healthier coping methods.
