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Individual therapy

Therapy for adults

For people who are ready to understand their emotional patterns — and to build a life that feels more aligned, meaningful and free.

Who this is for

If you are feeling overwhelmed, stuck, or unsure where to begin


Some people come to therapy because something specific has happened — a loss, a diagnosis, a betrayal, a move, a birth. Others come because nothing in particular has happened, and that is precisely the problem: life works on paper, and still feels flat, anxious or lonely.

Both are good reasons. Therapy can be a place to reconnect with yourself and find a clearer path forward.

Common reasons people reach out

  • Anxiety, worry, or a body that will not settle
  • Depression, low mood, or losing interest in things that mattered
  • Trauma and post-traumatic stress, including childhood experiences
  • Grief and loss
  • Low self-esteem and harsh self-criticism
  • Major life transitions — career, migration, motherhood, midlife
  • Difficulty in relationships, or the same pattern repeating
  • Anger, stress and burnout
  • Questions of culture, identity and family expectation
  • Substance use and recovery

The work

What we actually do together

Make sense of the pattern

We trace how your history, your early relationships and the roles you learned to play still shape the way you relate to yourself and others today. Insight is not the whole of therapy, but very little changes without it.

Heal what is still open

Where trauma or attachment wounds are still driving the present, I use trauma-informed work and EMDR to help you process experiences that have stayed stuck — so that they become memory rather than alarm.

Build what comes next

Emotional awareness, boundaries, communication, self-worth, tolerating discomfort without abandoning yourself. Practical capacities, built on real understanding rather than technique alone.

Sheida Shavalian, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, seated in a calm, sunlit room

Your first session

A space to slow down and begin telling your story


Your first session is not an interrogation and not a form-filling exercise. I will ask thoughtful questions to understand what brings you to therapy, what you have been struggling with, and what you hope could feel different in your life.

There is no pressure to have everything figured out. We simply start where you are.

From there we usually meet weekly. Sessions are 50 minutes, held by secure video anywhere in California. Some people come for a defined piece of work over a few months; others stay longer and go deeper. We will talk openly about what makes sense for you, and revisit it as we go.

Fees & insurance

You do not have to face this alone.

Reach out for a brief consultation — there is no cost and no obligation.