Individual Counseling | Plano TX
Divorce & Separation Support
Professional counseling to help you navigate the crisis of divorce—and understand the patterns that brought you here so you don’t repeat them.
Request a Free 15-Minute Consultation
What you actually need right now
More Than Just a Place to Talk
Not advice about what to do. Not judgment about your choices. Just three essential things that help you get through this crisis and land on your feet.
Help Thinking Clearly
You’re facing decisions about asset division, custody arrangements, living situations, and financial futures – decisions that will affect you for years. Therapy creates space to sort through your options when your mind feels like chaos.
A Sounding Board
Your attorney handles the legal strategy, but sometimes you need to talk through a decision without the meter running at $500 an hour. You need someone to help you think through the pros and cons, process what you’re feeling about it, and figure out what actually aligns with your values.
Space to Fall Apart
You can’t break down at work. You can’t rage in front of your kids. You can’t process your grief during a mediation session. Therapy is where you get to feel everything you’re holding back everywhere else. The shock, the fear, the guilt, the anger, the sadness about losing the future you planned – all of it.
Making Decisions You Won’t Regret
Get Help Thinking Clearly
Divorce forces you to make life-altering decisions while you’re at your least rational. Should you keep the house or sell it? How do you split retirement accounts fairly? What custody arrangement actually works for your kids’ schedules? These financial and logistical puzzles require clear thinking, especially in high-conflict divorces.
However, your brain isn’t wired to make good decisions under extreme stress. When you’re grieving, angry, or panicked, your prefrontal cortex (the part that handles complex decision-making) essentially goes offline. You’re running on survival mode, which makes it hard to focus on anything except survival.
Therapy helps you:
- Separate the emotional weight from the practical decision
- Identify when you’re making choices from fear versus clarity
- Think through second and third-order consequences
- Recognize when you need more time versus when you’re stalling
- Get your analytical brain back online when you need it most
You don’t need someone to make decisions for you (we don’t give advice; we help you figure out what is right for you). Therapy can help you access the part of your brain that can make good decisions, even when everything feels overwhelming.
A Place to Figure Things Out
A Soundingboard With No Stakes in Your Decisions
Your mom thinks you should take him for everything he’s got. Your best friend thinks you should just settle and move on. Your sister can’t understand why you’re still upset because “you’re the one who wanted the divorce.” Your business partner is worried about how this affects the company. Everyone has an opinion, and none of them are actually helpful.
Your family wants to protect you (or their relationship with your ex, or their access to grandkids). Your friends are projecting their own relationship experiences onto yours. Your colleagues are thinking about business impact.
A therapist has no agenda. I’m not trying to get you to stay married or get divorced faster. I’m not worried about my relationship with your ex or how this affects my holidays. I don’t care if you fight or settle, keep the house or sell it, stay in Texas or move.
What I care about: that YOU feel good about your decisions. That you’re making choices aligned with your values, not out of pressure or guilt or someone else’s idea of what’s “right.” That you have space to figure out what you actually want without everyone else’s voices drowning out your own.
A Sounding Board That Doesn’t Charge $500/Hour
Your Attorney Is Not Your Therapist
Your attorney is brilliant at legal strategy. They know the law, they know what judges favor, and they know how to protect your assets. But they are not a great sounding board for working through your feelings.
And honestly? You don’t want them to be. At $400-600 per hour, every phone call where you’re processing grief or talking through whether you should fight for the house is money that could be going toward your actual settlement.
You need both legal expertise AND emotional support. Therapy is where you sort through the emotional and values-based aspects of your decisions. Then you can show up to your attorney meetings clear about what you actually want and why – making those expensive hours count.
Permission to Be Messy and Contradictory
Think Our Loud Without Judgement
“I know I should want custody, but honestly, I’m relieved when it’s his week.”
“I hate him for what he did, but I also miss him.”
“I feel guilty for wanting out when he’s trying so hard to change.”
“Everyone says I should be happy to be free, but I’m devastated.”
“I’m so scared of the future. What if…?”
These are the thoughts you often hesitate to say out loud to your family, your attorney, or your kids. But they’re important, and holding them in makes everything harder.
Therapy is where you get to be contradictory, messy, and human. Where you can say “I want this to be over” one week and “I’m terrified of being alone” the next, and both are valid.
Where you can admit that you’re grieving the marriage even though you’re the one who ended it. Where you can work through guilt without someone telling you to just “get over it.”
A therapist is someone who can handle the full complexity of what you’re feeling and help you make sense of it so you can act more intentionally rather than reactively.
You don’t have to be strong all the time
A Space to Fall Apart
At work, you’re holding it together – but just barely. In front of the kids, you’re trying to be okay, but kids are observant, and they feel the difference. It seems like you’re holding it together, except you’re not doing as well on the inside.
Emotions don’t just go away. When you don’t have a place to process your emotions, they come sideways – in insomnia, in snapping at your kids over small things, in that third glass of wine, in anxiety that keeps you up at 3am, in crying in your car in the parking lot at work.
Therapy is where you can cry without someone getting worried and trying to solve your problems or talk in platitudes like, “Everything is going to be okay”. This is a space where you can be angry without scaring your kids (or turning them against your soon-to-be ex). Where you can say “I don’t know how I’m going to get through this” without someone giving you a pep talk that shows how much they don’t understand your situation.
Falling apart in a safe place is what lets you hold it together everywhere else, and helps you get through this difficult time.
Permission to Be Messy and Contradictory
After the Crisis: The Deeper Work
Getting through your divorce is just the beginning. Once the papers are signed and the dust settles, that’s when the real questions often surface:
Why did this happen?
Most people discover their marriage didn’t fail randomly. There were patterns—some you brought to the relationship, some your ex brought, and some you created together.
Common patterns that show up:
People-pleasing and losing yourself – You made yourself small, ignored your needs, and became whoever your partner wanted
Avoiding conflict until resentment explodes – You never learned to address problems directly, so they built up until the relationship couldn’t survive
Choosing emotionally unavailable partners – This might not be your first relationship where you felt unseen or unheard
Codependency – Your worth came from being needed, fixing your partner, or managing their emotions
Lack of boundaries – You didn’t know how to say no, protect your energy, or ask for what you needed
The work after divorce helps you:
- Understand your role in what happened (not blame—understanding)
- Identify what patterns you’re bringing to relationships
- Heal the wounds that created these patterns
- Build skills you never learned (assertiveness, boundaries, self-worth)
- Make sure your next relationship is fundamentally different
This work takes time—often 1-2 years. But it’s the difference between repeating history with someone new and actually creating something different.
Whether you’re in the middle of divorce chaos or six months past the final papers, we can work on both surviving the crisis and making sure you don’t end up here again.
Learn more about post-divorce recovery therapy.
Goldfinch Counseling
What People Are Looking For When They Find Me
Sometimes people don’t know what they need or want. That’s okay – we will figure it out together, week by week.
Making high-stakes financial decisions while emotionally overwhelmed.
Trying to co-parent with someone they’re furious at.
Grieving the future they planned and feeling uncertain about what a new future looks like.
Needing to think clearly but feeling like their brain is in fog.
Difficulty coping with complex and conflicting emotions.
Needing a sounding board rather than advice and plattitudes.
Understanding why their marriage failed and what patterns they need to change
Making sure their next relationship is different.
- Rebuilding identity and confidence after divorce
Ellery Wren, LPC Associate
Supervised by Belinda Gale Hartschuh, LMFT-S, LPC-S
She/Her
I’m Here For Your Story Not Mine
I Get It (And I’m Here for Your Story, Not Mine)
I’m a licensed professional counselor in Plano, Texas, specializing in relationship transitions – particularly divorce and separation. I also happen to be divorced myself.
Does that mean I know exactly what you’re going through? No. Your relationship, your circumstances, and your emotions are unique to your divorce journey. But I might get it in a way that a non-divorced therapist might not fully grasp.
I’m not here to tell you my story, give you advice, or tell you it’s all going to be okay. I’m here to walk this journey with you – to help you think clearly, process complex and conflicting emotions, and make decisions that will help you land on your feet.
I’m also trained in couples therapy and discernment counseling, which means I understand relationship complexity from multiple angles. I’ve worked with people who are certain they want out, people who are agonizing over whether to stay (learn about contemplating divorce), and people who feel trapped with no good options.
My approach:
You’re the expert on your life. I’m the person who helps you sort through it when everything feels overwhelming—whether you’re in crisis mode during divorce or doing the deeper work of understanding what happened and making sure it doesn’t happen again.
Curious about my education and training, learn more about me.
Goldfinch Counseling
The Office
We see clients in-person in our Plano Texas office (just south of Frisco), at 8105 Rasor Blvd, Suite 225, Plano TX 75075.
Goldfinch Counseling
Divorce Therapy FAQs
These are some of the most common questions for those navigating a divorce and the healing afterward.
How is divorce therapy different from marriage counseling?
Divorce therapy also includes the deeper work of understanding why your marriage failed and what patterns you need to change so you don’t repeat them in future relationships. This post-divorce recovery work often takes 1-2 years and is where real transformation happens.
If you’re not sure whether you want to stay or go, that’s a different process called discernment counseling.
Can you see both me and my spouse (or soon-to-be-ex)?
No. If I work with you individually, I can’t also see your spouse – it creates a conflict of interest. My role is to support you specifically, which means I can’t be neutral if I’m also hearing your ex’s perspective.
If you’re both looking for support during the divorce process, you’ll each need your own therapist. If you’re trying to decide whether to divorce, discernment counseling with both of you together might be appropriate.
Do you take insurance?
I know cost is a consideration, especially during divorce when finances are already strained. For many people, having a place to think clearly and process emotions saves them money in the long run – fewer impulsive decisions, more strategic use of attorney time, and better mental health so they can keep working.
Will what I tell you be used in court?
What we discuss in therapy is confidential. I don’t speak to attorneys, don’t write letters to judges, and don’t testify in custody cases unless compelled by the court. This is your space to process emotions and think through decisions without worrying that it’ll be used against you legally.
Therapy records can technically be subpoenaed, but it’s rare, and I’m mindful of this possibility in my clinical notes.
I'm already seeing a therapist. Why would I need someone who specializes in divorce?
If your current therapist is a good fit for you and you’re benefiting from therapy, it makes sense to stay with them.
If your therapist is not a good fit, it might be beneficial to switch to someone who specializes in divorce support and recovery.
In Texas, our licensing board does not allow us to provide therapy to someone already in therapy unless the therapies are very different. For example, you might be going through a divorce, but also struggle with an eating disorder or addiction. In that case, it makes perfect sense to see two different therapists.
Will you tell me if you think I'm making a mistake?
I won’t tell you you’re making a mistake, but I will ask questions that help you think through whether you’re making decisions from clarity or from panic/anger/guilt.
My job isn’t to judge your choices. You’re the expert on your life. I’m just here to help you access your own wisdom when everything feels overwhelming.
Can I do this virtually or do I need to come to your office?
Both. I offer in-person sessions in North Texas and virtual sessions for anyone in Texas. Some people prefer the ritual of coming to the office – it creates separation between “therapy space” and “home space.” I prefer in-person therapy, but sometimes there just aren’t enough hours in the day to fit it into your already busy schedule. I tend to virtual sessions later in the day/evening.
I'm fine most of the time - I don't think I need therapy. But sometimes I completely fall apart.
That’s exactly when therapy is most useful. You’re holding it together at work, for your kids, in public – and then you’re alone and the panic or grief or rage hits and you don’t know what to do with it.
You don’t need to be non-functional to benefit from therapy. In fact, therapy helps you stay functional by giving you a place to process the emotions you can’t show anywhere else. You’re going through something objectively hard, and having professional support doesn’t mean you’re weak. You’re human, and we all need support sometimes.
The Full Journey
We Support You Before, During & After
We help through the entire divorce journey: from contemplation, navigating the process, and healing afterward.
Individual Divorce Contemplation
If you need to explore the decision on your own, individual therapy helps you figure out if your marriage is fixable, what you want, and what divorce would really look like.
Going Through a Divorce
If you decide to separate, therapy helps you think clearly, process emotions, and navigate the chaos of divorce—from custody decisions to co-parenting to rebuilding.
Healing After Divorce
After the crisis is over, the deeper work begins. Understand what happened, identify your patterns, rebuild confidence, and make sure your next relationship is different.
In-person or Online
Plano Texas Divorce Therapy
We see therapy clients in-person and online from our Plano, Texas office.
Most of our clients are from:
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Schedule an appointment, and let’s get you on a better path.