Therapy:

For creating a home within yourself.

I see therapy as a space where you can think out loud, be vulnerable, strengthen your values, and explore the deeper territory of your psychological experience.

In therapy, you have the chance to process past wounds, examine current dynamics in your life, transform your relationships, and start embodying a future that is designed by the “healed” version of you.

If you’d like to learn more about my credentials and specialties, keep reading. If you’d like to know about the story behind my therapy career, scroll to the bottom.

My credentials in the Therapy field include:

  • Licensure from the State of California, which requires a) successful completion of an accredited Master’s Degree in therapy; b) successful passing of a state-administered Law & Ethics exam; c) 3,000 manually-tracked, hours of clinical experience, approved by the Board of Behavioral Sciences; and d) successful passing of the state-administered Clinical Marriage & Family Therapy exam.

  • Level 1 Certification in EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing) Trauma Therapy, from the EMDR Institute

  • “IFS (Internal Family Systems) Foundations” training, in progress, taught by the IFS Institute (the original home of IFS)

My style:

  • I’m kind, curious, and direct in therapy

  • I’m deeply interested in the “story” of a client’s life, and how their decisions influence the story

  • Strengths-based: I encourage clients to identity and embody their personal strengths

  • Values-oriented: I believe in using core values as a compass for life

  • Communal: I encourage clients to find and/or strengthen their most important relationships, which act as important support systems

  • Practical: I teach tangible skills that clients can take with them into everyday life, outside of our sessions

  • Somatic: I teach clients about the nervous system, and how to create safety and calmness in their bodies

My specialties:

  • People who work in tech or corporate

  • First-generation Americans

  • Care professionals in the medical, academic, & counseling fields

  • LGBTQ+ & BIPOC clients

  • Adults age 18+

  • Individuals, partners, & family members

Therapy fees:

  • Complimentary 20-minute phone consult for new clients

  • $150 per 50-minute therapy session for individuals

  • $200 per 50-minute therapy session for couples

  • Additional experiences & fees available upon request (workshops, intensives, extended sessions, etc.)

The Story Behind the Career:

My journey as a therapist, starts with my origins.

As the child of Lebanese immigrants in America, I grew up with stories of migration, grief, and resilience. I was raised on a steady diet of traditional Middle Eastern food, like tabbouleh and kafta. I was immersed in the customs, rituals, and music of my culture. Yet as I got older, this first-generation identity made me feel like an outsider — someone who belonged “everywhere and nowhere”. I was often considered “too Western” for my Middle Eastern community, and “too ethnic” at school or at work, where I rarely encountered other Middle Eastern people. Over time, I learned to adapt to whoever was in front of me, and I looked for identity in external things - my achievements, my goals, my relationships, my salary, my ability to “fit in”.

Upon becoming a therapist, I finally realized what what I had been searching for, all those years: a home within myself. I wanted to trust myself. I wanted to feel grounded in the present moment. I want to replace self-criticism with self-compassion. I wanted to feel more connected to all parts of my personality, not just the pleasant ones, or the dominant ones. I wanted to feel peace, instead of chasing after some elusive idea of “happiness”.

I carried these desires within me for a long time, and they motivated me to eventually leave the tech world for the mental health world. In my graduate program at the University of San Diego, I wrote one paper after another on my family history, my identity, and my experiences in the world. Through my nonprofit field placement as a student therapist, I learned from passionate narrative therapists who fueled my radical compassion, insatiable curiosity, and healthy skepticism of the “powers that be”. And finally, as an Associate therapist, I worked at a narrative therapy group practice, a residential treatment center for trauma, and a psychoanalytic clinic. In each setting, I gained just as much knowledge about myself, as I did about the human experience, and how to work effectively with clients, whatever their needs were.

As a licensed therapist, I’m proud and privileged to be doing this work. My approach is influenced by my lived experience, education, and specialized training. My style is rooted in narrative therapy, IFS (Internal Family Systems), and somatic therapy. By blending these styles together, I offer an experience in therapy that is holistic, not just intellectual and done “from the neck up”. In sessions, I like to combine open conversation, curious questions, and shared insights. I honor each client’s inner wisdom, the needs of their body, and their potential to build a lasting, healing home within themselves - something we all deserve, and can achieve.