About
Hi! I’m Daniela.
I’m a licensed clinical social worker based in Chicago, Illinois and I help people like you better understand how your mind works, feel less stuck in difficult thoughts and decisions, and move toward a life that reflects your values.
Some people come to me because they’re tired of fighting against all kinds of anxiety, self-doubt, OCD, and executive dysfunction challenges. Maybe you can relate to experiences of overwhelm, dread, overthinking, and constant “what if” worries running through your mind. Maybe you find that you can only get yourself started on a task when you’re facing significant pressure or high levels of shame, finding yourself on the teeter-totter between shame as a motivator and shame as an oppressor.
Therapy with me is a collaborative, safe space to help you learn the valuable tools that help you spend less time fighting against your thoughts and feelings and more time actually engaging with what you value most in life.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
Pronounced like the word “act,” Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is an evidence-based approach that helps you build a more compassionate and flexible relationship with your thoughts, emotions, and experiences. Rather than waiting to feel better before living the life you want, ACT helps you learn that meaningful change is possible even when difficult thoughts or feelings are present.
ACT helps you learn to:
Notice your thoughts and emotions without getting pulled into a struggle with them
Make space for difficult experiences with greater self-compassion
Take intentional steps guided by your values and the life you want to create
This approach can feel challenging at first, especially if you’ve spent years trying to fight, fix, or avoid parts of yourself. I provide a supportive space to practice these skills, develop greater self-understanding, and move toward a life that feels more authentic and meaningful.
Why ACT?
Rather than teaching you to get rid of difficult thoughts and feelings, ACT focuses on helping you change your relationship with them. Our minds naturally create thoughts and emotions—many of which we cannot control. Yet we often tell ourselves we should be able to stop feeling anxious, think more positively, or push away painful experiences.
When those efforts don’t work, it’s easy to feel like something is wrong with us. ACT offers a different path: learning to make room for your experiences while still moving toward the people, relationships, and goals that matter most to you.
Exposure and Response Prevention
Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) is a specialized, evidence-based therapy for OCD and anxiety-related concerns. ERP helps you gradually face feared thoughts, feelings, situations, or sensations while learning that you can tolerate discomfort without relying on compulsions, avoidance, or reassurance-seeking.
Through ERP, you can learn to:
Reduce the power that intrusive thoughts and anxiety have over your choices
Face uncertainty and discomfort with greater confidence
Spend less time engaging in compulsions, avoidance, or mental rituals
Reconnect with relationships, activities, and goals that may have been pushed aside because of anxiety
What is ERP for?
When anxiety shows up, it makes sense to want relief as quickly as possible. You may find yourself checking, avoiding, seeking reassurance, analyzing thoughts, or trying to achieve a sense of certainty. While these strategies can reduce anxiety in the moment, they often keep the anxiety cycle going over time.
ERP helps you break that cycle. Together, we identify the fears and patterns that are limiting your life and practice responding differently through gradual, intentional exposures.
Why ERP?
The goal of ERP is not to eliminate anxiety or make uncomfortable thoughts disappear. Instead, ERP helps you discover that anxiety can be present without dictating your actions.
Over time, many people experience greater confidence in handling uncertainty, increased freedom to make choices based on their values, and more space to engage in the parts of life that matter most.
Therapy provides a supportive, collaborative environment to practice these skills at a pace that feels challenging while still manageable.