Meet Gabby (she/they)

Hey, nice to meet you; I'm so glad you're here! I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW 136962) offering psychotherapy both in-person in Los Angeles and via telehealth throughout California. I am a nonbinary lesbian with lived experience in many of the areas I support clients with, which informs the way I practice.

I began my journey on the path to becoming a psychotherapist at the University of California, Berkeley, where I was a student researcher studying the psychology of stigma and prejudice. I grew frustrated with the need to prove through research the validity of people's lived experience with racism, sexism, fatphobia, homophobia, transphobia, and other forms of structural oppression. We already know these things are real; people are experiencing these forms of oppression every day. As a result, following graduating with my Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, I turned toward a more direct practice focus.

I began working as a counselor and group facilitator in eating disorder treatment, where I facilitated DBT Skills and Expressive Arts groups. Here I learned I loved working at the intersection of eating disorders and LGBTQ+ identity. Around the same time, I began my Master's of Social Work (MSW) at the UCLA. As part of my graduate education, I provided therapy and case management to adults and children in homeless services and school settings; this reaffirmed my love of therapy and built my competency in providing trauma-informed care that challenges oppressive social structures. Following graduation with my MSW, I continued to provide therapy to adolescents and adults in intensive outpatient and hospital settings. In these roles, I focused on direct psychotherapy, including individual, couples, family, and groups, and I have worked with various presenting concerns from PTSD, dissociation / trauma, eating disorders, psychosis, anxiety, OCD, depression, and sexual and gender identity development.

Eventually, I decided to open my own practice to focus more on the work I love most -- supporting queer and trans youth and adults through challenging relationships to food and body, anxiety and excessive worries, and gender identity questioning. I understand my role as a supportive guide in combatting the impacts that oppressive systems, distorted thought patterns, and negative past experiences have on my client's lives and helping them return to the way they want to live their lives.

In my free time I like to hike, kayak, birdwatch, practice photography, create chalk art and ceramics, and spend time with my family, friends, and pets.

My Approach

I aim to balance warmth and gentle challenging in sessions. I will be one of your biggest supporters, and also call you out on the patterns that keep you from the change you want to see. I am an IFS Trained psychotherapist, and I use an integrative approach to therapy, meaning I use multiple different modalities depending on what will best help the person I am working with. I pull primarily from IFS, DBT, and ERP, among other modalities. In session, this looks like exploring physical sensations, connecting them to emotions, and uncovering the origins in the past of certain parts with more depth in order to move past patterns that keep us stuck. It may also look like us collaborating to create distress tolerance and emotion regulation-focused coping skills to keep us in the present, and improving our ability to handle difficult triggers that might typically send us into full blown panic mode.

I provide a collaborative, supportive, and trauma-informed space in therapy that considers how both personal experiences, thought patterns and protective parts, and systemic issues impact wellbeing. I view the clients I have the privilege of working with as experts with invaluable knowledge gained through lived experiences. As such, I seek to honor this knowledge while also asking tough questions and facilitating the creation of new insight and skills to support clients though challenges.

I view the strength of relationships as a crucial pathway toward healing. Healing does not happen in isolation, but through community, the support of loved ones, and our therapeutic relationship. My goal in all the work I do with clients is to make my job obsolete; I aim to help you build a strong enough sense of self, level of coping, and sense of community that you'll be able to move on from our work together with confidence.

If you’d like to learn more about working with me, please reach out for a consultation! I can’t wait to learn more about you.