Premarital Counseling

Jesse Cetz, MA

Marriage and Family Therapist Associate
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Are you navigating one of these areas in your life?

  • Relationship issues
  • Marital conflicts
  • Intercultural communication
  • Racial/ethnic identity exploration
  • Systemic racism
  • Life transitions
  • Grief and loss
  • Men’s issues
  • Anxiety and depression
  • Premarital support

What would it look like to work with me?

Life can be different. Change is possible. I believe in helping you on your journey of self-understanding and healthy relationships. I am a first-generation Latino with white privilege. I grew up in a low-socioeconomic neighborhood. I received my master’s degree from George Fox University in marriage, couple and family counseling. I use an attachment-based approach (Emotionally Focused Therapy) that emphasizes change occurring in the therapy room with an exploration of core emotions at the root. I also use mindfulness as a way to gain awareness into the present moment. I have 4.5 years of experience in higher education helping young adults navigate racial/ethnic identities and life transitions. You can expect me to show up as the unique me because I value you bringing your unique self.

Potential counseling outcomes

  • Identifying and expressing your emotional needs
  • Increased understanding of your internal world
  • Learning how to communicate with your partner
  • Feeling connected with your partner

Abby Fleeter, MS

Marriage and Family Student Intern
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Does this sound familiar?

  • Feeling a sense of disconnection between you and your partner(s), like changes in intimacy or trouble
    navigating communication in your romantic relationship?
  • Experiencing a reproductive health loss and hoping for a space to process?
  • Feeling stuck in patterns of conflict with your romantic partner, friends, family, or other people in your life?
  • Struggling with self-esteem or academic pressure as a teen?

I Can Help.

I bring a compassionate and collaborative approach into my work with clients, and my hope is to offer a supportive space where you can be yourself and where laughter can feel possible even as you navigate challenging parts of life. We will explore your emotional experiences and relationships, build confidence in
expressing your fears and strengths, and even take some leaps to try out new ways of relating to yourself and others. I use narrative therapy and emotionally focused therapy (EFT) approaches to support individuals, couples and intimate partners, and families in learning from their stories and moving towards
connection and change. I also work from a systemic and relational perspective, which means seeking to understand how we are all impacted by and impacting our relationships, communities, cultural contexts, and stories.

In therapy, I draw upon my background in community mental health and I believe that healing happens every day in community spaces – through music, art, sports, connection, and through the ways we shape and are shaped by community. Whether working with individuals, families, or couples and intimate
partners, small changes can lead to bigger changes as we navigate the hope, loss, overwhelm, joy, and many other experiences that show up in our lives.

What can you expect?

  • A sense of hope for re-connection in your romantic partnerships
  • A deeper understanding of your emotional experiences and needs, and how those needs show up in different ways in your life
  • In couples and intimate partners therapy, an opportunity to explore and practice ways of feeling more connected with each other when tackling challenges, as partners rather than as opponents
  • Greater belief in yourself and your own capacity for growth, healing, and connection

Jimmy Boyda, LPC

Licensed Professional Counselor
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Heal, grow, and create the life that aligns with your values.

Does this sound familiar?

  • Experiencing conflict or stress in relationships?
  • Ready to heal from past trauma?
  • Exploring questions about gender or sexuality?
  • Looking for greater meaning and direction in life?

I Can Help.

With a background in family therapy and education, I support children, teens, adults, and couples navigating family conflict, mood disorders, relationships, trauma, and gender/sexuality concerns. I provide compassionate, evidence-based guidance, helping you understand yourself, recognize your strengths, and build a life aligned with your values.

What can you expect?

  • Greater confidence, self-awareness, and self-acceptance
  • Practical tools for healthy relationships and conflict resolution
  • Increased resilience to handle life’s challenges and stressors

Let’s work together to create the life you want.

August Smith, MS

Marriage and Family Therapist Associate
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Does this sound familiar?

  • Struggling with your or a loved one’s gender identity, sexuality, or level of self-acceptance?
  • Experiencing difficulty in discussing, exploring, or engaging with intimacy, pleasure, or sex tied to shame, trauma, or relational distress?
  • Grappling with current, past, or generational trauma, seeking a safe space to process and utilize coping tools to expand your emotional capacity?

I Can Help.

  • I utilize integrative trauma-informed Narrative Therapy, DBT, and Polyvagal Theory to guide clients through understanding their internal beliefs shaped by early life experiences and how those foundations impact tolerance, behavior, and relational dynamics in adulthood.
  • I believe therapy can assist clients in unlocking their internal resources needed to promote individual and systemic growth, leading to meaningful change.
  • I implore a liberatory approach by analyzing the client’s context within the systems theory framework and the effects of interpersonal interactions on the client.

What can you expect?

  • I work on an individual and relational level to build clients’ innate resources, fortify distress tolerance, promote understanding of behavioral functionality, and fine-tune awareness of interacting communicative patterns.
  • My notable clinical interests include sex therapy, trauma processing, and identity exploration involving gender & sexuality, collectively framed by liberatory practices and systemic thinking.
  • As a queer and transgender therapist, I have experienced facets of systemic oppression and witnessed its impact on other marginalized communities, driving my own goal to expand the accessibility of mental health services and aim to provide a safe and inclusive therapeutic environment to support client’s mental health regardless of cultural or personal identities.

Rita Melnikova, MA

Marriage and Family Therapist Associate
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Does this sound familiar?

  •  Experiencing a lack of accessibility, responsiveness and engagement in your relationship?

  • Feeling out of control and driven by strong and confusing emotions

  • Experiencing a sense of disconnection within oneself and with others?

I Can Help.

  • So much of what impacts us on a daily basis has roots in relationships; our relationships with people around us but also with ourselves. I seek to understand clients’ needs in the context of their individual lives, experiences and relationships.

  • I am direct and efficient in my use of my models, utilizing Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) with couples and Internal Family Systems Therapy (IFS) with individuals.

  • I know that life can get really messy, relationships can take many forms and sometimes the history people share together can seem too complicated to be understood. I am here to hear your story, follow your lead as the expert in your own life and support you in the changes that you want to make.

What can you expect?

  • Clients will walk away with more clarity about what they want for themselves and in their relationships, gaining skills in identifying, understanding and expressing their emotions.

  • Individuals participating in couples therapy will begin to express themselves more fully to their partners, while feeling supported and understood by them.  They will find new collaborative ways to handle situations which have previously led to conflict and disconnection.

  • Clients will find themselves adopting an US vs. the PROBLEM stance more often than the ME vs. YOU stance when finding themselves in conflict with their partner.

  • Individual clients will experience a newfound sense of clarity in understanding their own emotions and where they come from. They will feel an increased sense of control in their lives and feel empowered to respond to life’s stress in a way that tends toward growth, calmness and security.

Brendan Moore, CSWA

Clinical Social Worker Associate
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Does this sound familiar?

  • Are you or your teen navigating questions around identity (such as gender, culture, race, disability)?

  • Are you struggling with repetitive relationship or career conflicts that don’t make sense?

  • Are you trying to adapt to and make meaning out of a painful event (breakup, divorce, illness, death, or other loss)?

I Can Help.

  • I work with clients to identify and change how unconscious patterns from the past show up painfully in the present

  • My advanced training in psychoanalysis, literature, and feminist theory have taught me to focus not just on symptoms, but on the life story of the person in front of me

  • Culture and structures of exploitation contribute strengths and vulnerabilities to every person’s life, and I strive to welcome these concerns into the consulting room in a spirit of humility

What can you expect?

  • You will derive greater satisfaction and meaning from life, work, and relationships

  • You will experience more clarity on issues of identity, love, and long-term goals

  • You will find improved resilience in the face of life’s challenges

Savannah Rigney, MA

Professional Counselor Associate
I work with:
I specialize in:

Does this sound familiar?

  • Feeling overwhelmed by significant life changes or experiencing issues related to complex trauma?
  • Striving to build trust in yourself and secure relationships with others?
  • Are you seeking a life filled with more joy, purpose, and sense of peace?

I Can Help.

  • In our work together, I’ll guide you through a journey of self-discovery, helping you understand the connection between your mind and body, and supporting you in creating new patterns and insights that align with your personal hopes and goals.
  • I’m trained in a holistic and systematic approach, which means I consider how all aspects of your life have influenced you.
  • I approach our work with compassion and curiosity, always fostering hope and confidence in your healing journey.

What can you expect?

  • Let go of the burdens from the past, heal emotional wounds, and address the effects of trauma.
  • Enhanced self-awareness and understanding of your relationship with others.
  • Deeper access to your inner self, fostering qualities such as playfulness, connection, self-belief, and compassion.

Halle Winkler, MA

Marriage and Family Therapist Associate
I work with:
I specialize in:

Does this sound familiar?

  • Are you or your child struggling with questions of identity?
  • Does it feel hard to find a “new normal” after things have changed?
  • Are you hoping to strengthen your relationships but aren’t sure where to begin?

I Can Help.

  • I work from a systemic lens, seeking to understand you within the context of the communities and relationships you’re part of.
  • My approach is trauma-integrated and attachment-based, meaning I thoughtfully consider how trauma and our earliest relationships shape how we experience the world today.

What can you expect?

  • A strength-based approach where we move at your pace.
  • A deeper connection with yourself and your body.
  • Practical coping strategies you can use right away, alongside tools to address the deeper patterns underneath.

I’m passionate about supporting individuals and families in cultivating healthy relationships with themselves and with others. I primarily work with children, teens, young adults, and parents, and I incorporate whole-family treatment when appropriate.

Mayan McDermott, MA

Marriage and Family Therapist Associate
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Does this sound familiar?

  • Difficulty trusting your own needs, boundaries, or instincts?
  • Wondering why your emotions feel intense, confusing, or hard to regulate at times?
  • Wanting to live more authentically, but unsure how or where to start?

I Can Help.

  • My role as a therapist is to facilitate a personalized, collaborative space in which you feel safe, comfortable, and understood. What’s important to you is important to me.
  • You can expect me to meet you with compassion, authenticity, humor, and openness. I rely heavily on a trauma-informed therapeutic approach that emphasizes the connection between your mind and body.
  • As a neurodivergent therapist who was diagnosed later in life, I know firsthand the grief, confusion, and internalized ableism that can sometimes come along with this discovery. Together, we can figure out how to soothe your nervous system, heal your relationship with yourself, and get in touch with your innate resources.

What can you expect?

  • Feeling more calm, curious, clear, compassionate in your relationships – with yourself and with the people that matter most to you.
  • Make sense of longstanding patterns of behavior and resolve feeling “stuck” in various places in life.
  • Learn how to express yourself authentically, to experience yourself fully, and to know yourself deeply.

Connor O’Bryan, MA

Professional Counselor Associate
I work with:
I Specialize In:

“A therapeutic relationship that seeks the truth and supports your growth”

Does this sound familiar?

  • Feeling distant or out of touch with yourself and the people you care about?
  • Wanting to improve your communication with others but don’t know where to start?
  • Do you often find yourself experiencing worry, overwhelm, irritability, or a low mood?

I Can Help.

  • I believe that the truths and insights we uncover together can deepen your relationships and help you find joy in the world.
  • I offer warmth, connection, empowerment, and humor in my therapeutic space. I am an encourager who believes that no step towards your goals is too small.
  • I draw from a variety of evidence-based theories including Emotionally Focused Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy. I align my therapeutic framework with your goals and what feels important to you at the time.

What can you expect?

  • We will work together to identify patterns in your life that can be adjusted to ease your emotional pain and give you more fulfilling relationships.
  • You will experience a therapeutic relationship that feels safe and empowers you to be your most authentic self.
  • You will gain a better understanding of who you are and how you can live a life in alignment with your values.

Noah Belcher, LCSW

Licensed Clinical Social Worker
I work with:
I Specialize In:

Finding clarity, balance, and joy in your everyday life.

Does this sound familiar?

  • Feeling stuck, lost, or directionless?
  • Overwhelmed with feelings of sadness or anxiety, making it difficult to foster happiness?
  • Struggling with a life transition?

I Can Help.

  • I have experience in both clinical and community-based settings, providing a perspective on how mental health impacts life at all levels of treatment.
  • I provide a mindfulness approach informed by evidence-based practices that are grounded in reality and tailored to the individual and their needs.
  • I use humor and irreverence to help identify strengths, skills, and goals in a genuine, supportive, nonjudgmental, safe space.

What can you expect?

  • Improved ability to cope with day-to-day stressors.
  • Greater capacity for change and identifying goals.
  • A renewed passion for connections and interests.

Alexandra Aguirre, MS

Marriage and Family Therapist Associate

I work with:

I specialize in:

Supporting you to navigate life, relationships, and identity with clarity, confidence, and care.

Does this sound familiar?

  • Struggling or feeling stuck in your relationships?

  • Exploring or experiencing challenges related to your gender or sexuality?

  • Feeling stressed or worried about major life changes or transitions?

I Can Help

I provide a collaborative, client-centered, and nonjudgmental approach, working with you to create therapy goals that align with your needs and priorities. As a transgender woman, I bring both lived experience and professional insight to support transgender clients.

I also use a systemic lens in my work—looking at the relationships and systems you are part of to understand how they shape your experiences and challenges.

What can you expect?

  • Improved relationships: Feel more heard and supported through better communication skills
  • Gender and sexuality support: navigate gender transitions and gain clarity and confidence around your identity.
  • Emotional tools: Identify emotions, communicate needs, and develop coping strategies to manage stress and challenges
  • Healthy boundaries: identify and maintain boundaries in personal relationships and creating a work/life balance.