About Phyllis
Phyllis Smith is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) who focuses on helping people manage stress and anxiety. She brings five years of practice to sessions and works with individuals and couples who want clearer communication and healthier relationships. She uses a down-to-earth, collaborative style.
Phyllis asks about your goals and works with you to set practical steps. She draws on strengths you already have and helps you build new ways of thinking and acting.
Background and approach
Her approach mixes focused skills work and deeper reflection. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) helps challenge unhelpful thoughts and form new habits. Mindfulness techniques teach simple ways to pause and calm racing thoughts.
Phyllis also uses client-centered principles to keep the work driven by what matters to you. The Gottman Method informs her work with partners, emphasizing clearer communication and manageable behavior changes. She adapts methods depending on each person’s situation.
Common concerns she addresses include anxiety, depression, relationship conflict, parenting strain, grief, trauma, addiction, and challenges around identity and intimacy. She also supports people facing caregiving stress, family-of-origin issues, and life transitions. Sessions are offered from North Carolina and conducted in English.
Phyllis aims to make therapy practical and relevant, helping people leave sessions with concrete next steps and clearer ways to cope between meetings.
Approaches that translate to online care
Client-Centered Therapy focuses on listening and following your priorities, giving you space to set goals and pace. This approach helps people who want a supportive, nonjudgmental space to sort feelings and make decisions.Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) teaches clear skills to change thought patterns and behaviors. It is useful for anxiety, stress, and low mood because sessions include concrete exercises and homework to practice between meetings.
Mindfulness Therapy emphasizes simple attention and breathing practices to reduce reactivity and improve focus. It pairs well with skills-based work when racing thoughts or strong emotions get in the way of daily life.
Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist will collaborate with each person to choose methods that fit their goals, needs, and comfort with different techniques. That choice can shift over time as progress is made.
Online therapy offers flexible ways to connect, including video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging. Video sessions allow face-to-face interaction for skill demonstrations and emotional check-ins. Phone sessions use less bandwidth and can fit a short break at work. Live chat and text-based messaging are useful for quick check-ins, notes between sessions, or steady support when writing feels easier. These options make it simpler to maintain steady work on anxiety and relationship goals while adapting to a busy life.
Questions people ask
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What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Family conflicts
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Co-morbidity
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Depression
- Divorce and separation
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Gender dysphoria
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Trauma and abuse
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 5 years
- Licensed
- North Carolina
- Languages
- English
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