About Vanessa
Dr. Vanessa Prestridge Graf helps people who are feeling stressed, anxious, depressed, or stuck in painful patterns. She supports those facing relationship strain, parenting stress, low self-esteem, addiction struggles, grief, trauma, and intimacy or body image concerns.
She is Dr. Vanessa Prestridge Graf, a licensed marriage and family therapist with extensive experience in these areas. She uses clear, practical talk in sessions.
Clients can expect to look closely at unhelpful thoughts and learn new ways to think about everyday problems.
Background and approach
She also brings mindfulness practices into work on anxiety and depression to help people notice what is working in their lives. Her approach draws on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Mindfulness Therapy, and psychodynamic ideas about how early experiences shape today’s beliefs and reactions. That means sessions often combine present-focused skill building with attention to older patterns that still affect behavior.
Dr. Graf stresses small, steady changes rather than big promises. She encourages clients to test new ways of thinking and behaving between sessions and to notice concrete shifts as they happen.
Humor and compassion are part of how she helps people stay engaged with the process. With nearly three decades in practice, she has worked with a wide range of concerns from anxiety and mood struggles to relationship and family-of-origin issues. People who prefer practical strategies, mindfulness exercises, and a thoughtful look at past patterns may find her style a good fit.
Approaches and online care for anxiety and stress
Dr. Graf uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Mindfulness Therapy as core tools in online sessions. CBT focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thoughts and behaviors, which can reduce anxiety and improve mood. Mindfulness Therapy teaches simple attention practices to help people notice their thoughts and feelings without getting swept up in them, which can ease worry and rumination.Finding the right approach is part of the work together. She will discuss goals, symptoms, and preferences and then try methods that fit the client’s life. That collaborative process means methods can be adjusted as progress is tracked and needs change.
Online formats include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging. Video is useful for a full conversation similar to an in-person visit. Phone sessions need less bandwidth and can fit a break at work. Live chat and text messaging make short check-ins and between-session support easier. These options help people fit therapy into busy lives and maintain steady progress.
Questions people ask
What kinds of problems does she help with?
How would you describe her therapeutic style?
How much experience does she have?
What credentials and location are listed?
Which languages are available for sessions?
What session formats are offered?
How does cost and billing work?
What are the steps to begin working together?
What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Parenting issues
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Depression
- Eating disorders
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fertility issues
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-love
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 29 years
- Licensed
- California, Colorado
- Languages
- English
We will earn a commission if you sign up through our link, at no cost to you.