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DEDICATED TO HELPING YOU OVERCOME DIFFICULTIES TO LIVE A FULLER, MORE MEANINGFUL LIFE.
Individual Therapy Services
Most clients of our clinic receive treatment with individual therapy. Generally, clients attend weekly sessions with a therapist who is matched to you based on your presenting concerns. If the clinic or therapist is not a good fit, we make a referral to the appropriate provider. Clients to the clinic generally meet with a therapist weekly for 18-25 sessions, before tapering to less frequent sessions and ending treatment within a year. This short-term model requires clients to be focused on learning skills, engaging in assignments in between sessions, and communicating with their therapist about their progress.
ECAS uses evidence-based approaches – below is a list of therapies used by our staff for different presenting concerns.
Exposure Therapy: Learn to Overcome your Fears
Exposure Therapy is the treatment that works the best for most types of anxiety. Confronting fears and obsessions while approaching them in new ways that increase confidence are effective for a range of anxiety disorders, including fears of specific situations (including flying, needles, driving), Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), Panic Disorder, Social Anxiety, and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: Learn to Alter Beliefs and Thoughts That Hold You Back
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy helps you develop new ways of evaluating the thoughts and beliefs that keep you stuck in the same habits. It helps you increase your awareness about how the way you think impacts how you feel and act. Through awareness, you can begin to make different choices that are based on your deepest values instead of your fears.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: Learn Acceptance and Mindfulness Practices To Roll with Life’s Punches
Sometimes, changing thoughts and behaviors do not account for really difficult life events. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) teaches how to listen to your experience and practice acceptance and mindfulness to commit to making your most important life commitments.
Self Compassion Therapy: Learn To Listen To Yourself and See Your Difficulties With Kindness
Humans are often given messages that we should “suck it up” and move on, and are taught that having emotions make us weak or too sensitive. This leads us to respond to life difficulties and mistakes with anger, judgement, and cruelty. Self-Compassion Therapy helps you counteract these tendencies by learning to respond to challenges with kindness and caring when you need it the most. Research shows this makes us more effective, less stressed, and more resilient to life events.
What We Treat
Stress
Life can be incredibly stressful, and too often we feel pressure (or are told explicitly) to carry on in autopilot even when we are really struggling. Ignoring chronic stress can have huge impacts on mental and physical health, and lead to burnout. Our team is dedicated to listening compassionately, helping problem-solve, and helping you develop tools to create boundaries and respond to emotional challenges. Whether your stress is at work, home, or school, with family, friends, or partners, or is related to systemic issues like racism and discrimination, our team can help.
Anxiety Disorders
Anxiety Disorders are a group of related problems where the level of anxiety a person is experiencing causes suffering and impacts their ability to function. They are differentiated by the contexts that the person experiences the anxiety. For example, people with Social Anxiety Disorder experience anxiety about social situations, fearing rejection and negative evaluation in social and performance-related situations. In Generalized Anxiety Disorder, people experience anxiety about many experiences (work, family, health, friendships), which results in worry and painful physiological symptoms. In Panic Disorder, people have sudden symptoms of anxiety and panic that arise out of the blue and may cause concern about health.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is characterized by unwanted, intrusive thoughts that result in distress and lead to compulsive behaviors that are meant to get rid of the thoughts and painful feelings. Unfortunately, like a knot that is pulled tighter and tighter, people with OCD can become stuck in this cycle, spending large amount of time and energy in the OCD loop.
Related to OCD are Obsessive Compulsive and Related Disorders (OCRD), which include Hoarding, Body Dysmorphic Disorder, and Body Focused Repetitive Behaviors (like skin-picking and hair-pulling). More information about these difficulties can be found here.
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is set of symptoms that can occur after a person has experienced a life-threatening event. These symptoms include re-experiencing the event (in thoughts, dreams, or feelings), trying to avoid remembering the event (by pushing down thoughts or avoiding places), startling more easily, and thinking about themselves and the world in negative ways. It is important to know that right after a traumatic event, most people experience these symptoms. They are normal responses to a traumatic situation. However, if these symptoms do not improve over time, then a person may need help recovering.
Gender Dysphoria
At ECAS, we welcome individuals of all gender identities. We provide therapeutic support for those experiencing gender dysphoria and/or experiencing effects of discrimination and bias based on gender identity. We also provide assessments and letters of support for individuals experiencing gender dysphoria who are seeking hormonal interventions and/or gender confirmation surgery. Using The World Professional Association for Transgender Care Standards of Care as a guide, our assessments include exploration of gender dysphoria, discussion of effects of hormonal and surgical interventions, and assessment of any relevant mental health concerns. Respect for the autonomy of each person is a core value, and we are committed to creating an environment that is safe and empowering.
Distress Related to Oppression
Experiences of racism and oppression can lead to stress, anxiety, PTSD, and depression. Even low-levels of discrimination experienced on a regular basis can result in psychological problems. Oppression-related traumatic experiences can range from frequent ambiguous microaggressions to blatant hate crimes and physical assault. Microaggressions are subtle, pervasive acts of racial discrimination against stigmatized groups. These may be brief remarks, vague insults, or even non-verbal exchanges. Chronic fear of everyday bias may induce constant vigilance or paranoia, which over time may result in PTSD-like symptoms, or even contribute to PTSD when a more stressful event occurs.
Our Approach
Specializing in Stress and Anxiety
ECAS is a specialty clinic, focusing on the treatment of Stress, Anxiety Disorders, Obsessive Compulsive and Related Disorders, Posttraumatic Stress Disorders, and distress/trauma related to oppression. While clients who seek treatment at ECAS may have difficulties beyond these issues, the focus of treatment should be within the scope of these specialty areas. Thus, appropriate clients to the clinic should be ready and interested in focusing on one of the areas of specialization, and address other issues as they impact the client’s ability to work on their presenting concern.
Evidence-Based
ECAS is committed to providing treatments that have been tested and found to be effective, with a particular emphasis on exposure-based principles and anti-oppressive practices. Therapists use evidence-based approaches to help clients develop tools to manage their symptoms, identify ways that the American context may be impacting clients’s experience, and help them develop self-efficacy for managing symptoms after the course of treatment.
See “our services” to learn more about the types of therapy we provide.
Time-Limited
We think therapy should be goal-oriented and lead to measurable improvement. We know you want to feel better, engage more fully, and move forward toward what you truly value. With that in mind, our therapists will collaboratively develop a treatment plan with you and track your progress, and make sure we are helping you move in the direction of change. In this model, therapists see clients weekly for six-months before tapering to less frequent sessions and ending treatment for most clients within a year. By treating clients for a more limited period of time, therapists encourage clients to become their own therapists by developing self-efficacy, and will have openings in their caseload to meet the community’s great mental health needs. We expect that you will be making progress within a few weeks, and believe a “Course of Treatment” is somewhere between 18-30 sessions.
Committed to Multicultural Humility and Anti-Oppression
Stress and anxiety in America do not happen in a vacuum, but in the American context, which furthers white, heterosexual, cisgender, thin, and able-bodied ideals that set conditions for reinforcing trauma, shame, and self-blame in addition to perpetuating oppression and discrimination. We believe that this societal and cultural understanding is essential to help all people feel truly heard and understood. As therapists, we take into consideration not only how your intersecting identities impact you as a person but also how experiences of discrimination, bias, and marginalization impact your mental health. Our therapists use a multicultural orientation to invite all clients to share their cultural backgrounds and identities in addition to their societal impact as they feel comfortable doing so. At ECAS, we value and affirm diverse identities and are committed to creating a safe and inclusive environment for all clients.
We are explicitly anti-oppression as a core value in our work. We recognize all types of diversity that leads to oppression in the American context, including ethnicity, race, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, class, size, citizenship status, religion and ability. We acknowledge the systems of power that grant privilege and access unequally such that inequity and injustice result, and we are committed to dismantling these systems. As an organization, we show our commitment to anti-racism and anti-oppression through self-examination and organizational examination of internalized biases, ideas, and areas of privilege on a regular basis (in monthly meetings focused on developing a multicultural organization). With clients, we show our commitment by providing a context to talk about the impact of oppression on their lived experience, and naming oppression when racist or hateful statements are made. We also bring awareness to the physical space clients enter when coming into our offices. We have gender inclusive bathrooms that are also ADA-compliant, include chairs in waiting rooms and offices to accommodate clients of different sizes, and choose art that is inclusive.
