About Teresa
Teresa Lakin is a licensed marriage and family therapist in California with 17 years of clinical experience. She focuses on helping people manage stress, anxiety, addictions, trauma and abuse, self-esteem challenges, and major life changes.
Background and approach
Teresa aims to make the first steps toward help feel less daunting and more doable. Her work begins with listening.
She creates an open space where people can speak about their thoughts and feelings without judgment. Teresa uses practical conversation and steady support to help clients find clearer next steps.
She draws on client-centered methods that prioritize each person's lived experience. This means sessions often focus on what matters most to the person in front of her and on real problems they face day to day.
Teresa also integrates psychodynamic ideas to look at long-standing patterns that affect relationships and mood. For trauma and abuse, she uses trauma-focused approaches to address painful memories and reduce their impact on current life.
Those methods aim to help people feel less overwhelmed by past events and better able to move forward. Teresa works at a pace set by the client and helps build practical coping skills.
She supports people who want clearer communication, healthier boundaries, relief from shame or guilt, and renewed motivation. Her goal is steady, realistic progress that fits each person's life.
Approach-driven online care for stress and trauma
Teresa draws on client-centered therapy to center each session on the person's own priorities and experiences. This approach focuses on listening closely, reflecting what matters most, and building a collaborative plan to address immediate problems and goals.She also uses trauma-focused therapy when past traumatic events are affecting current functioning. That work aims to reduce the hold of painful memories and to build skills for managing reactions and reclaiming daily routines. Psychodynamic ideas are used selectively to notice patterns that repeat across relationships and life choices, helping people understand where those patterns come from and how to change them.
Finding the right approach is part of the work together. The therapist will help clients decide which methods fit their needs, goals, and preferences, and adjust the plan over time. This is a collaborative process that starts with listening and small, practical steps.
Online formats include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging. Video calls allow face-to-face conversation; phone sessions need less bandwidth and can be easier during a busy day; live chat and messaging offer shorter check-ins or ongoing written support. These options give flexibility to fit therapy into a variety of schedules and communication styles.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
Also works with
- Attachment issues
- Avoidant personality
- Co-morbidity
- Codependency
- Communication problems
- Coping with life changes
- Dependent personality
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Guilt and shame
- Isolation / loneliness
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Post-traumatic stress
- Self esteem
- Self-love
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 17 years
- Licensed
- California
- Languages
- English