About Laurie
Laurie Jo McDonnell, LMFT, focuses on helping people who are worn down by stress, anxiety, grief, or relationship strains. She speaks plainly and helps clients name what is hard. Laurie believes people carry strengths they can use to move forward, and she meets them where they are in the process.
She has worked in the field for 25 years and is licensed in Florida as a licensed marriage and family therapist.
Background and approach
Her background includes supporting people through depression, family conflict, and loss. Laurie listens for the patterns that keep problems repeating and helps clients try new ways of responding. In sessions she draws on a mix of approaches to match each person's needs.
That can mean noticing unhelpful thoughts and testing them, identifying values and small steps toward them, or paying attention to relationship patterns that block connection. The work is collaborative and paced to what feels manageable. Laurie also brings experience with specific concerns such as abandonment wounds, attachment struggles, blended family issues, caregiving stress, chronic illness or pain, and divorce or separation.
She helps people sort through family of origin issues and communication problems so they can make clearer decisions. Her style is straightforward and respectful. People who want practical tools plus time to tell their story often find this approach useful.
If you want a therapist who balances listening with concrete steps, Laurie may be a good match.
How approaches like ACT, CBT, and Emotionally-Focused Therapy work online
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ACT, helps people name what matters to them and take small steps toward those values even when anxiety or pain shows up. It focuses on practical moves and accepting difficult feelings so they have less control. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, looks at the thoughts and behaviors that keep stress and anxiety going and teaches concrete skills to change them, such as testing thoughts and changing routines. Emotionally-Focused Therapy, or EFT, helps people notice how emotions shape their responses in close relationships and builds new ways to connect and respond to each other.Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist will talk with each person about goals and preferences, then suggest methods to try. That decision is collaborative and can shift over time as needs change.
Online sessions are offered by video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to make therapy flexible. Video calls let the therapist and client see expressions and practice communication. Phone sessions use less bandwidth and can fit a short break during a busy day. Live chat and text messaging allow brief check-ins and written reflections between longer sessions. These options help people fit therapy into their life and try approaches in the situations where they need them most.
Questions people ask
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What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Family conflicts
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Attachment issues
- Avoidant personality
- Blended family issues
- Cancer
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Codependency
- Communication problems
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Divorce and separation
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Infidelity
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Postpartum depression
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Women's issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 25 years
- Licensed
- Florida
- Languages
- English
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