ABOUT ME: I am a licensed clinical social worker in OR and WA. I have been practicing professionally for 13 years, and have been working in the field of mental health and developmental disabilities for over 20 years. I started out working in a small school for children with autism. Since then I have gained valuable experience working in a variety of settings working with adolescents and adults. Recently I made a long anticipated transition into my own private practice. This is an exciting time for me and I am grateful to be able to offer high quality care that is specifically tailored to meet individual needs.
WHO I TREAT: My primary focus is treating adolescents and adults in individual therapy. Relationship dynamics show up in every person's life, and are apart of almost every problem and every solution. As such, I do welcome family members and loved ones into the therapy room. I also deeply enjoy working with relationship dynamics and welcome couples as well.
THERAPY: I often use Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) as a first line treatment because it provides effective and efficient ways to manage troublesome symptoms. CBT uses straight forward and accessible skills that typically start to bring some relief quickly. CBT also provides an excellent foundation for deeper therapeutic processing, and therapy focused on increasing insight, values exploration, meaning making, and personal growth. I also incorporate "bottom-up" strategies such as noticing how our body experiences things like emotions and memories. We learn how to compassionately work with the body, breath and mindful movement to help care for the body and heal emotional wounds that are often stored stored there. When treating Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and anxiety, exposure and response prevention are coupled with ACT principles in order to create a more meaning driven exposure process. Therapy is always client centered and strengths based. Treatment is provided using trauma informed and harm reduction lenses.
ADOLESCENTS: Teens are going through profound and rapid changes in the brain, body, and emotions. Adolescents undergo more change than any other age group, except during the years of 0-1. Teens can often come across as self centered and moody. However, this is a part of their major developmental task of developing a sense of self. Therapy provides a place to explore and develop a sense of self in a safe environment with gentle guidance to manage mental health, strong emotions, develop healthy relationships, and set boundaries, and meet increasing demands, all of which provides teens with a good foundation as they journey toward adulthood.
YOUNG ADULTS: As you embark on your adult life, it can be hard to manage increased responsibility, navigate adult relationships, and changing roles, all while the brain is still developing. Like teens, young adults have a high degree of neuroplasticity, making it a great time to make lasting changes. Some mental health conditions usually emerge in early adulthood. These factors make young adulthood another important intervention point.
NEURODIVERSITY: I support clients with emotional challenges that often accompany learning disabilities and neurodiversity. I create an accepting and validating space to build on strengths, learn accessible coping skills, while also developing compensatory strategies to improve functioning. I work with people who have received a late diagnosis to integrate this information into their personal narrative, learn about neurodiversity and how they personally experience it, as well as examine the impacts of being neurodiverse on things like academic achievement, career, relationships, and daily life.
PARENTS: I enjoy working with parents and caregivers to cope with burnout, develop strategies that support mental wellbeing, healthy boundaries, self care, and effective communication and connection in families. From the moment you become a parent, everything changes and these adjustments are not intuitive for many people. In other cases, you may be caring for an aging parent while parenting your own children. A lack of time, sleep, and stress often results in strained relationships, health problems, and mental health conditions that were previously stable may become exacerbated. In order to be a good support, you need to have good support. One of the best things you can do for your family is to take care of yourself. If you are struggling to put yourself first, balance responsibilities, feeling burned out, or simply need to process with someone who is really listening, I can help. I particularly enjoy working with single parents who have additional unique challenges.
ADULTS: I provide psychotherapy for adults who are struggling with unwanted symptoms of depression, anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder. Perhaps you are finding yourself missing work more often, experiencing chronic headaches, or neglecting to do your usual self care. Therapy can help you get back to being functional and more skillful in your life. Therapy can also help you gain insight into how past experiences shape how you experience things today, and you can learn to identify old patterns and forge a new path.
CHRONIC ILLNESS MANAGEMENT: Often, when you have a chronic mental illness, it requires you to learn to manage your condition. This could be a bipolar 1 disorder, very severe depression, or another condition that requires ongoing management. Often in these cases it's important to have a strong relationship with your therapist, who can be part of your treatment team. Therapy ranges from stabilizing current symptoms, to increasing awareness, identifying early warning signs, and developing a plan for what to do if symptoms emerge or worsen. Typically for severe and chronic mental illness, maintenance visits with your therapist can aid in symptom monitoring, increased insight, medication adherence (if applicable), and support to manage stressors.
NEUROCOGNITIVE CONCERNS, AGING, and CAREGIVER SUPPORT: Age related cognitive decline is normal and expected and does not mean it will progress to dementia. However, often when people begin to feel a decline in memory or other types of executive functioning, it's very worrisome. Many have had a parent struggle with dementia, or did a DNA test that indicated an increased risk of dementia...it's very easy to get worried. However, there are a few important and reassuring things to know about cognitive concerns. It's important to know that there can be other causes of cognitive problems that should be ruled out, such as sleep apnea and depression. Some people develop minor cognitive disorders, however, even a diagnosed mild neurocognitive disorder does not necessarily, or even usually, progress to a severe cognitive disorder like Alzheimers. Sometimes people have already gone through screenings or even the diagnostic process and are coping with a diagnosis of dementia or Alzheimer's. Regardless of where you are in this process, its' a scary place to be. However, don't despair because in all of these situations there are things that you can do to help cognition and slow deterioration.
I would love the opportunity to provide you with emotional support to process what you are feeling, and support you with learning and implementing some strategies to maximize well being for as long as possible. I am also honored to support caregivers who are the unsung heroes. They have often been forced to put their self care and mental health last behind their kids, aging parents, family and work....but that eventually catches up to you. Please contact me so I can provide a safe space to process feelings and develop some strategies to incorporate more TLC for yourself.
LICENSING SUPERVISION: I offer clinical licensing supervision for Associates in Oregon and Washington.
Caroline Rose
Licensed Clinical Social Worker
