About Frances
Frances Higgins is a licensed independent clinical social worker with 30 years of experience helping people work through stress, anxiety, loss, and relationship challenges. She listens first and then partners with each person to find useful ways forward. Frances practices in Massachusetts and offers sessions in English.
Her style is practical and person-focused. She draws on client-centered work to meet people where they are. She also uses cognitive behavioral tools to help people notice unhelpful thoughts and try different behaviors.
Background and approach
When emotions run high, she brings in skills that echo dialectical behavior ideas to help regulate feelings in the moment. Frances has long experience supporting people who have survived physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. She uses trauma-informed ideas to reduce distress and to build coping skills for day-to-day life.
She also works with concerns around addiction, grief, parenting stress, intimacy, and self-esteem. Many people find her approach straightforward and steady. Sessions focus on practical steps, skill-building, and clearer communication.
She helps clients set realistic goals and reviews progress over time. Frances also supports people dealing with adoption and foster care issues, attachment concerns, autism-related needs, blended family adjustments, and first responder stress. Her experience includes both psychotherapy and coaching elements to help people move toward greater stability and clearer relationships.
Therapeutic approaches and online care
Frances draws from client-centered therapy to create a warm, accepting space where people lead the conversation and goals are set together. This approach helps when someone needs to feel heard and wants to build a clearer sense of direction in life. She also uses cognitive behavioral therapy, which focuses on identifying unhelpful thoughts and testing new behaviors to reduce anxiety and depressive patterns. CBT is often helpful for worry, panic, and low mood.Finding the right approach is part of the work. Frances collaborates with each person to decide which methods suit their needs, goals, and daily life. She checks in regularly and adjusts the plan as needed so therapy stays practical and relevant to what the person wants to change.
Online sessions are offered by video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to make therapy more flexible. Video helps when visual cues matter, phone can be a good simpler option when bandwidth is limited, and messaging supports brief check-ins or ongoing support between sessions. These formats make it easier to fit therapy around work, caregiving, or travel while keeping the focus on building skills and improving daily functioning.
Questions people ask
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What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Family conflicts
Also listed
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Eating disorders
- Family problems
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- HIV / AIDS
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Jealousy
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Trauma and abuse
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 30 years
- Licensed
- Massachusetts
- Languages
- English
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