Elahe Toutaiolepo-Bellinger (she/her)

I have been trained through the Trauma Instituite located in Arizona with focus on providing trauma therapy to individuals and families. My approach is to work with a gentle and thoughtful manner, I provide a trauma informed, psycho-education driven, compassionate space for clients to explore their past, identify triggers, inner parts that need addressing so that they can have a healthier, calmer experience of self and of their world.

Cognitive behavioral therapy allows us to explore some of our core beliefs and the language/personal dialogue we are engaging with ourselves as a mean to interrupt negative thinking styles that often affect how we feel and behave. We are what we think--and we can change our thoughts that still honor how we feel but transform them into empowering/resourceful ways to engage with ourselves.

In this area I assist client's in getting in touch with their feelings, I believe that feelings are messengers with important information to share and it takes skill to learn how to identify them and feel what they are trying to say. Some of us were taught to stuff down emotions and to ignore them and this brings up a lot of issues later on in life--and by exploring emotions that come up--we find the key to increasing well-being with this focus.

Anxiety is often an indicator of a few things, my approach to this is to explore some of the history of anxiety, how it shows up, ways to increase relaxation, grounding in self and getting present and finding ways to observe the anxiety versus fully absorbing it.

My approach to depression is from a person in environment approach that includes what is going on now internally, what is going on in your environment that you spend time in (people, places, etc); personal history, medical history and from there finding ways to increase positive feelings, examining negative thoughts, increase assertion of self where needed and finding other interventions that may be helpful in assisting in decreasing depression.

Trauma is the past living like it is here today. I assist client's in learning what trauma is, how it shows up for them, finding ways to cope with symptoms that come up through a neurobiological approach with tools of using the senses to calm the nervous system down when activated. When clients are ready, then we can explore some of the past in a safe manner to assist with addressing the roots of trauma.