"Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding."                 Kahlil Gibran

Individual Therapy

We are all seeking wholeness.  Internal conflicts can arise which cause crisis, sometimes immobilizing us in confusion, fear, anxiety or depression, and impairing our ability to form and maintain healthy interpersonal relationships.  Viewed another way, these conflicts are our teachers.  With training and experience in a variety of modalities including psychodynamic psychotherapy, cognitive-behavioral interventions, family systems theory, and ego-psychology, Lauren uses a strengths-based approach, with a direct and nurturing style, to address each client's needs.

Lauren provides individual therapy with a particular focus on interpersonal relationship issues.  With expertise in the resolution of childhood physical, sexual and emotional abuse, childhood and family trauma, grief and loss, identity development (in particular, adolescent identity development, gender identity development, cultural identity development, and sexual orientation identity development), mood disorders including depression and anxiety, parent and adolescent struggles, and living with a mentally ill family member, Lauren helps individuals develop awareness of their patterns of behavior and thought and how these may be impeding their growth and personal development.  Together with the client, Lauren can help set goals and design a plan of action for the resolution of internal conflicts which will aid in the development of healthy relationships.

Couple's Therapy

We are hurt in relationship, and we can be healed in relationship.  Whether you are seeking to improve your understanding of what is happening in your relationship, build communication and empathy skills, or have descended into a downward spiral of fighting or conflict avoidance and believe that there is little hope for the relationship to be saved, couple's therapy can help.  Drawing on training and study in a variety of different techniques and schools of thought, most notably family systems theory, The Gottman Institute 's research on marriage, Imago Relationship Theory , Non-Violent Communication , and current thinking in neurobiology and human relationships, Lauren will assist a couple in solving the mysteries of their difficulties.  She can help partners discover their individual areas of growth and tasks to complete, stop hurting each other and learn how to get their mutual needs met.  In so doing, partners in a couple learn to see themselves and their relationship clearly, with greater compassion for their partner and for themselves, and can journey forward toward authentic connection and wholeness.

When we meet and partner with another person, we are often deeply in love and swept up in the early, romantic phase of relationship.  Eventually, however, most relationships reach the stage of power struggle, in which we see the other person as hurting us in ways we have previously been hurt, or frustrating us in our desire to have our needs met.  Some partners are able to pass through the power struggle stage and learn skills to help them resolve future conflicts.  Many others, however, can benefit from the caring, sensitive assistance of a knowledgeable and experienced therapist.

Couples' therapy is not individual therapy with two people; it is a process in which the individual histories, motivations, wounds and strengths of each person are considered, with a focus on how those factors are playing out in the dynamic relationship of the partners, and interventions are suggested at the level of the relationship. 

Lauren provides respectful, accepting, and non-judgmental therapy to partners in intimate relationships, in whatever ways partners choose to form and define those relationships.   

Therapy FAQ

How do I hire a therapist?

To assist you in your search for the right therapist for you, at this time, and given the issues you wish to be working on, here are some links to directories of other therapists.  You can check out the  National Association of Social Workers, Oregon Chapter, and also my colleagues at Wise Counsel & Comfort , among other resources.  You may wish interview several therapists to ask questions about their education, experience, areas of focus, philosophical or theoretical orientation, office location, and fees.  In addition, it can be helpful to interview a prospective therapist in person to see if there is a "fit" between you. For this reason, Lauren makes available the option of an intitial, one-half hour in-person consultation appointment at no charge.

How do I make an appointment? 

You can email or telephone to set up an intial in-person consultation. Sessions are by appointment only, with some evening, early morning and weekend availability.

    Just shopping around? The intial, half-hour consultation is offered at no charge. 

    More sure you'd like to go forward? You may choose to schedule an initial, one-hour in-person consultation at half price. 

How much does it cost? 

The initial, half-hour consultation is offered at no charge.  Individual therapy is scheduled in one-hour sessions, at $100.00 per hour (a 20% discount is offered for clients who pay out of pocket rather than bill insurance).  Couples therapy is scheduled in 1 1/2 hour sessions, at $120.00 per hour. Alternatively, you may schedule an initial, one-hour (individual) or 1 1/2 hour (couples) in-person consultation at half price.  Reduced fees and payment plans are negotiable.

What happens next?

Should you decide to commit to therapy, you will be asked to complete a series of documents including an Intake Form, a Consent for Therapeutic Services form, and a Confidentiality Form.  In contracting for services, together with the therapist you will develop goals you would like to acheive, and estimate the length of treatment.  You will then set a regular appointment time, during which time the therapist will be totally focused on you, and the achievement of your life goals.