In-Person in Lafayette, LA 70503
Most people who find their way to my practice have already tried to figure things out on their own. They've read the books, talked to friends, maybe even seen a therapist before. And somewhere along the way they realized that what they actually need isn't more information — it's a space where they can finally be honest about what's really going on.That's what I try to offer.I'm an adoptee, a former marathon runner, a person who has changed careers and navigated loss and started over more than once. I don't bring my story into the room to make therapy about me. But I do bring it as evidence that I understand, in a real way, what it feels like to sit with hard questions about who you are and where you belong.My work is warm and direct. I won't validate you into stagnation or challenge you without compassion. I'll tell you the truth, sit with you in the uncomfortable, and help you build the kind of self-knowledge that actually changes how you move through the world.I work with adults, athletes, and families navigating adoption, relationships, life transitions, and the mental side of athletic performance. I see clients in person in Lafayette, Louisiana, and via telehealth throughout Louisiana, Ohio, and Minnesota.If you've been looking for a therapist who will actually engage with your whole story — not just the presenting problem — I'd love to talk.
Client Focus
Session Format: Couple, Family, Individual sessions.
Age Specialty: Adult, Teen, Young Adult
Languages: English
Treatment Approach
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) One of the most widely used approaches, CBT helps people identify unhelpful thoughts and replace them with healthier patterns. It is effective for anxiety, depression, and many other concerns.
- Family Systems Therapy Looks at problems within the context of the family as a whole. It aims to improve communication and balance in family relationships.
- Motivational Interviewing (MI) A collaborative, client-centered approach that strengthens motivation for change. It is especially effective for addictions and health behaviors.
- Person-Centered Therapy (Rogerian) Emphasizes empathy, unconditional positive regard, and authenticity. It provides a safe space for self-discovery and growth.
- Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) Helps clients challenge and replace irrational beliefs. It is an action-oriented approach for lasting change.
Approach Description: My approach to therapy doesn't fit neatly into a single modality, and I think that's appropriate. People are more complex than any one framework, and the most honest thing I can say about how I work is that I follow the client — not the model.
That said, my clinical foundation is grounded in several specific, evidence-informed approaches that I draw from depending on what each client actually needs.
For clients navigating trauma, attachment wounds, and adoption-related experiences, I work primarily through the lens of Trust-Based Relational Intervention (TBRI), Attachment Theory, and Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT). Both frameworks recognize that early relational experiences shape how we move through the world as adults — how we attach, how we regulate emotion, how we respond to perceived threat — and both offer practical tools for rewiring those patterns in a relational context.
For families, I draw on experience with Functional Family Therapy (FFT), a structured, evidence-based model that examines behavior within the context of family systems rather than treating the individual in isolation. This is particularly useful in adoptive family work, where the dynamics between family members are often as important as any individual's internal experience.
Across all my work, I integrate adoption-competent practice as a clinical lens — not just a sensitivity, but a specific framework for understanding how the adoption experience shapes identity, attachment, grief, and relationships across the lifespan.
Beyond these formal models, my work is deeply relational. I believe the therapeutic relationship itself is one of the most powerful mechanisms of change. Clients who feel genuinely known — not assessed, not managed, but actually known — are more willing to take risks in the room and make changes outside of it. Building that kind of relationship requires honesty, consistency, and a therapist who is actually present. That's what I try to bring to every session.
I am also direct. I don't believe in indefinite validation without movement. If I notice a pattern, I'll name it. If I think a client is avoiding something important, I'll say so — with care, but clearly. The clients who tend to work well with me are people who want to be challenged, not just supported.
Finally, I approach every client with the understanding that insight without application doesn't change much. My goal in every session is that the client leaves with something — a new way of seeing something, a skill to practice, a decision made more clearly. Therapy with me is an active process, not a passive one.
Fees & Insurance
Fees
- Average Session Fee 175
- Out of Network
Education & Credentials
Melissa LaCour LPC
- Female
- License # 7708
- Licensed in Louisiana
- Practicing Since 2018
Education: I obtained my Masters in Clinical Mental Health Counseling in 2018 from the University of the Cumberlands. My undergraduate degree is in Mass Communications and English from the University of Louisiana.
Melissa LaCour Practice Details
Therapy Sessions
- Available In-Person in Lafayette, LA 70503
- Available Online for residents of Louisiana, Minnesota, Ohio
- Online Therapy Details: I offer telehealth sessions via a secure client portal on SimplePractice.
There's a particular kind of exhaustion that brings people to therapy. It's not always crisis-level. Sometimes it's quieter than that — the slow realization that the way you've been doing things isn't working anymore, that the patterns keep repeating, that the story you've been telling yourself about who you are might need to be reexamined.
That's the work I do. And I take it seriously.
My practice serves adults, families, and athletes who are ready to go beneath the surface — people who want more than symptom management and are willing to do the real work of understanding themselves. My four core areas of focus are adoption, relationships, life transitions, and sports counseling. These aren't arbitrary categories. They're areas where I bring both deep clinical training and genuine personal investment.
Adoption is the specialty closest to my own story. I am an adoptee, and I have spent my entire life and much of my professional career understanding what adoption really means — not just at the time of placement, but across a lifetime. I work with the full adoption constellation: adult and teen adoptees navigating identity, grief, and attachment; adoptive parents learning how to support their children and themselves; birth parents carrying grief that rarely gets acknowledged; and families touched by foster care, domestic, international, and transracial adoption. My clinical training includes Adoption Competency, and I approach this work through the framework of the seven core struggles of adoption — loss, rejection, grief, guilt and shame, identity, intimacy, and control. These themes don't resolve in childhood. They show up in adult relationships, career choices, and sense of self in ways that aren't always obviously connected to adoption — until someone helps you see the thread.
Relationships are where most of our pain lives and most of our growth happens. I work with individuals examining their relational patterns — why they choose the partners they choose, why certain dynamics keep repeating, why intimacy feels unsafe or elusive. I also work with couples navigating conflict, communication breakdowns, and the slow drift that can happen even in loving relationships. My approach to relationship work is honest and direct. I'm not interested in keeping the peace at the expense of the truth. I'm interested in helping people build relationships that are actually sustainable — ones built on genuine understanding rather than performance.
Life transitions are disorienting even when they're chosen. Career changes, divorce, loss, becoming a parent, leaving a career in sport, relocating, entering a new decade — these moments ask us to redefine ourselves, and that process is almost never as clean as we hope it will be. I work with clients standing at these crossroads who need space to grieve what's behind them, get honest about what's ahead, and figure out who they are on the other side of change.
Sports counseling is work I came to through my own athletic background. I've crossed marathon finish lines and competed on the tennis court, and I understand firsthand what it means to push through mental resistance and compete under pressure. I work with college and professional athletes, high school competitors, coaches, and anyone for whom athletic identity is a significant part of how they understand themselves. Performance anxiety, burnout, identity after injury or retirement, team conflict, and the pressure to perform at a level that never quite feels like enough — these are the issues I work with most often in this space.
Across all four areas, my approach is the same: warm, direct, and deeply personalized. I keep my caseload deliberately small so that every client gets my full attention and genuine investment. I don't use scripts or assign worksheets you could have Googled. I show up prepared, I pay attention, and I tell the truth — even when the truth is uncomfortable.
I am a Licensed Professional Counselor licensed in Louisiana (LPC #7708), with privileges to practice in Ohio and Minnesota. I offer in-person sessions at my office in Lafayette, Louisiana, and telehealth sessions for clients located anywhere in Louisiana, Ohio, or Minnesota. I am out-of-network with insurance by design and provide monthly superbills for clients who wish to seek out-of-network reimbursement from their insurance provider.
If you're ready to do real work — on who you are, how you connect, and where you're headed — I'd be glad to talk. Free 10-minute consultations are available and always no-pressure.