2025 Practice Updates

We are already through the first month of 2025, and I have been coming up for air after having a lovely restful time off during the holiday season. January is usually a busy time for welcoming new clients to my practice, preparing for tax season, and setting professional intentions for the year ahead. In this vein, I also want to acknowledge how much our country and world have changed since last year. Many clients are coming to therapy with many anxieties about their sense of community safety and belonging. I hope to provide support and services to meet you in those spaces of anxiety and offer ways to keep you healthy during these uncertain times.

This being said, here are a few pre-existing offerings and new updates in my practice in 2025:

1. Somatic processing: I have attended many somatic trainings and find that when we have too much coming at us, we often get emotions and stress stuck in the body. Therapy sessions can help us keep our bodies free from emotional and stressful blockages. Many suggestions involve finding micro-movements that feel good to the body, help to release stress, and activate more of our parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest).

2. Cannabis education: Last year, I completed a course on becoming a Cannabis Educator. While I am not able to give direct recommendations on the use of cannabis, I can talk through what and how cannabis can work as a healing medicine, a fantastic endocannabinoid system regulator, and how to manage symptoms of tolerance and titrating with CBD products. CBD is a non-psychoactive substance found in hemp and is legal for over-the-counter use. I highly advocate experimenting with CBD products to help with anxiety-related symptoms.

3. Florida clients with Blue Cross Blue Shield (Florida Blue) insurance: I am now an in-network provider for Florida Blue and am accepting new clients. If you have out-of-state Blue Cross plans, I offer to provide superbills for your therapy fees to see if you can get in-network reimbursement. Please remember that I cannot provide superbills if you live outside my licensed states (Illinois, Georgia, Florida).

4. Counseling Compact to expand provider access across state lines: The counseling field has initiated the same type of national licensing compacts that psychologists and other licensed providers already have. The national compact allows licensed counselors to become licensed in multiple states more easily. They hope the compact will be open for applications starting later this year. Upon learning more about the procedures, I hope to expand my access to Missouri, Wisconsin, Colorado, and other states.

Every year, I set learning goals aligned with my values as a psychotherapist and healer. This year, I am taking more courses around neurodiversity, obtaining more training specifically for women with ADHD, and taking a course on using nutrition supplementation to balance neurotransmitter function. I'm excited to share more about my learning and offerings in the coming months! In the meantime, if you are interested in working with me, my application is here. Take good care of yourself!

NEW Practice Offerings: South Carolina, insurance, and single sessions

With the recent completion of an updated telemental health ethics training course and the acquisition of valuable resources from The Knowledge Tree, I am thrilled to share that accessing telehealth in counseling is becoming more convenient for both counselors and clients. As a clinical counselor, I am excited about the potential to practice across multiple states through a national counselors pact, which could be in effect as early as next year. In the meantime, individual states are already making provisions. I have successfully registered as a telehealth counselor in South Carolina, which means I can now serve even more clients. These exciting changes will be updated on my website in the near future, making it easier for you to access the services you need.

For my valued Florida clients, I am delighted to announce that I am increasing accessibility by getting contracted with Florida Blue, or Blue Cross Blue Shield. I am working towards billing insurance by September or October. However, any BCBS clients who wish to be put on my waitlist can do so by emailing me or filling out my application. For clients who prefer to pay out of pocket, please remember that if you have out-of-network coverage, I can always create a superbill for you to submit to your insurance company for potential reimbursement. Your convenience and satisfaction are my top priorities.

Another way to approach healing services is by taking advantage of single-session or short-term options. If you are interested in remote energy healing (Thetahealing), a single session can often bring insight and relief to the energy body and mind. Astrology readings are also a great way to gain personal insight by booking a natal chart reading or asking a question that could be answered by reading your chart, such as: "What will my intimate relationships look like in the coming year?". Since I am a nutrition coach and cannabis educator, I can use my mental health background to help with any nutrition goals and stick with them. If you are using cannabis as medicine or for nervous system regulation, I am happy to provide education about ways to optimize cannabis as a personal medicine. Integration therapy for plant medicine work is one of the short-term options that can be used both before and after a journey. Many of my integration clients have reported benefiting from our work, and often are with me for 2-4 sessions. So many of these services are ways I can serve by offering short-term solutions for any of you concerned about cost over time.

If you are curious about any of these short-term offerings, feel free to ask me, and I will include your questions in my next blog post!

Enjoying the summer sun at my neighborhood beach.

Twenty Years of Practice: Authentic Collaboration

In the final installment of reflecting on my twenty years as a professional counselor, the last seven years of practice have been a lengthy integration process of evolving how I hold space for clients. As I incorporated more tools to help my clients become unstuck in trauma therapy, I also deconstructed my physical health to support treatment for PCOS. This process coincided with my plant medicine journey to give and receive love for my family, lessons in letting go, and uncovering the shadow parts of my identity that need more love and attention.

In 2016, I began to work with a nutrition company that specialized in optimizing my movement goals with food choices. I wanted to heal my metabolism from past eating disorders and learn how to eat to add muscle mass and reduce fat. This journey was challenging as my body adjusted to more food and weight training. I continued with more individualized nutrition and exercise coaching in 2017 and also began to increase my curiosity about using psychedelics for emotional healing. My spiritual practices continued to grow during this time. I received my first official astrology reading during the summer of the total solar eclipse, which prompted a lifelong curiosity to study astrology to understand my clients better.

In December 2017, the call to do plant medicine arrived, and my first experiences changed how I saw myself, my family, and our planet. I could access the love I knew I had inside me after feeling blocked from giving and receiving love freely. By the time 2018 arrived, I was ready to embark on my year-long astrology apprenticeship. My physical health had improved, my private practice was thriving, and I was beginning to learn more about the emerging field of psychedelic-assisted therapy and its promise in helping clients move through years of trauma and pain. By the end of that year, I had attended a training on psychedelic integration, which creates a space of intention for people who are using psychedelics for personal healing.

These significant events of personal and professional expansion showed me how I wanted to show up more effectively for my clients. My business coaching had prepared me for how to show up online to attract the ideal clients for more profound healing work. By January 2019, I had launched my new professional website, which reflects my professional, personal, and spiritual presence more authentically. The previous year had also revealed my need to separate from the family I helped create. I was devastated that the love I felt during plant medicine could not sustain our future, and the separation process unfolded throughout 2019. I also found Zen Buddhism to assist in a new chapter of life, and I spent a month in a Buddhist retreat at Green Gulch Farm in California to reset my nervous system for this transition.

By the time the pandemic appeared in early 2020, I welcomed the enforced solitude of quarantine. I was already living alone, and working from home had been a dream of mine for years. Despite how devastating and confusing this time was for the world, the pandemic gave me many gifts. I took advantage of my situation and relocated to Atlanta. I understood that my separation allowed me to start expressing more parts of my gender and sexual identities. Moving away from my familiar community allowed me to express myself without fear as I played with my appearance, my partnerships with others, and my spiritual curiosities.

By the end of 2021, it was time to relocate again to the Florida panhandle, where I could be closer to family and the ocean breezes. Becoming a digital nomad--a telehealth counselor--is now my reality. While my home base is in Florida, I retained my other counseling licenses due to increased client access. Professionally, I used the pandemic to learn more about ancestral or generational healing and somatic trauma therapy. In 2022, I embarked on a year-long training for ketamine, MDMA, and psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy. This training coincided with my autism diagnosis in June of the same year, which created another healing crisis.

Neurodiversity language had begun to increase online and in mental health communities as many people learned of their undiagnosed autism, ADHD, or other neurodiverse identities while being quarantined. I now see my struggles through the lens of life-long autistic burnout, which has manifested as chronic physical and mental health conditions consistent with a sensitive and rigid nervous system. As a result, I have since taken professional training to help support partners in neurodiverse relationships, help adult clients navigate the process of receiving a formal diagnosis, how to use cannabis as form of nervous system regulation, and have learned more about the Persistent Drive for Autonomy (PDA) profile in neurodiverse brains.

I understood that my ongoing struggles, apart from my trauma history, better fit within an autism diagnosis, and this transparency with new people in my life has been invaluable. Last year, I met someone who is now my long-term partner and confidant. Showing up more unmasked and myself was scary, but the reward is feeling unconditional love for Ryan and me as we navigate a new life together.

As a person who identifies as gender fluid, pansexual, and autistic, my professional journey now mirrors a more accurate representation of how I show up as a counselor. Being open to a collaborative relationship with my clients has been an ongoing process of curiosity and openness. I am incredibly grateful for all the mentors, colleagues and friends who have mirrored their own authenticity in order for me to give the same gift to all my clients. As a result, I want to keep a childlike sense of wonder in my work and life. If reading my professional evolution has increased your curiosity, feel free to fill out an application to work with me here or email me!

Ryan and I at his solo art installation in Panama City, December 2023. Photo by Galina Wells Photography.

Integration Services: For Psychedelic Therapies and Beyond

In the past year, I have been in a nine-month training program for ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP). I have previously written on the topic of psychedelic therapy here, and have been offering integration services for clients since early 2020.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with what integration therapy is, here is a brief description: when a person knows ahead of time they will be undergoing ketamine-assisted therapy (the only legal form of medicine-assisted therapy available), it is recommended they connect with a therapist to help prepare them for the sessions. These preparation sessions can help to process the goals of seeking KAP or other forms of plant medicine therapy. While I can help a client to set their intentions and plan for aftercare, I can not recommend clients seek to use illegal substances. Since I practice a harm-reduction model to substance abuse, clients are encouraged to discuss their plans while not expecting me to give direct feedback to use of illegal substances.

There are other indications for potential clients to utilize integration services. I have had several clients who either knowingly or unknowingly injested a psychedelic substance, and had a very challenging experience with ongoing symptoms long after the substance has exited their system. Integration services can help a client process these challenging experiences, much like in trauma therapy. Other instances where integration work can be helpful are: after any type of psychotic episode, prolonged depersonalization or derealization, or deep existential crisis.

Very often, KAP is done in a series of sessions for the most effective, symptom reducing treatment possible. It is recommended that clients have regular integration sessions after their KAP sessions in order to process and make sense of what they have experienced into their every day life. Clients often find these sessions to be very useful, especially when they experience great relief in symptoms, but don’t always remember what to work on. Most types of psychedelic sessions, if done well, provide an opening in a client’s life to make more significant, long-lasting changes in therapy they might have previously struggled to implement.

To demonstrate this point, behavior change is one of the hardest things to consistently implement for clients. After several of my plant medicine experiences, I received clarity in the areas where I wanted and needed to make changes. Most of these changes come in the way of lifestyle medicine, otherwise known as biohacking. The simplest example of implementing lifestyle medicine is with consistent nutrition and exercise that will support my ongoing healing process. One of my main areas of lifestyle medicine is using nature: the sun, water, ground, and fire sources to help balance my body and mind.

This morning I wasn’t feeling well. In order to aide in my bodies immune response, I drove to my nearby freshwater spring. I have made lifestyle changes to live in an area where I can access natural elements year round. Taking a morning plunge in the 68 degree water, swimming around, and then sunning off, was medicine for my body, mind and spirit.

If you are curious about ketamine-assisted therapy—which I don’t provide directly—integration services for previous or upcoming plant medicine journeys, or want to know more about working with me, please fill out my online application here, see my provider listing in psychedelic support here, and read more about my personal experience with plant medicine here. I wish you well in your journeys!

After a morning soak in the freshwater springs.

Psychedelic Therapy & Support

The field of trauma therapy is rapidly changing. Since my trauma specialty began to unfold in 2009, we continue to learn more about how systemic trauma can be to the body and the mind. In my own search for healing, I began to research the use of various native plants to help heal trauma. Growing research by non-profit groups such as MAPS have shown the amazing results of MDMA, ayahuasca and even cannabis on various mental health conditions, including trauma. Ketamine-assisted therapy is already being used to treat depression with amazing results. A link to a more comprehensive list of research can be found here. MAPS is now in it’s third phase of clinical trials for MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for PTSD, and pending FDA approval, will be expanding their access to the public by 2021.

In December 2017, I embarked on my own journey with Ayahuasca, which you can read more about here. Since that transformative experience, my intention has been to position myself as a therapist who can administer psychedelic-assisted therapy once it is approved for medical use. In that vein, I have received further training through the Zendo Project on how to help individuals integrate their plant medicine experiences. In experiencing healing in such an extraordinary state, being able to process these experiences within a supportive community or with a qualified professional is of the utmost importance.

The skills to attend to many forms of extraordinary states of consciousness is something I have been interested in for many years. Kylea Taylor explains these states of mind as “entering through a doorway, awakening from the normal trance of daily life in which our awareness is focused in a different way, so that we can navigate beyond the external and material world or though it in a very different way” (Taylor, 2017). Examples of possible extraordinary states are: dreaming, childbirth, intense grief, during somatic work, and using various plants as medicine.

While we are continuing to see the research unfold, hear the testimonials of the research participants who have found relief from years of suffering, therapists and doctors are getting trained now to be able to offer plant medicine as a legitimate treatment option. If you are a licensed professional interested in knowing more, please let me know! We need licensed therapists, doctors, and clinics who are willing to step up and invest in getting the training, and we can’t do it by ourselves. I am currently looking for prescribing doctors and therapists in Illinois, Minnesota and Colorado who are willing to join a treatment team. I am also listed on the Psychedelic Support website as a therapist who can offer integration services. Check it out!

I’ve linked many of the organizations and research topics within this post, but if you have further questions or would like a free consult on if plant medicine is for you, fill out an application here.
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Sources:
Taylor, K. (2017). The Ethics of Caring: Finding Right Relationship with Clients. Hanford Meed.

My Plant Medicine Journey

NOTE: This post was previously released on October 25, 2018 as a part of my writing series: Awake @ Dawn. Previous posts in this series will be released periodically.

I noticed that I was completely without pain. As we began to get out of the car and approach the airport for our trips home, I began to feel the tension return. The paradox was astounding. No pain at all, to the creeping in of old body patterns. I had been transformed. 

48 hours earlier, I was arriving to an undisclosed location where I would be partaking in three separate ayahuasca ceremonies. These would be with a group of strangers I had never met, with a husband and wife team who would facilitate the ceremonies. I had taken many months to pray and consider using this form of plant medicine to help heal aspects of my trauma history that weren’t responding to traditional therapeutic techniques. I was taking the plunge to see if this plant could help heal the blockages in my body and spirit. 

I am not a group person.  I have participated in many group experiences over the years both when I was a practicing Christian, and in graduate school. It’s not my comfort zone. I would much rather be vulnerable with one person than a whole group. We had a good mix of people who were brand new to ayahuasca as well as others who had done it many times before. As the weekend unfolded, our unity and appreciation grew for one another. I feel a closeness to them that is everlasting. We participated in each others deep healing process. 

The ceremonies are performed with many prayers, songs (called Iquaros), and rituals as ayahuasca has a very strong spiritual component passed down from the generations of shamans in South America. I will save you the details of the ceremonies, but only tell you that my life has never been the same since. In taking this plant, I not only entered into the most profound healing experience of my life, but I also have a very different view of my spiritual life and direction as a result. 

I also experienced physical healing and found that my body was able to return to a place of comfort and safety that I have never felt before in my whole life. I was able to feel a deeper sense of gratitude and appreciation for myself and all sentient beings. I was able to feel unconditional love for my husband and son. I was able to believe that it’s possible to live in complete freedom from the wounds of my past. I was able to gain further confidence as a healer for other people’s pain with out taking it on. I was able to fully release other people’s pain I’ve absorbed by being a therapist. I was able to more fully own my role as a leader and change agent for others.

One of the things I read by others who have testified about their ayahuasca experience is they feel a connectivity to themselves and others that allows them to never feel alone again. This is why the research around using various psychedelics for the treatment of mental health issues is so important. I can attest that this deep assurance of self, this connection to the life force of ALL, this profound peace in the midst of pain, has never left me since.

One of the hardest parts about a plant medicine experience is integrating back into day to day life. Even now, ten months later, I feel like I’m still integrating. My spiritual practices have continued and grown deeper. My relationship to my body is much more kind and much more free. My relationships aren’t perfect, but I’m able to find my center with greater ease. My inner center, the life force that we all have inside of us, is stronger each day. Ayahuasca is not a miracle plant. For me, it was a doorway that expanded everything. For me, it was a journey I would gladly take again.