About Laura

I have been privileged to serve in the community mental health field since 2009. My service includes both volunteering and employment in residential treatment, outpatient counseling clinics and programs and the PTSD Clinic at the VA Portland Medical Center, at risk youth, intensive out-patient programs all focused on trauma recovery and resilience. My experience includes working with adults, adolescents, couples, groups and veterans. I am honored to walk with the people I work with along their journey of resiliency, recovery, resolution, and remembering their truest selves.

I am from the PNW, rooted with great reverence for the local cedars, rivers, ocean and mountains.  I have a passion for connecting with the healing wisdom capacities and possibilities of the intersection of the body-mind-soul, spirit and earth. I honor the interconnectedness of life. I believe once we can release and restore our bodies beyond our trauma and attachment wounds back to our innate wholeness, our intuition and internal compass of truth and potential connected to our heart and soul can begin to express itself more clearly in the world. We can start to show up for ourselves, relationships and the earth in a way that is in greater service of goodness.  I believe to feel, we heal, and even more, feeling and sharing with one another and the earth is the gateway to returning to our deepest belonging. 

I continue on the healing and growth journey of healing trauma and deep attachment wounding that extends beyond generations, along with dismantling systemic oppression that lives in the body-mind impacting many areas of authentic being in the world, with myself, others and the earth.

Every day I am reminded to practice presence and gratitude of the moment, self- compassion and welcoming of the wounded parts of myself that require self-love, receiving, letting go and surrendering control, vulnerability to grow and feel connected, gentle and courageous authenticity to show up in a way that is guided by my heart. I am drawn to remembering that all is in relationship with one another and this guides me to continue to have a practice of mindful awareness of my choices and self-responsibility and deep reverence for all of life. I understand the value and courage to welcome the pain and struggle in order to feel and experience the essence of who we truly are and experience deep healing. I believe death is always here in cycles with life and rebirth and it continues to be a teacher of how grief opens me to an increased longing to belong and gratitude to live life with greater meaning, purpose and aliveness. I believe the sacred gift and evolution of our well-being lies within the suffering as well as joy and play. Healing and change is through relationship with our Self, one another and the living earth.

For my own self-healing and evolving growth journey I also interweave holistic practices of ecstatic dance, understanding attachment and intergenerational and collective trauma and its impact on the body, relationships and connection to the soul and Spirit.  Honoring the  healing and growth through deep respect of psychedelics and their potential to open the shadow and light and reveal our truest self. The gift of intuitive movement, meditation, breathwork, shamanic journeying, and authentic vulnerability with others. Connecting to the origins of my ancestral lineages through the earth and dance has been an important part of my path of remembering my inner wisdom.   I love cooking, dancing, spending time in nature and resting in the gratitude of the beauty and belonging with the Earth and one another. 

Education and Trainings

• MA, Counseling Psychology, Lewis & Clark College, 2013
• LPC, Licensed Professional Counselor in Oregon, 2015
• EMDR Certified by EMDRIA, 2016, Certified Supervision (Ross Cohen, LPC)
• Sensorimotor Psychotherapy: Level I: Trauma Training in Affect, 2017 Dysregulation, Survival Defenses and Traumatic Memory
• Sensorimotor Psychotherapy: Level II: Emotional Processing, Meaning Making, and Attachment Repair, 2019
• Assistant, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy: Level II, May 2024- Feb 2025
• Continuing Education:
• End of Life and Existential Distress in Psychedelic Therapy: PRATI (Psychedelic Research and Training Institute), 2024, Christine, Pateros, RN, MA
• NeuroAffective Touch completion of initial training,  2022, Aline LaPierre, PhD
• MDMA-Assisted Psychotherapy training for Complex PTSD with MAPS Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (I do not offer MDMA-assisted psychotherapy and am currently part of developing an Expanded Access Program specifically under FDA-approved protocol)
• Polaris Insight Ketamine Training, Level 1-3, 2020, Portland, OR
• Fluence, Psychedelic Integration 101/102, Elizabeth Nielsen, PhD and Ingmar Gorman Phd, 2020, Portland, OR
• Psychedelic harm reduction services, crisis intervention and integration with the Zendo Project and MAPS Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies. Please see MAPS for current research on the applications for treating complex PTSD.
• Psychedelic Integration Clinical Consultation Group, Jeffery Guss, MD, 2020
• Reiki I/II Certified with Lorelynn Cardo, PhD, 2012, Portland, Oregon
• Shamanic Journeying and Ancestral Healing Course with Christina Pratt at the Last Mask Center, 2017, Portland, OR