Therapist in California; Alison Swisher, LMFT.

Therapy for Individuals, Couples, Parents and Teens

Self, grant me the serenity to accept
the people I cannot change;
the courage to change the one I can;
and the wisdom to know it is me.

Individual therapy areas of expertise include:

  • Anxiety

  • Depression

  • Parenting

  • Addiction and Recovery

  • Anger Management

  • Low Self-Esteem

  • Grief and Loss

  • Eating Disorders, Disordered Eating, and Body Image Issues

  • Relationship Issues

  • Career and Work transitions

  • Trauma and PTSD

Our work together will be spontaneous and tailored to your evolving needs.

My work is influenced by Psychodynamic therapy, which acknowledges the importance of early life experiences and how they impact us as adults and Attachment Theory, which is an evolutionary model on relationships. 

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Therapist in California; Alison Swisher, LMFT. Therapy for Parents

Therapy for Parents

I can support you in finding ways to connect with your child(ren) and find some enjoyment in parenting.

Whether you’re facing challenges with your child that you’re not sure how to handle, finding yourself struggling to be the engaged, calm, and collected parent you’d prefer to be, or looking for support to manage your own anxiety as it shows up in parenting.

You will leave your sessions with new tools to use, new ways of understanding your child’s behavior and your reactions to their behavior, and new skills to manage your emotional reactivity.  

Here are some parenting challenges that I work on regularly with my clients:

  • Raising kids who aren’t entitled (especially when surrounded by the intense wealth of the Bay Area)

  • Children getting picked on or bullied by peers

  • Parenting styles and being on the same page with your partner

  • Challenges with divorce and Co-parenting

  • Alcohol and Drug Use

  • Talking with children about sex and sexuality

  • School Placement

  • Homework/studying battles

  • Appropriate boundaries and consequences

Understanding the developmental tasks of your child will help you better cope and navigate through parenting challenges. 

Therapist in California; Alison Swisher, LMFT. Therapy for Teens

Therapy for Teens

If your teen is struggling, I can support them in navigating this uniquely challenging time.

Being a teen is an extremely challenging time (being the parent of a teen is also extremely challenging!).  There is no other time in life where so many changes are happening at once outwardly (physically) and inwardly (socially, emotionally, and cognitively). School pressures are rampant and social pressures abound.  

Believe it or not, the brain is not fully developed until early adulthood (mid twenties), and the part of the brain that is still developing during adolescence, the pre-frontal cortex, is responsible for impulse control and critical decision-making.  This leaves teens vulnerable to making impulsive decisions and experimenting with risky behaviors—they may not see the connection between actions taken today and consequences tomorrow! 

Although you may often feel unwanted and unimportant to your teen, your involvement and guidance during this phase of life are critical to your teen’s development.

Therapist in California; Alison Swisher, LMFT. Couples Therapy

Couples Therapy

It’s not necessarily that you want to leave. You just don’t want to keep living like this

Here are some of the things I hear most often from couples I work with:

  • I feel so lonely and disconnected even though my partner is lying right next to me.

  • We seem more like roommates than romantic partners.  Intimacy feels distant or even awkward.

  • I am exhausted from the demands of my job and parenting and there is nothing left to give each other at the end of the day.

  • I avoid having difficult conversations with my partner because I am exhausted.

  • We are stuck in a vicious cycle of having the same fight over and over on repeat and nothing changes.

  • We are engaging in dynamics that leave us both feeling angry, exasperated, frustrated, misunderstood, and resentful.

  • I’m carrying all of the weight of the mental load and logistics.  We are supposed to be partners.

  • I barely recognize the person I feel in love with.  I’m not sure I even recognize myself.

  • Am I supposed to continue accepting what feels unacceptable in our relationship?  Is this what we have become? 

And that nagging question keeps creeping up: Is this all there is??

Couples often ask me: “Can you save our marriage?”  I always answer honestly that I cannot save your marriage because it is not mine to save.  Saving your marriage — if that’s what you both want — comes from intentionally choosing to show up for one another differently.   I can teach you skills to reconnect, rebuild trust, and create emotional and physical intimacy.  You can choose:

  • To listen differently.

  • To speak differently.

  • To take ownership of what you each bring into the dynamic.

  • To step out of old protective patterns that probably served you in the past, but now keep you stuck.

  • To allow new patterns to emerge that foster trust, intimacy, and true partnership.

You won’t leave couples therapy with magic; you will leave with tools.  With clarity. With hope. And with the understanding that meaningful change is the result of small, intentional shifts, made over and over again, by both of you.

Decorative mantel with a round wooden-framed mirror, a framed quote, two white candles in brass holders, and a small wooden frame with botanical line art.

Is This All There is?

Couples often ask me: “Can you save our marriage?”  I always answer honestly that I cannot save your marriage because it is not mine to save.  Saving your marriage — if that’s what you both want — comes from intentionally choosing to show up for one another differently.   I can teach you skills to reconnect, rebuild trust, and create emotional and physical intimacy.  You can choose:

  • To listen differently.

  • To speak differently.

  • To take ownership of what you each bring into the dynamic.

  • To step out of old protective patterns that probably served you in the past, but now keep you stuck.

  • To allow new patterns to emerge that foster trust, intimacy, and true partnership.

You won’t leave couples therapy with magic; you will leave with tools. With clarity. With hope. And with the understanding that meaningful change is the result of small, intentional shifts, made over and over again, by both of you.

Every day, you are offered a choice:
To protect your relationship.
To fight for connection.
To show up — even when it’s hard or painful.

Therapist in California; Alison Swisher, LMFT. EMDR Therapy

EMDR Therapy

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a powerful, research-backed therapy that helps people heal from the emotional impact of distressing experiences. Originally developed to treat PTSD, EMDR is now widely used to address anxiety, trauma, grief, chronic stress, and more.

Unlike traditional talk therapy, EMDR activates the brain’s natural healing process, using bilateral brain stimulation to help reprocess difficult memories and reduce their emotional charge to resolve the way trauma lives in your nervous system.

Who Can Benefit from EMDR?

EMDR can help if you’re struggling with:
- Anxiety or panic
- Flashbacks or nightmares
- Grief and loss
- Childhood or attachment trauma
- Feeling stuck, numb, or withdrawn
- Feelings of low self-worth and shame
- Emotional reactivity or chronic overwhelm

Many people try EMDR after feeling like they’ve “talked about it enough” but still feel activated, stuck, or emotionally hijacked by their past.  

Through bilateral stimulation—typically bilateral tapping or eye movements—EMDR helps your brain reprocess stuck memories and emotions. This allows traumatic experiences to be integrated in a healthier way, reducing their emotional charge and power over your daily life. 

The result is often profound relief from symptoms that may have persisted for years, without requiring you to relive every detail of your trauma.

Medical Trauma & Physical Pain

While I work with a wide range of issues using EMDR, I have a particular passion and specialization in supporting people healing from surgical trauma, medical procedures, physical trauma, and chronic or injury-related pain.

I know firsthand the weight that physical trauma can carry—not only in your body, but in your mind, your relationships, and your sense of self.   I know what it’s like for pain (and the accompanying fear, helplessness, grief and sense of betrayal by your own body) to ripple through your day, robbing you of joy, connection, and hope. I understand this emotional toll because I’ve lived it.  You won’t have to explain how hard it is—I’ll meet you there with empathy, care, and a deep commitment to help you find your light again.

EMDR gently helps your nervous system reprocess painful experiences so they no longer dominate your daily life. Instead of being trapped by the trauma, your system can release it, allowing space for relief, resilience, hope, and healing.

Healing is Within Your Reach

Let’s talk about how EMDR can transform your physical pain today.

Schedule Consultation

You are never stuck - your brain is designed to heal - and through compassion and connection, the wounds of trauma can be rewired.

Testimonials

  • “Attuned has given me so much insight into the relationship with food, weight, and my body. I have lived the past 40 years of my life feeling trapped in the endless thoughts about food and weight - I have never been able to turn it off. It has caused so much pain and destruction in my life. I learned that there is another way and it is EASY. I thought I was addicted to eating, but Alison taught me about process addiction and how I’ve used it to cope my whole life. I am now eating all of the foods I love without guilt, shame or fear. I feel truly at peace in my body, which is the biggest accomplishment I have ever achieved.”

    — J.N.

  • “I learned so much in this class that I’ve never heard of before - this was a truly different approach and it was so refreshing. I feel like I am finally listening to my body and understanding what it is communicating to me. I had silenced it for so long that I didn’t even realize how much wisdom it holds and how open it was to being there for me when I just tuned in. I am trusting in my body in a whole new way because I am responding to it in an entirely new way. I have never felt more alive. My body has shifted dramatically which feels great, but that is only a fraction of the lightness I feel inside.”

    — K.M.

  • “Alison’s cycle of violence in dieting was the most eye-opening and different approach I have ever seen or thought of. I truly thought I had all of the information because I have been on every diet I can think of and had done what I thought was trying absolutely everything out there. Nothing worked for me. I didn’t realize it was because of the internal relationship with food, weight, and body that needed to shift in order to break free from the diet mentality and trap of living on again and off again on diets for my whole life. Everything shifted for me and I wish I had this information years ago as it would have interrupted a vicious cycle that took so much space in my life.”

    — A.E.

  • “My partner and I are communicating openly and honestly for the first time in our marriage. I didn’t understand how I could sit next to someone on the couch every night and feel completely alone at the same time. I realized I was feeling lonely because the connection we were having wasn’t actually a connection. We learned that we often fight because it kept us connected and that was better than no connection - somehow fighting met a need. Now we are choosing to spend positive time together without distractions instead and the fighting has dropped off. We had never thought about how fighting actually kept us connected to each other but we prefer this new connection so much more.”

    — M.W.

  • “I didnt realize how afraid of my emotions I was until I started working with Alison. My emotions owned me and I felt burdened by them. With Alison's help, I have been able to understand what my emotions are communicating and how to respond in ways that take care of me verses just reacting to my emotions, which gets me in trouble. It is truly liberating to feel like my emotions are not running my life!”

    — R.S.

  • “My husband and I were feeling like roommates and not like romantic partners when we started working with Alison. She was so insightful, thoughtfu,l and nonjudmental- we knew were in very capable hands. We learned how important it is for us to have things to look forward to together that add energy and vitality to our relationship. We are thinking about everything between us differently and she has given us so much hope and perspective that we can enjoy a great relationship that feels satisfying when we put in the time and effort that all relationships require.”

    — A.T.

  • “Alison has taught me so many tools and about how my brain works. I have a better understanding of myself than I ever have before and that is true power. I am finally starting to feel like I can truly get my needs met because I finally understand what they are.”

    — C.M.

  • “Working with Alison has been the best gift I have ever given myself. She has helped me uncover so many patterns that have gotten in my way of meeting my goals for myself. I’m finally making movement and, with Alison’s support, I am in the first healthy relationship of my life. I am so grateful to be where I am now.”

    — L.P.

  • “Alison’s attuned eating group helped me find an approach that I’ve been looking for since adolescence: a way to have a healthy relationship with food, free of dieting or overindulgence. I’ve struggled with body image and compulsive exercise for over thirty years. I have tried a number of approaches to have a more peaceful relationship with food and my body— from individual therapy, to recovery groups, to meditation. Alison’s attuned eating approach, coupled with the hunger scale, helped me tune in to my body cues and enjoy food without overeating in a way I've never experienced before. I found the group aspect extremely helpful in minimizing shame and learning from others’ experience. I can’t recommend this group enough!”

    — E.B.

  • “Alison is a truly gifted therapist. Her insights are profound and she knows the right questions to ask at the right time. With her support, I have been able to overcome long-standing obstacles that previously held me back from fully living.”

    — A.H.

Get started:

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Schedule an initial consultation or contact me to ask your questions and determine if we are a good fit in working together to support your goals. ​

  • My rate is $225 for 50-minute individual sessions and $250 for 60-minute couples/family sessions.  

    I am not contracted with any insurance panels.  However, I can provide you with a monthly Superbill that you can submit to your insurance provider for reimbursement. Please contact your insurance provider to ask about their out-of-network mental health reimbursement benefits. ​My clients with out-of-network mental health benefits are generally reimbursed anywhere from 30%-80% of my fees.

  • I meet with clients for 50-minutes (individual sessions) or 60 minutes (couples/family sessions).   I generally meet with clients weekly or bi-weekly (once every 2 weeks).

    It can take a few sessions to establish a relationship and get to know one another. From there, we can determine how often we'll meet based on your needs and be flexible with scheduling based on your needs.​

  • Yes, I currently offer sessions by Zoom or phone, depending on your needs.

  • I kindly ask for 24 hours notice for any cancellations.  If you cancel within 24 hours of your appointment time, you are responsible for payment for your full session. I also understand that life happens and make exceptions for extenuating circumstances when they arise.  

  • I am licensed to provide therapy to individuals anywhere in the state of California. For clients who are outside of California, I can provide mental health and wellness coaching - reach out to learn more.

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