My Approach to Helping
Is your life controlled by your weight and the food you eat? Feeling helpless and hopeless when your anxiety and depression sabotages your lifestyle? Is it difficult adjusting to a different culture after emigrating? If you feel stuck and tired of not feeling good about yourself or you're overwhelmed and paralyzed by self-critical thoughts and behaviors, it's time to take action.
At Healthy Lifestyles, I use a more collaborative approach to my work. Imagine you and I in a car. You're behind the steering wheel and in charge of the brakes and accelerator. You decide how fast you want to move in therapy. I'm in the passenger seat and my job is to identify what the mechanical issues are that are stopping your car from moving forward (ie is it depression, anxiety, anger etc?) We will identify the roadblocks (stressors related to food, weight, work, school, health, money, culture shock, and relationships)that are stopping your car from moving forward.
Together we will plan out our route using psychotherapy andor nutrition therapy to get you to the place you want to be in your life. On our journey, you will learn tools and strategies to help you turn those self-critical thoughts and feelings around, improve your self-worth and self-esteem, and live the quality of life you deserve. These long-term solutions will help you manage your weight, stress, anxiety, and depression so you begin to see your identity as more than just your appearance.
More Info About My Practice
I am an in-network provider with United and Aetna insurance companies for psychotherapy sessions. If you have coverage with other insurance companies, I will provide you with a Superbill. Sessions are offered virtually and in-office at my Allen location.
I want to make sure you feel confident about starting therapy at HealthyLifestyles! If you're nervous or have doubts, you can schedule a 30-minute discovery session for $65. Please go to www.HealthyLifestylesPLLC.com to request a 30-minute consultation appointment. This consultation helps us to briefly discuss your needs and how we would manage them in therapy sessions. It's really important to me that I understand what you need and you understand how we will be working together.
Nutrition therapy sessions are offered separately. Struggles with nutrition include difficulties with meal planning, purchasing, and preparation or difficulties eating in restaurants or social events. In-home, grocery store, and restaurant sessions help us work on the difficult thoughts and feelings that arise in these different environments. The goal is to help you develop enjoyable, acceptable, and sustainable changes in your relationship with food and eating.
My Therapy Focus
As a licensed dietitian and licensed clinical social worker, I offer psychotherapy as well as nutrition therapy based on your needs and can offer these back to back for your convenience.
If you are struggling with an eating disorder or disordered eating behavior, nutrition therapy will help you to explore your thoughts and feelings about your weight, food and eating that have sabotaged your efforts to follow a healthy lifestyle. If you are struggling with anxiety andor depression, nutrition therapy will ensure that your brain is also being nourished to help manage your moods.
Psychotherapy for anxiety, depression, eating disorders and disordered eating treatment will help you to understand the causes of these conditions and provide you with tools and strategies to manage them and use more healthier coping skills and prioritize your self care.
How My Own Struggles Made Me a Better Therapist
Are you and your family immigrants from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh or other South Asian country trying to adjust to the majority culture without losing your own cultural identity? As a South Asian therapist, I understand the cultural values and beliefs of the South Asian community and the challenges that teens, parents, spouses face as they experience and try to adjust to the majority culture without losing their own identities. I was born in a South Asian community in Tanzania, East Africa, immigrated and raised in a South Asian community in the UK and settled in different South Asian communities in Chicago, New Jersey and now in the DFW area.
