Psychotherapy for difficulties that keep returning.

Sometimes people begin therapy because they are in a crisis. Just as often, they come because something has been difficult for a long time.

You may repeatedly find yourself in relationships that become painful in similar ways. You may be very sensitive to criticism, struggle to trust other people, or find it difficult to know what you want. You may be successful in important parts of your life while remaining dissatisfied or uncertain in others.

You may already have a convincing explanation for why you struggle and still find yourself feeling or behaving in familiar, painful ways.

In therapy, we explore these difficulties through the experiences, memories, thoughts, and feelings you bring to our conversations. You are encouraged to say what comes to mind, including things that seem unrelated, uncomfortable, or hard to make sense of. Over time, this work can help loosen the hold of longstanding difficulties and open possibilities that previously felt unavailable.

I begin by listening closely to what you say and asking questions about your particular experience. I pay attention to the words you use, moments of uncertainty, and thoughts or feelings that seem difficult to put into words. Something that initially seems incidental, contradictory, or embarrassing may prove important.

You do not need to arrive with a clear explanation of what is wrong. Part of our work is to make room for what you have not yet been able to say, including feelings that surprise you or do not fit your usual picture of yourself.

This includes your experience of me and of the therapy itself. Feeling disappointed, guarded, understood, misunderstood, or reluctant to speak can become something we explore together.

Understanding can be valuable, but the work is also directed toward changes in how you feel, what you find yourself repeating, and how you live and relate to others. I listen with those possibilities in mind, while remaining open to having my own assumptions questioned.

My work is informed by contemporary psychoanalytic thinking and by advanced training in Transference-Focused Psychotherapy, an approach developed for people with complex and persistent difficulties in relationships, identity, and emotional life.

I have extensive experience working with gay men and other LGBTQ+ patients. Sometimes sexuality or gender is central to what brings someone to therapy; often it is not.

My work may include questions involving relationships, intimacy, identity, sexuality, shame, family, aging, and the ways social or cultural expectations can shape how a person experiences themselves and other people.

I approach these concerns in the context of the whole person rather than assuming that sexual orientation or gender identity explains a particular difficulty. As in the rest of my practice, the aim is to understand the particular meanings and patterns that are important in an individual's life.

Couples often come to therapy knowing exactly what they argue about. What is less obvious is why the argument keeps taking the same form.

One partner feels ignored and protests. The other feels criticized and withdraws. One person seeks reassurance in a way that makes the other feel controlled. Attempts to solve the problem can gradually become part of the problem itself.

Couples therapy provides a place to slow down familiar arguments and speak about what each person experiences, wants, fears, and finds difficult to say. We examine assumptions about one another and pay attention to what happens between you during our meetings. The work aims to make different ways of responding to each other possible.

I work with couples around recurring conflict, emotional and sexual intimacy, trust, infidelity, communication difficulties, and major changes in a relationship.