Internal Family Systems Therapy
You've probably spent a lot of time trying to fix the parts of yourself that feel broken. The anxiety. The anger. The shutdown. The part that people-pleases and the part that pulls away. Maybe you've been told those parts are the problem.
They're not. And that's what IFS is built on.
What's actually going on inside
Internal Family Systems, developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz, starts from the idea that every person has multiple parts. Not in a clinical, alarming way. In a completely human way. You've felt it yourself: one part of you wants to speak up, another part says stay quiet. One part wants closeness, another keeps people at a distance. One part is exhausted, another keeps pushing.
Those parts aren't random. They developed for a reason, usually to protect you from something that felt threatening at some point in your life. The problem isn't that they exist. The problem is that they're still running old strategies in situations that have completely changed.
IFS gives you a way to actually work with those parts instead of fighting them.
You might be a good fit for this work if
You feel like you know what you should do, but something keeps getting in the way
You react in ways you don't fully understand and can't seem to stop, even when you want to
You feel disconnected from yourself, like you've lost access to who you actually are underneath all of it
You've done therapy before and it helped somewhat, but something still feels unfinished
You carry a lot of shame about parts of yourself you wish were different
What the work actually looks like
The goal of IFS is Self-leadership. That's Dr. Schwartz's term for something you've probably felt glimpses of: the calm, grounded part of you that knows what it actually needs. Not the anxious part, not the critical part, not the part that shuts down when things get hard. The part underneath all of that.
In sessions, we get curious about the parts that are driving the patterns you want to change. We don't try to eliminate them or argue them out of the way. We find out what they're carrying, where that came from, and what they actually need. When a part feels genuinely understood, it stops having to work so hard.
This is exploratory work. There's no script, no worksheet to complete. You bring what's present, and we work with it together. I'll follow your lead on pace and depth.
What shifts over time
IFS is not a quick fix, and I won't tell you it is. But clients who do this work tend to notice things changing in ways that feel different from other therapy they've tried. Not just feeling better for a week. Actually understanding themselves differently.
Some of what comes up over time:
The inner critic loses some of its grip because you finally understand what it's been protecting
Reactions that used to feel automatic start to have a pause in them
Relationships feel less charged because you're no longer running old patterns on autopilot
There's more access to a steadier, quieter version of yourself that was always there
What to expect when you start
We begin with a free 15-minute phone consultation to talk about what's bringing you in and whether this feels like a good fit
If we move forward, you'll fill out a few intake forms through the secure client portal before your first session
The first session is about getting to know you and what's bringing you to therapy right now, no pressure to lay everything out at once
Most clients start weekly and move to every other week as things develop
All sessions are virtual. You can work with me from anywhere in Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, or South Carolina.
Who this works well for
I work with adults 18 and up. IFS tends to be a strong fit for people who feel like they've already tried the skills-based approaches and want something that actually gets underneath the behavior. You don't need to know anything about IFS before we start. You just need to be curious enough to try something different.
This is a space that welcomes everyone, regardless of background or identity.
Fees and insurance
Session length: 50 minutes
Private pay rate: $165, sliding scale available down to $100
Insurance accepted: Blue Cross Blue Shield, Aetna, Cigna, Carelon, Quest
Platform: HIPAA-secure client portal, no extra software needed
Thinking about reaching out?
It's okay to not be completely sure yet. Most people sit with this for a while before they contact anyone, and that makes sense. When you're ready, I'd be glad to connect.