Child Therapists in Portland, OR

Working with Children, Adolescents and Young Adults is my strongest specialty because it was during that time in life when I needed support and it was hard to find. I love introducing first time and continuing therapy clients to a positive experience they can carry throughout their lives.

I help children and teens express what’s hard to say with words. Using art, play, and mindfulness, I create a safe space where they can explore emotions, build confidence, and develop healthy coping skills. Together, we work to strengthen resilience, improve communication, and support emotional growth at home and school.

I have worked with children and adolescents from the very beginning of my career. I have extensive background in child and adolescent development and treatment, including play therapy, sandplay therapy, family therapy, and issues regarding adoption, divorce, blended families, and racial and gender identity development, amidst many other areas of focus in therapy.

I am trained in child development and adolescent issues. I find working with this population to be rewarding. Children are eager to grow and helping them achieve this through family intervention, talk therapy and art therapy is my approach.

I work with supporting the parents/caregivers that have children or adolescent with issues.

Portland has a strong therapy culture deeply intertwined with its progressive values, with high demand for therapists who specialize in LGBTQ+ identity, non-traditional relationship structures, trauma, and social-justice-informed approaches to mental health. The city's visible homelessness crisis and political tensions have contributed to significant community-level anxiety, and therapists here frequently address activist burnout, moral injury, and eco-anxiety alongside more traditional presenting concerns. Oregon Health & Science University provides major institutional mental health resources, complemented by a dense network of independent practitioners across the inner eastside, Hawthorne, and Northwest Portland. Oregon's relatively permissive telehealth laws make it particularly easy to access care from across the state.

Gender ID

	61%	Female
	26%	Male
	9%	Non-Binary
	4%	Gender Fluid

Session Type

	81%	In Person and Online
	19%	Online Only

Top Treatment Approaches

69%	Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
50%	Family Systems Therapy
50%	Person-Centered Therapy (Rogerian)
38%	Gottman Method Couples Therapy
38%	Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
31%	Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
31%	Psychodynamic Therapy

Ages Served

100%	Adult
81%	Young Adult
81%	Teen
75%	Senior
69%	Children

Client Focus

69%	Women
63%	LGBTQ+
56%	Hispanic / Latino
50%	Men
50%	Christian

Child therapists in Portland, Oregon OR

Catherine Saunders

Lyubov Gonina

Rose Snyder, EdM, PsyD, LLC

Molly Terry

GRIS ALVES