Support for High-Functioning, Overwhelmed Adults

From the outside, you appear capable, driven, and high-functioning. You may hold a demanding job, set high standards for yourself, and be someone others rely on. You’re thoughtful, intelligent, and self-aware.

And internally, things feel more complicated.

Your mind rarely quiets. Your inner critic is sharp and persistent. Emotions feel overwhelming, inefficient, or inconvenient. And when life gets hard, you’re used to handling it on your own.

If you’ve ever thought, “I understand myself, so why does this still feel so hard?”… you’re not alone.

This Might Be You

Many of the people I work with recognize themselves in some of the following experiences:

  • You are a high achiever or deeply ambitious (maybe even called a “workaholic”), often holding significant responsibility or striving for more.
  • You are insightful and can explain your patterns intellectually, but insight hasn’t brought the relief you expected.
  • You have a strong inner critic and hold yourself to standards you would never apply to others.
  • You struggle in close relationships with repeating dynamics, difficulty trusting, or feeling unsure how to let people truly see you, maybe resulting in chronic loneliness or feelings of disconnection.
  • You’ve lived through experiences that still show up in moments of overwhelm, emotional flooding, shutdown, or intrusive memories.
  • You feel largely disconnected from your body until anxiety, exhaustion, or burnout forces your attention.
  • Asking for help feels uncomfortable, unnecessary, or like a last resort.

Why This Makes Sense

These patterns didn’t come from nowhere. When someone has learned (often early or repeatedly) that emotions aren’t safe, needs aren’t reliably met, or competence brings approval and stability, the nervous system adapts. It learns to stay alert. Productive. Self-reliant.

These strategies often lead to success. They help you function, achieve, and survive.

And over time, they can also lead to chronic tension, emotional isolation, difficulty resting, and a feeling of being disconnected from yourself and others, even when your life “looks good” on paper.

You are not broken. Your system learned what it needed to in order to get through.

The Cost of Holding It All Together

At some point, what once protected you begins to cost more than it gives. You might notice:

  • Relationships feel effortful, confusing, or unsatisfying.
  • Rest doesn’t feel restorative.
  • You cycle between intense productivity and periods of overwhelm or shutdown.
  • Old memories or emotional waves surface when you least expect them.
  • You feel frustrated that things still feel hard after years of reflection, reading, or personal work.

Many high-functioning adults come to therapy not because they’re falling apart, but because they’re tired of carrying everything alone.

What Therapy Looks Like Here

I have zero desire to dismantle what is working for you. These life strategies have likely been a big part of what has led you to achievement.

Instead, therapy is about creating more flexibility, compassion, and choice without losing the strengths you’ve built. This is a space where you don’t have to perform, optimize, or stay composed. You don’t need to fall apart to deserve support. Our work is:

  • Collaborative: You won’t be analyzed or “figured out.” We work together, honoring your insight while gently exploring what lives beneath it.
  • Experiential: We pay attention to emotions, body responses, and patterns as they show up in real time, at a pace that feels tolerable and grounded
  • Attachment-Focused: We look at how your relational patterns formed and how they continue to shape your inner world and relationships today.
  • Strength-Based: Your discipline, intelligence, and resilience are assets. We build alliances with the parts of you that have kept you alive, rather than treating them as obstacles.

An Invitation

If this page resonates, I invite you to reach out for a brief consultation. It’s simply a chance to explore whether working together feels like a good fit and to speak more directly about what you’re navigating.

You’ve spent a long time holding things together. Therapy can be a place where you finally get to set some of that weight down.

Frequently Asked Questions

Many people who come to therapy are “doing well” on the outside. Therapy isn’t only for moments of crisis; it can also be a space to explore patterns that keep repeating, emotional responses that feel disproportionate, or a persistent sense of tension, disconnection, or self-criticism.

You don’t have to be falling apart to benefit from support.

Many high-achieving adults arrive with a deep intellectual understanding of their history, patterns, and relationships. Therapy here is moving away from building more insight for the sake of insight; it’s about helping your nervous system integrate what you already know.

That often means working experientially, paying attention to emotions and body responses in real time, and creating space for change that doesn’t rely on willpower or self-correction.

Therapy doesn’t need to be overwhelming to be meaningful. We move at a pace that respects how much you’ve had to manage and how important stability is in your life.

While difficult emotions may arise at times, the goal is not to flood or destabilize you, but to increase your capacity to stay present with your experience in a supported way.

This is a common concern for people who rely on structure, competence, and self-discipline to feel safe. Therapy is not about taking those strengths away.

Instead, it’s about helping you develop more flexibility, so productivity and control aren’t the only ways you know how to regulate, relate, or rest.

Not at all. Disconnection is often an intelligent adaptation to earlier experiences.

Therapy doesn’t require you to suddenly “feel everything.” We work gently and gradually, building awareness and tolerance in ways that feel manageable and respectful of your system.

You don’t need a perfectly defined goal to start therapy. Many people begin with a general sense that something isn’t quite right, or that old patterns are becoming more costly.

We can clarify focus together over time.

The relationship matters. I offer a free consultation so you can get a feel for my approach, ask questions, and see whether this feels like a space where you could be honest and at ease.

There’s no pressure to commit. It’s simply a conversation.