The right fit, right away.

We understand how important it is to find a therapist who is the right fit for you. It can be discouraging to invest time and energy in therapy only to find that you're not connecting with your therapist or seeing the progress you hoped for.

Our practice is committed to taking the guesswork out of finding the right therapist. The rigorous vetting process we use ensures that every therapist on our team possesses advanced training in effective treatments and has the essential qualities that help to foster a strong therapeutic connection.

We take great care of our clinical team, emphasizing industry leading pay, benefits, work/life balance, a supportive and collaborative environment, as well as manageable patient caseloads. This approach not only allows our therapists to be more effective in their work, it has also made our practice a highly sought after place of employment. Our clinic receives hundreds of applications per year for one or two job openings, which gives us the freedom to be extremely selective about who we hire.

We're confident that our approach makes it easier to find a therapist who can truly support you on your journey to healing and growth.

Good therapy is both an Art and a Science.

The science of therapy informs our practice in many ways. We utilize evidence-based techniques, meaning our methods are grounded in rigorous research and have been proven effective for addressing a wide range of mental health challenges. Our therapists stay current with the latest research and best practices, ensuring you benefit from the most up-to-date and effective treatments available. This scientific foundation allows us to understand the complexities of mental health, accurately assess your needs, and develop a tailored treatment plan that aligns with your specific goals.

However, we also recognize that therapy is much more than just applying scientific principles. It's an art. It's about creating a safe, supportive, and non-judgmental space where you feel comfortable exploring your thoughts, feelings, and experiences. Our therapists are skilled in the art of building genuine connections with their clients, fostering trust, and understanding the unique nuances of each individual's story. We believe that true healing comes from the therapeutic relationship itself – a relationship built on empathy, compassion, and deep listening.

Modalities

Read below to learn about a few of the approaches to therapy we offer:

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy

Cognitive-behavioral therapists provide a form of therapy in which cognitive (thought) patterns and behavioral (action) patterns are identified, analyzed, and deliberately changed through targeted interventions. This approach is premised on the insight that how we think and act has a tremendous impact on how we feel.

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is usually the first line of treatment for anxiety disorders. This is because the scientific evidence supporting cognitive behavioral therapy is overwhelming (1, 2). It works well and it works quickly. In contrast to many other forms of therapy, CBT can often be completed in just a few months.

Therapists at SAS utilize a number of specialized variants such as PE, IE, ERP, ACT, TF-CBT, CPT, SFBT, MBCT, EMDR, and REBT to help clients struggling with a wide range of anxiety disorders and related mental health challenges. We routinely utilize CBT to treat Adjustment Disorders, Specific Phobias, Agoraphobia, Panic Disorder, Social Anxiety, Insomnia, OCD, ADHD, PTSD, GAD, MDD, and OCPD.

Psychoanalytic Therapy

Besides our cognitive and behavioral patterns, anxieties can also be rooted in unresolved, and often unconscious, interpersonal and intrapersonal tensions. Because these tensions are buried, therapy must also look beyond conscious thinking patterns and overt behavior. To accomplish this, a contemporary and scientifically vetted version of the psychoanalytic (now often called "psychodynamic") approach is required.

This is an exploratory approach to therapy in which the client's personal history and the complex dynamics of their life are examined in depth. The purpose of this analysis is to develop insight and a deeper understanding of self that can set us free from these tensions.

The psychoanalytic approach to therapy has been refined now for over a century since it was originally developed by Sigmund Freud. The refinement is thanks to the penetrating insights of figures such as Jacques Lacan, Heinz Kohut, and Melanie Klein. Born from methodical and thoughtful observations of human life, their work has transformed psychoanalysis from a starting point in the history of therapy to a widely respected and empirically supported approach to treating a number of mental health issues including anxiety, depression, and trauma symptoms.

Although difficult to study, given the open-ended and exploratory nature of the therapeutic approach, psychoanalytic/psychodynamic therapies have demonstrated their effectiveness in a number of studies (3, 4, 5, 6). 

Existential Therapy

Anxiety can also be bound up with one’s search for meaning, purpose, and identity — crucial dimensions of our experience, without which we are unable to feel at ease in the world or at home in our own lives.

Existential therapy aims to help us clarify and unravel the questions we normally ignore in order to simply “get on with” our lives. Drawing on the work of thinkers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Frantz Fanon, and Simone de Beauvoir, it leverages their insights to help us arrive at insights of our own.

Although difficult to study given the complexity of the conceptual foundations on which it is based, versions of existential therapy have been shown to be effective in a number of clinical studies (7). Some psychologists have even claimed, quite controversially, that "only this type of therapy can replace emptiness with fulfillment and meaning and thus engender authentic, creative solutions to the challenges of this age" (8).