Jessica Hernandez (she/her)

Healing of the whole self involves navigating and processing through the systemic and structural oppression we face every day. I provide brave and vulnerable spaces for QTBIPOC folx to be heard, seen, and validated in their experience. As a QTBIPOC woman, my cultural lens informs my practice and how I show up for those that I support.

Anxiety and stress show up in our lives in different ways - through sleep disturbance, restlessness, overthinking, catastrophizing, and even panic attacks. Through my experience, I have learned that having a space to talk through stressors, fears, and spiraling thoughts support in navigating anxiety symptoms. I utilize perspective-shifting and reality-testing to support with learning how to quiet the spiraling voice in our heads and to uplift our strength and personal peace.

Depression can feel like a fog, clouding our minds and dampening our capacity for pleasure and joy. For others, it can feel like a weight - secure in its familiarity, and still preventing us from living our fullest lives. I work with folx who experience various degrees of depression - from sadness, to numbness, to suicidality and self-harm. Having a safe and brave space to open up about the vulnerable parts of ourselves supports in moving through cognitive distortions and building coping skills.

Rather than utilizing a culturally-sensitive approach, I utilize a culturally-humble perspective. You are the expert of your story and culture. I bring curiosity and openness to learning more about you and how your history, culture, environment, and various systemic structures make you who you are. My own cultural lens provides context and perspective with how I practice, while also allowing for vulnerability and openness to integrate our perspectives together.

Motivational interviewing centers on identifying and centering on our capacity for change. If you are considering a change in your life - navigating behavioral/emotional symptoms, shifts with your work or relationships, coming into your own as your authentic self - motivational interviewing can support in identifying those seeds for change and supporting in their growth. I utilize a motivational interviewing-informed practice in how I ask questions and how I hold space for others.

I utilize a trauma-centered approach to my practice. Rather than a trauma-informed approach, a trauma-centered perspective recognizes that trauma impacts our perspectives and how we move about the world, and serves to dismantle oppressive structures that perpetuate that trauma and its impact. We can do this together through reflective listening, modeling, meaning-making, consistency, contemplative reflection, somatic/body-work, and mindfulness.