If you don’t see your question here, you’re welcome to reach out — I’m happy to answer anything that would help you decide whether we’re a good fit.
About Working with Me
Both, though I’m a psychotherapist first — most of my work is talk therapy. I’m also board-certified in art therapy (ATR-BC®), so when creative approaches would be useful, I can offer that as an additional layer. Most virtual clients work primarily through conversation.
No. In my experience, brief intro calls tend to feel rushed or accidentally turn into therapy sessions without proper structure. Instead, I schedule a full 50-minute initial session so we have actual time to get to know each other. There’s no obligation to continue after the first session.
New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Because sessions are virtual, you can work with me from anywhere within those three states — at home, in your office during a break, or wherever feels private.
Sessions happen through a secure, HIPAA-compliant video platform. You’ll get a link before each session — nothing to download. All you need is a private space, reliable internet, and a device with a camera. Research consistently shows online therapy is as effective as in-person therapy for most concerns.
My standard session fee is $175 for a 50-minute session — applicable to clients paying out of pocket or using out-of-network benefits. If you’re using one of the in-network insurance plans I accept, your cost depends on your specific copay or coinsurance, usually significantly less than the full fee.
I’m in-network with several insurance plans, depending on the state you’re in.
In New York: Cigna and Carelon Behavioral Health.
In Pennsylvania: Aetna, Cigna, Carelon Behavioral Health, Capital Blue Cross Pennsylvania, and Quest Behavioral Health.
In New Jersey: I’m an out-of-network provider. I can provide superbills you can submit for out-of-network reimbursement, which most PPO plans cover at some level.
Anxious Attachment & Relationships
Adult Children of Dysfunctional Families
Yes — and it’s one of the most common things clients say. Many adult children of dysfunctional families were taught that their family was fine, normal, even better than average. The pattern often isn’t recognized until adulthood, when the same dynamics start showing up in relationships, work, and parenting.
No. The work is fundamentally about your own healing, not changing your family. Some clients eventually decide to change how they engage with certain family members, but that’s a personal decision that emerges over time — not a prerequisite. We focus on understanding the patterns and reconnecting you to yourself, whatever your family relationships look like.
Common patterns include perfectionism, hypervigilance, difficulty trusting your own perceptions, chronic guilt, fear of taking up space, struggling to identify what you feel or want, people-pleasing, and a sense that you have to earn love. Many also struggle to feel fully themselves — like there’s a performed self that gets praise and a more authentic self that’s been hidden.
A broad term covering families where one or more dynamics interfered with children’s emotional needs being consistently met. That can include addiction, untreated mental illness, narcissistic or controlling parents, emotional neglect, enmeshment, role reversal, or chronic invalidation. Families don’t have to look obviously bad from the outside to have been dysfunctional in ways that shaped you.
Anxiety & Overthinking
It varies. Many clients notice meaningful shifts within 6 to 8 sessions — more awareness of patterns, better tools for the spirals, less self-criticism. Deeper change around longstanding patterns typically unfolds over months. We’ll talk early on about what you’re hoping for and a realistic timeline.
Yes. Many of my clients are accomplished professionals whose anxiety doesn’t visibly disrupt their work but quietly costs them sleep, energy, and ease in relationships. High-functioning anxiety is real, common, and treatable — and you don’t have to wait until things “get bad enough” to deserve support.
We work in two directions. First, we look at the patterns underneath — perfectionism, fear of failure, anxious relationships — and trace where they come from. Second, we develop practical tools to calm your nervous system and interrupt the spiraling. The goal isn’t to never feel anxious; it’s to stop letting anxiety run the show.
Overthinking is often how anxiety shows up in high-functioning adults. Anxiety is the underlying physical and emotional experience — the tight chest, racing heart, sense of dread. Overthinking and rumination are the mental patterns the brain uses to try to manage that anxiety. Therapy works on both.
Pet Loss & Grief
We make space for the grief without rushing or fixing it. We look at the specific meaning your pet held — what they represented, what their absence is touching that may be bigger than them alone. We address practical struggles like sleep and other people’s reactions. When you’re ready, we explore what carrying their memory forward looks like.
There’s no universal right answer. Some people are ready to love a new animal relatively soon; for others, getting another pet too quickly can feel like a betrayal or short-circuit the grieving process. In therapy we think through what’s driving the question, what you’re afraid of, and what would feel right rather than rushed.
There’s no fixed timeline. Acute grief — the kind that makes daily functioning hard — often softens within weeks to a few months, but waves of grief can continue much longer and can be triggered by anniversaries, smells, places, or new pets. Persistent intense grief that interferes with daily life many months later may benefit from therapy support.
Grief that isn’t fully acknowledged or supported by the people around you or by society. Pet loss is one of the most common forms — when coworkers don’t think it warrants bereavement leave, when friends say “it was just a dog,” when you feel pressure to be “over it.” Grief that has to hide tends to get heavier, not lighter.
Yes. For many people, pets are family — daily companions, emotional anchors, witnesses to chapters of your life that human relationships weren’t part of. Research consistently shows pet loss grief can be as intense as, and sometimes more intense than, grief over human loss. If your grief feels disproportionate to others around you, that’s a sign of how much you loved.
Have a question I haven’t answered?
Email me at jennifer@artpsychotherapynyc.com or use the contact form.
