About Tara
Tara Whitecotton is a licensed clinical social worker who helps people manage stress, anxiety, depression, grief, and big life changes. She focuses on practical skills like coping strategies and clearer communication so daily life feels more manageable. Tara uses a down-to-earth, person-centered way of working.
She treats each person as the expert on their own life and helps them find solutions that fit their goals and values. Sessions emphasize small, usable steps rather than long talks without direction.
Background and approach
Her work often addresses relationship strain, parenting concerns, career stress, and reactions to trauma or loss. She also supports people dealing with eating and body-image issues, bipolar concerns, and the overlap of multiple health or emotional challenges. Tara pays attention to how past attachment and abandonment experiences affect present behavior.
Tara draws on approaches such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, cognitive behavioral ideas, mindfulness, and motivational interviewing to shape sessions. That means helping people notice unhelpful patterns, try new behaviors, and build routines that reduce distress. She uses coaching-style questions and practical homework when it helps.
With three years of clinical experience in Illinois, Tara offers short-term and longer-term options depending on goals. She provides a calm, respectful presence and works collaboratively to set clear, achievable steps toward better daily functioning.
How therapeutic approaches work in online sessions
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ACT, helps people clarify what matters to them and take small steps toward those values even when anxiety or setbacks appear. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, focuses on identifying unhelpful thoughts and testing new behaviors to reduce stress and depressive patterns. Client-centered therapy centers the person’s experience, with the therapist offering empathy and reflection so the client can find their own solutions.Tara treats choosing an approach as a collaborative process. She will talk with each person about their goals, try methods that match those goals, and adjust over time. The client and therapist work together to pick exercises and homework that feel doable and relevant.
Online sessions can be scheduled as video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to fit different needs. Video mimics an in-person conversation when someone prefers seeing facial cues. Phone calls can be easier when bandwidth is limited or when someone wants a shorter check-in. Live chat and text messaging support brief daily check-ins, notes between sessions, and flexibility around work or caregiving schedules. These options make it simpler to keep therapy consistent while tailoring the format to daily life.
Questions people ask
What concerns can Tara help with?
What is her therapeutic style like?
How much clinical experience does she have?
Where is Tara licensed and based?
Which languages are supported for sessions?
Can people outside the U.S. work with her?
What formats are available for sessions?
How does payment and starting therapy work?
What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Family conflicts
- Grief
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Adoption and foster care
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Cancer
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Co-morbidity
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Family problems
- Fertility issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Relationship issues
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sexuality
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 3 years
- Licensed
- Illinois
- Languages
- English
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