Michelle Mounts, LSW (she/hers)
The Basics
Title: Provisional Clinical Therapist
Availability: Limited availability
Location: Telehealth only
Schedule: Weekdays only
Insurance/payment: UPMC commercial, Highmark BC/BS commercial, Cigna, Aetna, Sliding scale $70-100
My Specialties
Trauma
Grief and loss
Adjustment, stress, transitions
Anxiety and mood symptoms
Relationships and sex (including poly/kink/non-traditional relationship communities)
LGBTQIA2SP+ Support
Couples/partners
Alcohol Use Disorder
Childhood Sexual Trauma
Young Adult Sexual Trauma
Adult Sexual Trauma
My Orientation & Approach
Narrative Therapy; Evidence-based trauma therapies; Expressive therapies; Internal Family Systems (IFS); Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT); Cognitive Behavioral Therapies (CBT), including process-based; Strengths-based.
Some Fun Facts
In the early aughts, I was an editor at Harper's Magazine in NYC/Brooklyn, where I loved to bike around the city.
What working with me is like
I am a real human being in session---relatable, personable, flawed, and transparent. Rapport is probably my greatest skill, and rapport helps my clients feel they can trust me. In the safe space of the (virtual) therapy room, clients venture deeply into the layers of their lives with me at their side as their trusted guide. I use evidence-based practices inside the therapeutic relationship, and the profundity of the relationship helps these practices stick.
Quote
"[W]e can be filled with holes and loss and wide expanses of unhealed geography--and we can also be excited by life and in love and content at the exact same moment.” ― Augusten Burroughs, This Is How: Surviving What You Think You Can't
Important about me
I have been a teacher, an AmeriCorps Volunteer, a fiction writer, and a managing editor, and I am still a writer, music-maker, and visual artist. If it appeals to a client, we might use the arts and the reading of various creative or philosophical texts in session. My approach is that of an artist selecting paints to use, from mindfulness and ACT to exploring a client's family of origin to dialoguing with a client's younger self to discover why that part hurts. All wounded parts are welcome; my clients learn to discover what those parts need and take good care of them.