Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)

Do your emotions sometimes feel overwhelming? Do you find yourself struggling with intense feelings, relationship difficulties, impulsive behaviors, self-criticism, or feeling stuck in patterns that seem impossible to change?

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is an evidence-based treatment designed to help individuals develop practical skills for managing emotions, improving relationships, tolerating distress, and building a life that feels meaningful and worth living.

DBT recognizes that many people are doing the best they can while also needing support to create lasting change. Rather than focusing on judgment or blame, DBT helps individuals understand the factors that contribute to emotional suffering while learning new ways of responding to life's challenges.

DBT focuses on four core skill areas:

Mindfulness – Learning to be present in the moment rather than becoming overwhelmed by thoughts, emotions, or past experiences.

Distress Tolerance – Developing healthy ways to cope with crises, painful emotions, and difficult situations without making things worse.

Emotion Regulation – Understanding emotions, reducing emotional vulnerability, and responding to feelings more effectively.

Interpersonal Effectiveness – Building stronger relationships through assertiveness, boundary-setting, and communication skills.

Jennifer incorporates DBT strategies to help clients increase emotional stability, strengthen relationships, and create sustainable change in their daily lives.

Radically Open Dialectical Behavior Therapy (RO-DBT)

Many people struggle not because they lack self-control, but because they have too much of it.

If you tend to be highly responsible, perfectionistic, emotionally guarded, self-critical, or feel disconnected from others despite appearing successful on the outside, RO-DBT may be a good fit.

Radically Open Dialectical Behavior Therapy (RO-DBT) is an evidence-based treatment designed specifically for individuals who struggle with overcontrol. While self-control is often viewed as a strength, excessive self-control can lead to loneliness, rigidity, emotional inhibition, perfectionism, and difficulty forming close relationships.

RO-DBT focuses on helping individuals become more flexible, authentic, and socially connected. Rather than teaching people to gain more control, RO-DBT helps people learn when to loosen control and become more open to new experiences.

Treatment focuses on:

• Increasing emotional openness and authenticity

• Reducing perfectionism and rigid thinking

• Strengthening social connectedness

• Improving flexibility and adaptability

• Developing self-compassion

• Learning to communicate needs directly and effectively

Jennifer utilizes RO-DBT to help clients build deeper relationships, increase emotional expression, and develop a life that feels more connected and fulfilling.

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

Traumatic experiences can leave lasting emotional, physical, and psychological effects long after the event has ended. Many people find themselves feeling stuck in painful memories, emotional triggers, negative beliefs about themselves, or patterns that seem difficult to understand or change.

EMDR is an evidence-based trauma treatment that helps the brain process and integrate distressing experiences in a way that promotes healing and resolution.

Rather than requiring individuals to repeatedly retell traumatic experiences in detail, EMDR helps clients access and process memories while remaining grounded in the present. Through the use of bilateral stimulation, the brain is supported in reprocessing experiences that may have become "stuck" in the nervous system.

EMDR can help with:

• Trauma and PTSD

• Childhood abuse or neglect

• Anxiety and panic

• Relationship trauma

• Grief and loss

• Negative self-beliefs

• Disturbing memories

• Performance anxiety and confidence issues

Jennifer utilizes EMDR as part of a comprehensive treatment approach that prioritizes safety, stabilization, and long-term healing. Treatment proceeds at a pace that respects each client's readiness and unique needs.

Dissociation Assessment and Treatment

Sometimes the effects of trauma extend beyond anxiety or emotional distress. Individuals may experience memory gaps, feeling disconnected from themselves, emotional numbness, difficulty staying present, or feeling as though parts of themselves are in conflict.

These experiences may be signs of dissociation.

Dissociation is a protective response that can develop when overwhelming experiences exceed a person's ability to cope. While dissociation often serves an important survival function, it can create significant challenges in relationships, daily functioning, emotional regulation, and a person's sense of identity.

Jennifer has received specialized training in the assessment and treatment of dissociation and works with individuals experiencing symptoms such as:

• Feeling disconnected from yourself or your emotions

• Memory difficulties or lost time

• Depersonalization and derealization

• Internal conflict between different parts of self

• Complex trauma and developmental trauma

• Chronic emotional numbness

• Difficulty remaining present during stress

Treatment focuses on increasing safety, strengthening internal awareness, improving emotional regulation, and fostering greater integration and connection within the self. Jennifer approaches dissociation with compassion and curiosity, recognizing that these adaptations often developed as a way to survive difficult experiences.

The goal is not to eliminate protective parts of yourself, but to help you develop greater understanding, stability, and connection so that you can move through life with increased confidence and wholeness.