My Areas of Focus

  • Couples therapy isn’t just for crisis. It’s for the how did we get here and the what do we do now—it’s for the ones navigating kids, sex and intimacy, or trust that’s been broken, betrayed or lost.

    It’s for the partners who want a strong foundation, and the ones who simply want more play, more communication, or more joy. The ones ready to stop letting the past determine what lies ahead, and the ones barely hanging on - or ready to let go.

    It’s for you both.

    And the quiet hope inside that things could feel different.

    Relationships shape the way you see yourself and the world, and sometimes, without realizing it, you carry old wounds into new connections. In therapy, we’ll take a close look at what keeps showing up in your relationships—whether it’s pushing people away, struggling with trust, or feeling like you’re always bracing for impact. We decide what we want and collectively create it. It’s not easy all the time but neither is a relationship in distress.

    This isn’t talk therapy on loop on a couch in Burke. This is a focused, intentional experience for couples ready to move beyond stuck, hurt feelings and patterns and create deep, lasting change in how you connect, heal and live.

    All couples of all identities and lifestyles warmly welcomed in person in Burke, VA and throughout Virginia via tele-health.

    For more information about Couples

  • Your younger self had it all planned, but now?

    You pour yourself into your family, your job, and everyone who needs you and sometimes it just feels heavy. You aren’t even sure you know what it is you know this isn’t it.

    You’ve learned to keep things together.

    To manage, deal, smile, hold on tightly…

    But underneath it all, the cracks on the surface are showing and this masking isn’t working anymore.

    Maybe there’s a heaviness that you’ve gotten used to.

    The roles you play in relationships, the messages you absorbed, the ways you learned to protect yourself—they didn’t come from nowhere. And maybe it’s time to try something new.

    My role is to help you see those patterns in real time, so you can start making different choices; healthy choices, ones you actually want - instead of repeating the same cycles you’ve already exhausted.

    I welcome you in to safely untangle, navigate and heal.

  • This isn’t about what is wrong with you - it’s about what happened to you.

    You have powerful survival strategies that have worked really hard at getting you here. They are brilliant and yet…what used to work is now, well - maladaptive. Trauma has a way of writing on the canvas of who we are.

    But trauma isn’t always one big, obvious event.

    Sometimes it’s chronic stress, emotional neglect, or being the one who held everything together when no one else did. It’s also not just about what happened—it’s about how your system had to respond to survive..

    The truth is, it’s showing up in your relationships, your decisions, and the way you see yourself. 

    We’ll look at where this started so you can start healing, recalibrating and reclaiming your life.

    On your terms.

    More about Trauma approaches here

  • As a retired Air Force wife it has been my honor to help military families and veterans navigate some very challenging situations.

    Deployments, reunification, separation and retirement, military wives… it isn’t as routine as it looks and we have a unique language and lifestyle that only those of us who have lived it can understand.

    There is a place for you here with someone who gets it.

    For Veterans suffering with PTSD, there is a way to find your peace. My work overseas using a very strong intervention called Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) has been so successfully at eliminating the symptoms of PTSD, Walter Reed has introduced ART as their gold standard treatment.

    I invite you to learn more here.

Here you can expect to:

  • Reclaim what you want; eliminate the self-defeating noise.

  • Shut down that bullshit inner critic that never lets up.

  • Stop bracing for impact in your relationships.

  • No more using your outward success as the only gauge for your worth - (hot tip: it’s faulty)

  • Engage all the parts of you - how you got here and what to do now.

  • Embrace, redefine, or untether from that relationship.

    More about Dawn

Burke VA therapist office - Polaris Counseling Center"

Find balance

Embrace peace

Step into the best version of yourself

It feels overwhelming to know what you need, where to go, who to call…we aren’t supposed to manage this alone.

That’s where our work comes in.

You job, your family, your relationships, your existence… they can be carefully curated to be what you want…without apology.

Your experiences may have shaped you, but they don't get to highjack your future.

Reach out here (it's easy, I promise!)
Reach out here (it's easy, I promise!)

To those of you surviving - you are not alone.

Your strength is the aftermath of battles no one saw

and choices no one should have had to make.

I see you.

I invite you in to rest, heal and find your joy again.