What to Expect in Therapy
The Therapy Breakdown
(Not that kind… well, also that kind.) 🫠😭
Though the journey of therapy and healing is never linear, it helps to have an idea of what to expect. This is a general outline overview of what our work together includes:
Evidence Based Assessments
Carefully Curated Counseling Library Access
Grounding and Emotional Awareness
Defusion and Understanding of Triggers
Identification of Values and Learning Style
Skill Building and Practice
Integration of Emotions with Decision-Making
Improving Self-Assessment and Acceptance
Appreciation, Gratitude, and Joy!
My clients tend to be…
Medical professionals (nurses, doctors, physicians assistants, physical therapists, occupational therapists, pharmacists, dentists)
Education professionals (teachers, principals, special education, reading specialists, English language learner / ELL educators, human resources)
Social justice / Nonprofit professionals (founders, community organizers, social media managers, finance directors and fundraisers, resource directors)
Tech professionals (project managers, product managers, individual contributors, software engineers, data analysts, UX/UI designers, web designers, recruiters)
Highly sensitive people (HSPs)
People from the Global Majority
Range in walks of life from 20’s to 50’s
Helpers, aka giving and caring people who have a hard time saying “no”
High achievers, hard workers, and pinch-hitters who make ‘magic’ happen with limited resources
Spending energy and time on their phones, laptops, tablets and feeling more drained afterwards
Anxious
Healing from Anxiety
It can look so different between people, but the markers underneath are the same: worry, doubt, and endless questioning.
Anxiety on a low level can seem harmless, but it grows subtly and slowly until it becomes unbearable. Stress dreams (or nightmares), sleep disturbance, panic attacks, body aches and pains, health anxiety thoughts, doom-scrolling, and thoughts that just won’t stop—suddenly it’s a part of your life every waking moment from morning to night.
Helping professionals are especially prone to anxiety. We make a living on doing everything for others and we constantly think of what would make life more convenient for them. We are often using our skills to nurture, protect, and support those around us.
How Anxiety Shows Up
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Thinking in circles or spirals
Catastrophizing, believing the worst case scenario will happen
Struggling with making decisions
Replaying scenes over and over again
Second guessing how to respond to messages or texts
Perfectionistic thoughts, never feeling good enough
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Sleep disturbance or trouble falling asleep
Headaches, migraines
Panic and/or anxiety attacks
Stomach issues and gastrointestinal discomfort
Chest pain or tightness
Difficulty staying still for too long
Loss of appetite or increased appetite
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Worrying constantly that other people are mad at you
Avoiding co-workers or supervisors
Replaying comments or feedback from colleagues over and over again
Having difficulty with conversation
Feeling FOMO when others seem to be enjoying themselves
Resentment towards others, sometimes even the ones you want to help
Constantly comparing your accomplishments to others
Overbooking yourself and saying yes to too many things
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Worry and stress
Dreading work
Overwhelm
Sudden mood swings
Irritability, frustration, anger
Feeling surprised by your own emotions
Apathy and lack of passion for things you loved
Compassion fatigue
Burned Out
Burnout isn’t the end.
There is hope & healing, beyond the endless expectations that have been placed on your shoulders. I will support you with practical steps as well as intuitive insights to get you unstuck, which will not only help you overcome burnout but prevent it in both your personal and professional life.
If you would like to take a test to know if you’re burned out or at risk, check out this exclusive link for the Burnout Risk Index.
It was developed at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business by neuroscientists, and it’s completely free.
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Burnout has been pervasive for quite awhile, especially due to the way our society is structured: around work and prioritizing increasing revenue as the reigning economic philosophy is capitalism. COVID-19 largely exacerbated this, though fortunately we are also having more conversations about burnout because of the pandemic.
In my therapy world, I've worked with folx who are often overworking, people pleasing, and used to supporting everyone else around them except for themselves. This could be due to many factors. It's important for us to name the societal messages we have received such as gender roles and cultural values, as well as the individual situations each one of us experienced in our own families and upbringing.
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Burnout is not just a feeling. It shows up in tangible ways, according to this study done through Asana:
Lower morale at work and home
Engage less often
Increased mistakes
Leave their job or "quiet quit"
Miscommunicate
In my work with helping professionals, burnout also shows up as:
Irritation or frustration that seems out of place
Overwhelm and low emotional tolerance
Apathy, feeling unable to bring yourself to do even ordinary tasks
Self-doubt that feels paralyzing
Sleep disruption or feeling tired when you wake up
Headaches, illnesses, and body aches
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In order to really target burnout at its root, it's important we figure out how to meet you where you are. We start with specialized assessments designed by neuroscience researchers at UC Berkeley to accurately address your needs. After this, we create a plan uniquely designed for you and connected to a network of evidence-based professionals (none of us, including me! can do this work alone), and review what your mental health map looks like. From there, we can navigate building your support system and opening the doors for relief, confidence, and freedom.
2nd Gen Millennials
The Unique Plight of 2nd Gen Millennials
If you were born between 1981-1996, congratulations! You’re a Millennial.
Welcome to being the middle-children of the generations between the 1900’s and the 2000’s.
We know how to speak Boomer, we learned culture from Gen X, and we paved the way for Gen Z and Gen Alpha. We got blamed for everything from killing the diamond industry to crippling the economy to ruining parenthood to eating too much avocado toast to being lazy and self-absorbed.
And if you’re 2nd generation AND from an immigrant family? You had to grow up in a country that was new to your parents, with clashing messaging about diversity and culture mixed in with capitalistic work ethic—plus the repercussions from the attacks on 9/11, the housing crash of 2008, and the dawn of mass school shootings… oh yes, and the rapid escalation of technology from boxy desktops and dial-up Internet to widespread pocket-sized high speed devices and the explosion of social media and now, AI.
Yeah, it does make sense: we need therapy. And our therapists need to understand exactly how much context we have been living through to get to where we are now.
Millennial Therapy in San Jose
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Acknowledge the context of the foundations of our mental health through childhood
Name the intersections between different parts of our identities and integrate our values from conflicting sides
Release messaging we no longer want to give power over us in our adult lives
Connect to sources of power and energy that are based in sustainable and ethical resources
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Often I see people who feel conflicted between what they were taught by people who love them and also by values we picked up as we absorbed the U.S. culture. Some of us were pushed to assimilate; others of us shamed for abandoning our family's culture; and sometimes, we got the double whammy.
Blending individualist philosophy and the collectivist beliefs from our families can seem impossible. But as I have found in years of work in therapy, each person finds their own beautiful and incredible way to create a cohesive identity that is all their own.
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We can't avoid it. I'm literally writing this on a website that you will likely find with your phone or laptop. In order to create healthy habits that are sustainable, I'm a firm believer that therapy, especially for millennials, must include conversations about our relationship to technology. I've been using a computer since I was 5 years old, and it has impacted me in so many ways - as a therapist, I will validate and honor however complicated your feelings are about technology and learn to live with it with intention and balance.
Attached to Technology
Mental Health Care Must Address the Impact of Technology
We cannot deny how much the Internet has changed our world. Everything has been affected, whether directly or indirectly, and as we address our mental health we must also address how technology and the industry around it are designed in order to heal emotionally and mentally.
As a therapist, I believe in education as an empowerment tool for all of us to be able to make informed decisions and move through our feelings and decision-making with grace. As a millennial, I frequently bridge the gaps between generations exposed to different facets of technology at different stages in time. As a cognitive science nerd, I hope to connect the multi-disciplinary ways to study the mind and the brain with how we reimagine systems for mental health. And as a human being working towards decolonization, I believe technology can be wielded with equity.
Technology & Mental Health
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We are all carrying around an addictive device in our pockets at all times. The hardest part can be to interrupt the cycle of doomscrolling, officially added to the Merriam Webster Dictionary because of its pervasiveness. I’ve written a piece here called: “How to Scroll Without the Doom”
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So many of us use technology for a wide variety of things. We hear about many disadvantages and detriments when it comes to social media and smart phone use. We also may consider some of the positives, such as increased neurological development, creating community, and empowerment across the world audience. In order to balance both the positive and negative, I believe in creating mindful and intentional use of technology to support your values.
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According to current research, yes. There are nuances of course but in general, yes. And it is also a pretty challenging task to implement on your own, depending on your relationship to your phone and how you use social media. Check out Harvard’s blog for some tips on how to change your habits.
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Our brains evolved to how they are today for a LONG time.. we are talking between 2 million to 500,000 years! And technology has existed for… well, so little time in comparison. Our brains expect cues that come from real life; social media gives us a feed for the dopamine reward system in our brains, but none of the emotional and tangible connection. In order to make social media actually social, we have to bring more conscious intention to how we engage.
Rooted in Social Justice
Therapy is Not Neutral
“It is the duty of a practitioner to better understand what happens for a person when they are not privy to the truth about their people’s history.” - Dr. Jennifer Mullan, Decolonizing Therapy
My values are deeply rooted in every human being treated with dignity and respect, with the context of our reality named. This includes: systems of oppression based on racism, sexism, classism, ableism, etc. and it is essential for healing from trauma that we understand the environmental factors that contribute to our emotional experiences and the formation of what matters most to us.
Therapists, now more than ever, must be socially conscious and practice cultural humility in order to be effective and ethically sound. I aim to support every client to feel seen and heard, to know that their heritage and culture are given the respect and honor they deserve.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I am practicing from my home office, located on stolen Land that are sacred to the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe. I thank the Indigenous Peoples for stewarding these Lands for generations. I acknowledge that I occupy and participate in exploitation of Land that are not native to me. I advocate for Land Back and Indigenous Sovereignty. (Give the Land back).
Decolonization is essential to the mental health movement. I acknowledge that I am a work in progress and I am dedicated to continuously growing within and shedding the layers of colonization that have brought me here and no longer serve my clients or me.
May we as a community consider our roles in the liberation, and restoration of Land, language, and culture for Indigenous Peoples on Turtle Island and globally.
Click here to see Native Governance Center's Beyond Land Acknowledgment Guide. Click here to see ways to participate in the Landback movement. I credit and appreciate Inclusive Therapists Directory for modeling the wording of this land acknowledgement.
Overcoming Perfectionism & People Pleasing
Recovering Perfectionists Unite
Breaking out of the habit of perfectionism can feel impossible. It got us so far in life, after all. At the same time, perfection can feel relentless. Nothing is ever good enough. Whether we’ve met our goals or accomplished something meaningful, we can experience feeling empty, anxious, or unfulfilled—always looking ahead to the next thing rather than enjoying our moment in the sun. “Perfect” can also be an unclear term for us. Oftentimes, we mistake high quality and effort for the pursuit of perfection. Getting clear on what truly matters to us, what “perfect” has meant to us, and how to adjust this definition to fit what is realistic and reasonable while honoring our whole self—not just our “doing” self or “useful” self—can free us from the bonds of ‘never enough’ and open us to the joy of life again.
Common Questions in Therapy About Perfectionism
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Anxiety is rooted in our nervous system, and it is activated with our "fight/flight/freeze/fawn" response. Perfectionism pushes us past what is realistic or reasonable and forces us to generate energy from limited resources. This is ok if used sparingly, but if we are trying to be perfect all the time, this drains us and anxiety takes over to try to make more and more energy from a dwindling battery.
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This is something my clients ask a lot. The short answer is no, the long answer is: it feels uncomfortable to confront how you feel about your work and accomplishments at times, and as we learn about what matters to you, it might feel like lowering at first. It's worth discovering what these words ("perfect", "standards", "quality", etc.) even mean to us.
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Perfectionists are super prone to procrastination. We often hesitate to start anything without a clear plan or direction, and it can lead to lots of feelings of shame and guilt, stress and anxiety or depression.
We start by addressing the feelings and allowing them to simply be, instead of pushing them away. We then can break down tasks into small enough pieces that feel the most doable. The aim is to create momentum rather than focusing on the outcome or end result.