Anissa Fox

My work can help anyone who wants to make change that’s more actionable. Some people come wanting to understand their patterns and where they come from. Others already have that awareness and are asking, “Now what?” They may be at different points in that process, but they’re ready to actually work through those patterns so they don’t continue to hold them back from being the best version of themselves.

A lot of the clients I work with are struggling in their relationships in some capacity. They might notice themselves getting “triggered” in an interaction or having a very visceral response when someone says something upsetting. They know their reaction feels bigger than the moment itself, but they don’t always know what’s driving it or how to respond differently.

Other times, there’s a bigger life event— a loved one passes, there’s a loss of a job, or another major transition— and suddenly the day-to-day anxiety or chronic stress they’ve been carrying feels like too much. That can start showing up as withdrawing or isolating more, feeling depressed, experiencing panic attacks for the first time, or simply feeling like, “I’ve hit a wall. I can’t handle this anymore.”

After our first session, I hope you leave feeling hopeful. I want you to begin to understand that there’s nothing wrong with you and that the ways you’ve learned to cope make sense in the context of what you’ve experienced. Over time, a lot of what I hear is clients sharing the changes they’re making in their lives that they’ve wanted to make, but didn’t know how to make before. They’ll say things like, “I’m setting more boundaries in my relationships. I’m not feeling as emotionally distressed following an interaction or conflict. I’m much more emotionally regulated, and I can think more clearly.” A lot of clients say, “I bounce back so much faster.” But the biggest thing I love is when clients say, “I just feel so much more confident in my body and who I am.”

Your first session with me is a 90-minute intake, because I want enough space to really understand what brings you here and what you’re wanting to leave with. I want to know: What brings you to counseling?

Psychotherapy can be limiting when we only look at someone through one lens. I take a whole person approach because what you’re experiencing may be about more than the symptoms themselves— and if we only try to fix the symptoms, we may be missing what’s actually contributing to them. For example, if a woman in her mid-to-late 40s comes to me with increased anxiety, I don’t want to automatically assume the root cause is earlier trauma. Could hormonal changes, nutrition, stress, or something else happening in her body or life be contributing? Counseling may be one piece of what you need, but it may not be the only piece.

A lot of what I do is listening and making observations. Even though our field can get really focused on techniques and interventions, the therapeutic relationship is such an important agent of change.

I didn’t originally plan to become a counselor. I started off as a kindergarten teacher and worked in education for nearly 10 years. I found myself doing– and really enjoying– a lot of the coaching and guidance with parents, especially because for many of them, it was their first experience having a child in school. I was also interested in what was happening underneath the challenges I saw in the classroom. It wasn’t just about the child themselves; I was thinking about their family structure, the dynamics at home, and how those things might be showing up in their behavior and ability to learn. So when I started thinking about getting a master’s degree, counseling felt like a natural next step.

The way I thought about counseling started changing later, through my own family. My oldest son became very drawn to alternative medicine and different ways of healing the body, while my mother was experiencing health concerns that I didn’t feel Western medicine was really looking at the root cause of.