- CBT skills
- DBT strategies
- Mindfulness practice
About Michelle
Michelle Varady is an LCSW with ten years of clinical experience working in California. She helps people who are dealing with stress, anxiety, depression, addictions, trauma and abuse, and struggles with self-esteem and sleeping. Michelle also works with mood variations, ADHD, grief, and coping with life changes.
Her approach blends practical symptom work with an interest in deeper roots of difficulty. She uses tools from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Dialectical Behavior Therapy to teach skills for managing overwhelming feelings and impulsivity. She also incorporates mindfulness and somatic techniques to help people notice how their body and thoughts interact when guilt or shame show up.
Michelle frames therapy as collaborative. She listens for patterns that keep someone stuck and offers concrete skills to try between sessions. Sessions often include short behavioral experiments, emotion regulation exercises, and practice in noticing unhelpful thinking.
Clients who have struggled with addiction, codependency, or repeated cycles of guilt and shame may find the mix of skills work and deeper exploration useful. She pays attention to how abandonment, control issues, and communication problems can keep problems repeating.
Michelle accepts clients from outside the United States and conducts work in English. She holds the California LCSW and the Nevada LCSW and draws on a decade of practice to balance immediate coping strategies with attention to underlying themes like forgiveness and self-blame.
How her approaches guide online work
Michelle uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help people spot patterns in thoughts and behaviors and try small experiments to test new ways of acting. CBT is useful for concerns like anxiety, panic, depression, and unhelpful thinking that fuels guilt. She also draws on Dialectical Behavior Therapy skills to teach emotion regulation, distress tolerance, and clearer communication. DBT tools can be practical when people feel overwhelmed, impulsive, or stuck in intense cycles of shame and self-criticism. Finding the right approach is part of the work. She collaborates with each person to choose which methods to emphasize based on their goals and what feels actually helpful. That means adjusting the mix of skill practice, mindfulness exercises, and somatic noticing as sessions progress. Confirm the available session formats before booking because the biography does not list specific delivery methods. Online sessions can make it easier to fit therapy into a busy life - for example, shorter check-ins between work tasks, not needing to travel, or choosing sessions that do not require video. Licensed professionals can use those practical options to help integrate skills into everyday routines without promising a particular format.Areas of expertise
Also works with
Additional focus areas
Therapeutic approaches
Experience
10+ years
Listed in
Nevada, California
Languages
English
Frequently asked questions
What kinds of concerns does she help with?
She works with stress, anxiety, depression, addictions, trauma and abuse, low self-esteem, grief, sleep issues, bipolar concerns, ADHD, and coping with life changes.
How would she approach shame or guilt in sessions?
She pairs skills-based methods like CBT and DBT with mindfulness and somatic noticing to help people identify triggers and practice different responses to guilt or shame.
How much clinical experience does she have?
Michelle has ten years of professional experience providing therapy in clinical settings and private practice.
What credentials and region are listed?
She holds LCSW credentials in California and Nevada and practices from California.
Does she work with people who live outside the United States?
Yes, international clients are accepted and sessions are offered in English.
What session formats are available?
Confirm current session options before booking as the biography does not specify particular session formats.
How are costs handled for sessions?
Cost varies by location and sessions use a subscription model that can be canceled at any time.
What should I do to begin working with her?
Select the See online therapy options button, complete the short matching questionnaire, and schedule a first session.
Online talk therapy is not emergency care. If you are in danger or thinking about harming yourself, use the crisis numbers.