Welcome to Focal Points Therapy, a home for crafting what you deserve: a meaningful, enjoyable life where you are proud of who you are and what you do, a life aligned with your core values, your focal points.
While no life is without pain, if we can learn to surf the waves of our thoughts and feelings, caring for our wounded hearts with compassion, we can live with remarkably little suffering.
As Nietzche said, “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”
I’m Valerie, a Somatic Therapist, Expressive Arts Therapist, and Ketamine-Assisted Therapist with 20 years supporting others in healing, grounding, and expanding.
My services
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Somatic Therapy
Connecting Mind, Body, and Emotion
Somatic Therapy integrates body-centered techniques like Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT/tapping), breathwork, mindfulness, and guided visualization to help regulate the nervous system and connect you with your embodied experience.
By tuning into your body’s wisdom, we create a safe space to release tension, heal emotional blockages, and bring your mind and body into alignment for deeper well-being. -
Ketamine & Cannabis-Assisted Therapy
Gentle Medicine. Deep Insight. Lasting Change.
Psychedelic-assisted therapy blends science and spirit to support healing on every level—mind, body, and soul. Whether with fast-acting ketamine or therapeutic cannabis, our 2-hour sessions create space for relief, clarity, and connection. With compassionate guidance, we use these medicines to unlock emotional breakthroughs, reduce chronic symptoms, and reconnect you to what matters most.
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Expressive Arts Therapy
Healing Beyond Words
Expressive Arts Therapy blends art, writing, music, and Jungian Sandplay to help you process emotions, access insight, and connect to your inner world.
Whether you're feeling stuck, overwhelmed, or searching for clarity, creative expression offers a powerful path to healing that goes beyond traditional talk therapy—no artistic skill required, just a willingness to explore. -
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Live Your Values. Make Peace with the Present.
ACT is a values-based talk therapy that helps you create meaningful change by increasing psychological flexibility. Through mindfulness, acceptance, and committed action, we work together to quiet the noise of self-doubt, reduce the grip of anxiety or depression, and help you take steps—small or bold—toward the life you want to live.
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Parts Work Therapy
Meet the Many Sides of You
Parts Work Therapy is a talk therapy that helps you understand and meet the needs of the many “parts” of your Self. Drawing from the Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapeutic modality, parts work helps you untangle inner conflict, heal emotional wounds, and connect with “self energy.” Self-energy allows for a secure inner community, where the Self acts as a loving and supportive parent to all your parts—the strong, centered place inside you that can lead from values with clarity and calm.
Find your focal points .
Find your focal points .
Clients say. . .
About Me
I bring decades of experience and training as a to your care—and a whole lot of lived life. With 51 years under my belt, I know that healing comes only when we are safe enough to be our true selves without fear of judgment. With this foundation for authenticity we co-create together, you will find your bravery to practice the hard but healing work of personal change.
I do this work because I was born to do it. There is nothing more authentic or fulfilling to me than listening and looking deeply into another’s story, and building a nurturing relationship where all is welcome.
As a sensitive child, I struggled to find ways to soothe my chronically reactive nervous system, habitually dissociating from the fear, loneliness, and anxiety I often felt by clenching and grinding my teeth, among other somatic behaviors I didn’t yet know were self-soothing means of metabolizing what was affecting me. My mother’s serious cancer when I was 12 further deepened these mechanisms. With one ill parent who couldn’t take care of herself physically or emotionally and the other without understanding of a child’s emotional needs, I unconsciously learned to bury my feelings under chronic muscle tension and longing to be seen and valued by others who would, in my fantasies, truly know me and make me feel emotionally safe.
I watched others and spent a lot of time reflecting on my own feelings. It’s no surprise that at age 12 I knew I wanted to be a therapist. At first, I took an academic path into psychology, but after my mother died when I was 24, I left my doctoral program in Clinical Psychology and started a Master’s in Art Therapy, finding the depth and creativity I craved in my work and in my own healing as I worked through the loss of my mother, a longterm relationship, a beloved pet, the city I lived in, a career path and professional identity, and the worldview I thought I could count on. I would go on to experience other losses that deepened my dedication to supporting others in grief in a culture that allows little space or compassion for it. The places of deepest pain and deepest growth in our lives light me up with curiosity and purpose.