I didn't arrive at this work in a straight line. 
I grew up between South Dallas and southern Norway as a first-generation Norwegian-American, learning early, how culture, identity, and environment shape the way people move through the world. 
Before becoming a therapist, I worked in high-intensity environments where steadiness mattered. I've been a health specialist, fire fighter, single mother and someone who has navigated reinvention, grief, and difficult transitions first hand.
In recent years, I was formally diagnosed with AuDHD; deepening my understanding of masking, sensory load, burnout, and the experience of adapting for years without realizing the cost. 
Those experiences shape how I practice:  calm, direct, thoughtful, and grounded. 
Many of the adults I work with are highly capable on the outside and exhausted underneath. Therapy becomes a space to slow things down, understand what your system learned to do, and build something steadier and more sustainable. 
My work is trauma informed and EMDR-trained. integrating cognitive and relational approaches when they fit the person in front of me. 
Thereapy, for me, is not about becoming someone else. It is about clarity, self-understanding, and creating a life that feels more sustainable to live. 

Med, LPC,
EMDR Trained
Founder

Melissa Worley