You are welcome exactly as you are.
I honor every client as an individual and tend to the unique cultural, familial, and internal factors that shape each person. I value the diversity of human beings and work actively to interrogate my biases. Understanding the effects of prejudicial societal structures is an important part of therapeutic work and of shifting our world to a place of greater equity and compassion. I strive to respect each aspect of your experience and identity: culture, sexuality, gender, race, disability, neurodiversity, personality structure, and religious and philosophical beliefs.
Areas of Expertise
Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
I primarily practice psychodynamic or depth psychotherapy, a style that aims to reveal the unconscious underpinnings of current emotions and behaviors through the process of developing greater insight. This involves understanding the root causes of current distress to open up new ways of experiencing and reacting to life. The following attributes distinguish psychodynamic therapy from other therapeutic approaches:
Focus on the expression of emotion
Exploration of defensive structures (psychological survival strategies that are attempts to avoid distressing thoughts or feelings)
Identification of recurring themes and patterns in the client's inner experiences and interpersonal relationships
Understanding how childhood experiences have shaped us to open up new ways of viewing ourselves
Focus on growing connected, meaningful interpersonal relationships using feedback from patterns of interaction in the relationship between therapist and client.
Exploration of fantasy life, imagination, dreams, and creative expression as symbolic material from the unconscious to deepen self-understanding
The review article linked below highlights the efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy. Studies have indicated psychodynamic psychotherapy is unique among therapeutic approaches in leading to ongoing improvement even after therapy ends. This is likely due to the process of developing insight and a psychologically-aware way of understanding one's self that persists after therapy ends: https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/amp-65-2-98.pdf
The teenage years are an incredibly challenging period of life. In the transition from childhood to adulthood, we all have to navigate identity, family and social roles, sexuality, and school while also experiencing rapid change of our bodies and minds with puberty. It is intense.
Teens are also experiencing new awareness, insight, creativity, philosophical exploration, and openness to ideas that is inspiring. The natural process of self-exploration occurring during teen years is an excellent match for the process of increasing insight and self-understanding through therapy.
I particularly enjoy working with people in adolescence, from age 10 through their twenties. An under-reported fact: the brain development that accelerates during puberty doesn't stop until our mid- to late-twenties! I have worked with teenagers and their families from the beginning of my career in settings ranging from residential treatment and crisis intervention to identity exploration and psychological growth. I have often worked with teens who are feeling suicidal, using self-harm, have experienced trauma, and where there is high stress or conflict in the family.
Therapeutic work with teenagers is optimized by family/relationship therapy occurring simultaneous to individual therapy for the teen. I follow the teenager and family's lead with this: sometimes I do both individual and family work in consultation with the preferences of the teen/family, sometimes it is best to work with a different therapist for family/relational work, sometimes this component it is not desired by the family or teen or it is unnecessary.
Imago Couples Therapy
Imago is the Latin word for "image": each of us carries a picture of what we think love is supposed to feel like based on our early life experiences. We bring that vision with us into romantic relationships, but it doesn't always serve us well. What is happening in the today is a complicated combination of echoes from the past and present-day hurts for each partner. Building mutual empathy, deep understanding, appreciation, and connection between partners is the goal of Imago.
Imago is a nonjudgmental, compassionate approach that will help you:
Reinvigorate your relationships.
Transform conflict into connection.
Embrace new possibilities to deepen all your relationships.
Imago's collaborative approach often takes fewer sessions than other forms of therapy to uncover the root problems and patterns fueling most conflict and disconnection. Imago’s approach also lessens most common concerns partners may have about participating in therapy. These concerns or fears may include: believing a couple should solve their own problems, fear of being blamed for relationship issues, concern therapy won’t bring lasting change, lack of progress with previous forms of therapy, or the belief that the current status of the relationship should be left alone.
Imago takes a relational problem-solving approach: the patterns that exist between a couple emerge in the space between them; one single person is not "the problem" in a relationship. The therapeutic process is about learning how to heal together as a team.
Rather than acting as a referee, Imago therapists teach and guide couples to communicate in a safe and structured way that removes blame, shame and criticism. Instead, by facilitating a conversation the couple can learn from one another, using conflict as an opportunity for healing and growth.
If you would like more information about this approach, here is a link to commonly asked relationship questions answered by Imago therapists:
https://www.imagorelationshipswork.com/couples-and-individuals/common-questions
Intergenerational Trauma
“Family dysfunction rolls down from generation to generation, like a fire in the woods, taking down everything in its path until one generation has the courage to turn and face the flames. That person brings peace to their ancestors and spares the children that follow”
— TERRY REAL
We are impacted not only by our individual life experiences, but by the experiences and patterns in the generations preceding us. Reckoning with the ways we are repeating the patterns of previous generations can be profoundly unsettling and also can allow for new patterns to be forged for future generations. Many people come into intimate relationships and parenthood wanting to do things differently than what they witnessed between their own parents or than what they experienced in their own childhoods. It is deeply painful (and also perfectly natural) when we then experience ourselves doing some of the same things we watched our parents do or behaving in the same ways we used as children to survive. I feel a deep sense of honor and purpose in supporting and guiding clients as they explore the impacts of trauma on themselves and in their family systems and in witnessing the profound clients do to shift these patterns. To me, this is the deepest type of therapeutic work and ultimately builds not only kinder and stronger relationships and families, but contributes to increasing compassion, tolerance, and peace in the world.
Dreamwork
I wrote my thesis at Pacifica Graduate Institute on cognitive neuroscience and depth psychology perspectives on dreaming. One main finding: dreaming is essential to survival, but there is no well-established scientific understanding as to why. Lots of theories have been floated, ranging from dreaming being a random byproduct of necessary brain activity to dreaming being the royal road to understanding one's self. Every night your unconscious produces intricate worlds and stories that the dream ego experiences as real and then we tend to be like, "huh, weird dream" and think no more about it.
From a depth psychology perspective, with exploration, dreams often provide us with useful information about what is going on inside our minds. This information comes in the form of personal symbolism, so thinking about what the images remind you of, what emotions are sparked, and analyzing the dream as if it were a piece of literature created for symbolic interpretation can lead to deeper understanding. If you are intrigued by dreams, have a recurring dream that you want to understand, or are plagued by nightmares, I am equipped to hold space for your exploration.
Walking Therapy
Movement and time in nature have positive impacts on wellbeing and some folks feel more comfortable opening up while outdoors. I offer walking or hiking therapy for some clients: we have a talk therapy session while walking together on an uncrowded and relatively flat trail or beach. This experience combines multiple factors that have a mood-lifting and emotion-regulating effect and folks sometimes prefer it to sessions that take place in the office.
Please let me know if you are interested in this option. We will have an initial session at my office to discuss the appropriateness of this approach.
Sliding Fee Scale
In an attempt to make the cost of therapy more equitable, my hourly rate varies by household income. This does not adequately address systemic issues of income inequality or healthcare costs, but it is my attempt to balance acknowledgement of these factors alongside the financial needs of my own family. Please review the sliding fee scale chart and agreement document below if you are interested in this option.
About the Therapist
I completed a Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute and am a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. I took a winding path to find my love of therapy that included an undergraduate degree in biology at UCSB and a few years of medical school at UCI (I dropped out after experiencing therapy myself for the first time and realizing that I wanted to address intergenerational trauma rather than physical wounds). I work as a therapist because I find it deeply meaningful and I view clients' trust in me as an honor. I am dedicated to my own ongoing therapy and psychological growth and I believe this to be the most important training for any therapist.
Outside of therapy, I most prize spending time with my family and friends. I enjoy philosophical conversation, playing Dungeons & Dragons and pickleball, hiking, and watching movies and shows. I have two sons and we are members of a vibrant extended family that I am lucky to be a part of.
Contact Me
Alexis Gibson, LMFT #139818
2280 Sunset Dr. Unit EE
Baywood-Los Osos, CA 93402, USA
(805) 242-1163