The Turtle Shell Approach
Rooted in Safety, Curiosity, Internal Wisdom, and Evidence-Based Practice
A metaphor that means something.
Every turtle carries something remarkable: a shell that is simultaneously home, armor, and self. It doesn't separate them from the world. It's the very thing that makes it possible to move through the world.
Therapy at Turtle Shell is built around this metaphor because it captures something true about healing: you don't have to abandon your defenses to grow. You don't have to become someone different, or tougher, or more like someone who was never hurt. You can heal while still being authentically you.
The work is about helping your nervous system build a foundation it can trust so that, in time, being out in the world feels less like exposure and more like choice.
Turtle Shell Therapy is an trauma-informed, attachment-focused framework that holds two truths at once: healing requires safety and growth requires experience. The therapeutic relationship itself is a shell. A consistent, secure container where exploration and healing becomes possible.
Three Phases of Healing
Building Safety in the Shell
Before anything else, we build the conditions for healing. Establishing trust in the therapeutic relationship, developing internal resources, and helping your nervous system learn that it is safe enough to feel. For many people — especially those with complex or early trauma — this phase is the work, and it deserves all the time it needs.
Healing and Restructuring
With a foundation of safety, we move into the deeper work — processing the experiences, beliefs, and relational wounds that have shaped how you see yourself, others, and the world. This is where trauma reprocessing becomes possible: not as a quick fix, but as a genuine reorganization of experience.
Coming Out of the Shell
Healing isn't just about the past — it's about what becomes available to you going forward. Integration: taking what has shifted internally and letting it ripple outward into relationships, identity, values, and daily life. You get to decide what kind of person you want to be in the world, now that the weight is lighter.
The Turtle Shell Approach was built
with specific populations in mind.
Complex Trauma
Childhood trauma, relational trauma, and attachment disruption across the lifespan.
Shame & Grief
Anxiety, grief, shame, and identity — navigated at any stage of life.
Neurodivergent & Disabled Individuals & Relationships
ADHD, autism, other forms of neurodiversity, and people living with a disability. With adaptations to support different sensory and processing styles.
LGBTQIA+ Individuals & Relationships
Affirming care for all identities.
Children & Adolescents
Developmentally adapted approaches including EMDR storytelling methods.
If you've wondered whether therapy can work for you specifically — this approach meets you where you're at, moves at your pace, and is tailored to your individual needs.
The tools that bring it to life.
The Turtle Shell Approach isn't a single technique — it's a philosophy about how healing happens. These evidence-based modalities are integrated thoughtfully based on what each individual client needs.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing
The backbone of my trauma processing work. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to help the brain reprocess traumatic memories that have gotten "stuck." EMDR is not about forgetting what happened — it's about keeping it in the past.
Learn more at EMDRIA.org →Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy
An emotion-focused, relationally-centered approach that emphasizes the healing power of the therapeutic bond itself. AEDP helps clients access and move through emotional experience in ways that can be profoundly transformative, especially for attachment wounds.
Learn more at AEDPInstitute.org →Internal Family Systems
IFS invites us to understand the mind as a family of "parts" — each with its own history, role, and protective purpose. Rather than fighting difficult internal experiences, IFS cultivates curiosity and self-compassion toward all parts of the self.
Learn more at IFS-Institute.com →Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
ACT helps people develop psychological flexibility — the ability to hold difficult thoughts and feelings without being controlled by them, while moving toward what genuinely matters and better understanding their values.
Learn more →Emotionally Focused Therapy
Grounded in attachment theory, EFT focuses on the emotional patterns within relationships — helping individuals identify negative cycles, access deeper needs, and build more secure connections.
Learn more at ICEEFT.com →Nature-Based Therapeutic Practice
The natural world is a therapeutic resource in its own right. EcoTherapy integrates nature-based practices into mental health treatment, drawing on research showing that time in natural environments reduces cortisol, improves mood, and fosters belonging.
Learn more →Human-Animal Interactions
A subset of EcoTherapy, HAI recognizes the profound psychological and physiological benefits of relationships between humans and animals. My own life with animals — three cats and a dog — is part of what informs the depth of my belief in this work.
Learn more →EMDR sessions with James fundamentally changed my mindset and nervous system for the better. I had run into a plateau after decades of traditional therapy, exercise, and medication. It is an incredibly powerful way to take control over your intrusive thinking and negative self-talk coming from past trauma.
— Former ClientWorking Together
Therapy is one of the most meaningful investments you can make in yourself and your relationships. I want the practical side of it to feel transparent and straightforward — so here's what you need to know before reaching out.
Individual Therapy
One-on-one sessions for adults, adolescents, and children navigating trauma, anxiety, grief, identity, and more.
Relationship & Family Therapy
Sessions for couples, families, and relationship systems. See note below about who I work with.
A note on relationship & family therapy
My primary clinical passion is individual work — the deep, focused attention on one person's inner world, history, and healing. That said, I deeply value the importance of systemic work and the ways our relationships shape and are shaped by everything we carry individually.
I reserve a small number of relationship and family therapy slots specifically for people who may have a harder time finding a good fit elsewhere — Queer relationships, inter-abled or neurodivergent consensually non-monogamous (CNM), polyamorous, and monogamous relationships and families. If your relationship system doesn't fit neatly into what most therapists are trained or willing to work with, you belong here.
Insurance & Payment
Turtle Shell Therapy Institute is in-network with UnitedHealthcare (through Optum) and Aetna. Clients with these plans can have therapy sessions billed directly to their insurance. Clients are responsible for any applicable co-pays, co-insurance, or unmet deductibles as determined by their plan. For clients with other insurance plans, Turtle Shell operates as an out-of-network provider. A superbill will be provided upon request, which clients may submit to their insurance company for potential out-of-network reimbursement. Reimbursement is not guaranteed. Clients are encouraged to verify their mental health benefits with their insurer before the first session.
Payment is due at the time of service. I accept all major credit cards, and HSA/FSA cards A limited number of sliding scale slots are available for clients with demonstrated financial need — reach out to ask about availability.
Therapy should not depend on what you can pay
If cost is a barrier to starting therapy at Turtle Shell, the Growing Shell Scholarship may help. Three awards per year — trust-based, no financial documentation required.
Learn About the Scholarship → See all Growing Shell programs"Feel comfortable inside and outside of your shell."