Ruth Buchanan,LMSW

Ruth Buchanan,LMSW

Telehealth Available
Professions: Social Worker, Psychotherapist
License Status: I'm a licensed professional.
Primary Credential: Social Work - 124024
Billing and Insurance:

I don't currently accept insurance, but I can provide documentation if clients wish to submit to an insurance company for "out of network" benefit coverage

Fees: $170 per session, sliding scale for eligible clients
Free Initial Phone Consultation
Evening Availability

Offices

113 University Place
New York, New York 10003
Kingston, New York 12401

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My Approach to Helping

I use a relationally-grounded approach, meaning that our therapist-client relationship is a critical aspect of our work that we can use for insight and change. It's vital that you have an environment where you don't feel judged, and that you can experience aspects of yourself you're figuring out or still discovering. I like to work with people on how they experience themselves and their relationships. We're always ascribing meaning and significance to events in our lives, and therapy is a place for us to examine, reflect, and explore this.

I use feminist and queer theory to gently challenge and acknowledge how our contexts shape us. Sometimes, therapy is about going into your past and connecting it with how you experience your life now, and other times it's about holding space for something you're going through in the present and offering support.

More Info About My Practice

I work with you to discern what you want to get out of therapy, and blend an approach that considers what works on the long. This might mean reducing symptoms with coping skills now, and longterm work understanding where those symptoms came from in the first place by delving into your past.

My View on the Nature of 'Disorders'

Many of what are termed disorders can be characterized as reasonable human responses to hard experiences, or the spectrum of neurodiversity. I'm affirming of folks that identify as neurodivergent, and feel strongly that the different sensory and perceptive experiences we have are a valuable form of diversity in our society. I don't subscribe to a 'disease' or 'disorder' model when it comes to mental health.

What the discipline broadly considers as "disorders" can be helpful information in terms of how symptoms might cluster together, but doesn't have any bearing on someone's value or worth. Learning that complex PTSD often results in a distorted perception of self-worth can be really useful, or that folks with ADHD might experience criticism in a different way can be helpful as we understand ourselves. Diagnoses can be helpful as a shorthand for what your experience is like (or where it came from), but in general, I see them as culturally constructed definitions. It's ALWAYS more helpful to go in with curiosity about the quality of each person's experience, what they themselves need, and what a diagnosis might do to help them or harm them; rather than starting with the lens of what a 'disorder' is.

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Ages I Work With

  • Adults
  • Elders

Languages

  • English

Groups I Work With

    I work with individual adult clients on everything from anxiety to LGBTQIA+ to relationship issues.

Industries & Communities Served

  • BIPOC
  • Education
  • LGBTQ+
  • Self-Employed and Freelance Professionals

Client Concerns I Treat

  • Adjusting to Change / Life Transitions
  • Anxiety
  • Depression
  • Emotional Abuse
  • Emotional Intelligence
  • Emotional Overwhelm
  • Emptiness
  • Family Problems
  • Fear
  • Habits
  • Helplessness / Victimhood
  • LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) Issues
  • Life Purpose / Meaning / Inner-Guidance
  • Parenting
  • Perfectionism
  • Self-Compassion
  • Self-Confidence
  • Self-Criticism
  • Self-Doubt
  • Self-Esteem
  • Self-Harm
  • Self-Love
  • Sensitivity to Criticism
  • Women's Issues
  • Worthlessness
  • Young Adult Issues
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Types of Therapy

  • Feminist Therapy
  • Integration of different therapy models
  • Psychoanalysis / Modern Psychoanalysis
  • Psychodynamic
  • Relational Psychotherapy
  • Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT)

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