Welcome to Love's Practice
Professional Self-Love Guidance from a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist
The end of August marked the tenth anniversary of my Marriage and family therapy career, and honestly? I'm really happy to be here. If I could do it all over again, I'd choose this path 100 times over. What other career lets you witness someone transform their deepest hurts into profound healing? Being a therapist is magical—I literally get to see people grow into the version of themselves they hoped for when they first walked into my office.
Over these ten years, my work has evolved alongside my understanding. I started as an intern working with the general public, then focused on healing generational trauma, helping people improve their relationship with sex and sexuality, supporting couples through imbalanced home management, and now I primarily work with adult daughters from complex families.
But here's what I've learned across every single client and situation: The thing people want the most is love, but what they actually need the most is self-love. And I'm not just talking about my clients—I'm talking about the people in their lives. The family members, friends, partners, and coworkers who call on them for support while struggling to love themselves.
Photo by sammy swae on Unsplash
The Problem with Love
Here's the thing about love: it's one of the most misused and abused concepts out there. Through my clients' experiences—and my own—I've seen how people weaponize the word "love" to manipulate and control. Others use it to soothe or validate. Either way, people get hurt by both the misuse of the term and the complete lack of understanding about what real love actually looks like.
Much of my work processing trauma involves helping clients understand what love truly is and how to have authentic love in their lives—starting with the relationship they have with themselves.
It's Not About Inability, It's About Practice
Through my decade of practice, I've discovered that struggling to love yourself isn't just about not liking who you are. It goes deeper than that. It's about not knowing how to have your own back when life gets complicated, or when the people who were supposed to teach you love passed down their own wounds instead. This is the foundation of generational growth therapy—understanding how family patterns shaped your relationship with yourself.
Not loving yourself isn't an inability—it's a lack of knowing and practice.
"But what if I don't know how to love myself?" This question is exactly why Love's Practice exists.
Loving yourself is a learned behavior. It has to be exhibited, experienced, and encouraged. Without this foundation, trying to love yourself feels like learning to swim from books without ever getting in the water. And if you grew up in a household where self-love was the furthest thing from being modeled—or worse, where it felt frightening or threatening—developing this relationship with yourself can feel impossible.
What Love's Practice Offers You
Love's Practice exposes, encourages, and empowers you to become self-loving. I want everyone to learn how to love themselves because when you do, wellness comes more easily and meaningful living becomes accessible. If you're curious about my therapeutic approach and how I blend family systems theory with self-love practices, learn more about my background and philosophy here.
We're born with the capability for self-love, but like language, it has to be taught. You have the capacity to speak, but you still need to learn sounds, words, and grammar. The more people learn to love themselves, the better partners, friends, and family members we become to each other. When you learn to love yourself and keep up the practice, you become better replenished—which makes being there for others easier and more meaningful.
Each week, I'll share the perfect combination of my personal and professional insights, along with resources on topics connected to practicing self-love. My goal is to offer understanding, guidance, and support for your self-love journey.
You'll also receive Your Practice This Week—three thoughtful questions designed to help you apply what we've explored together. Use these as journal prompts for deeper reflection, conversation starters with trusted friends, or simply as gentle check-ins with yourself throughout the week.
This newsletter is for you if:
You're on a wellness journey and want to improve your relationship with yourself
You feel stuck, lost, or disconnected from who you want to become
You're ready to learn what self-love actually looks like in practice
You're tired of searching for love everywhere except within yourself
If this resonates deeply and you're ready to do this work with professional support, I'm currently accepting new clients for online therapy in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C.
Your Practice This Week
Take a moment to reflect on these questions in your journal:
What would it feel like to have your own back completely?
What's one way you've been searching for love outside of yourself that you could redirect inward?
If you truly believed you deserved love simply for existing, what would you do differently this week?
Let's Practice Together
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Ready to go deeper with professional support? If you're an adult daughter from a complex family struggling with self-worth, boundaries, or people-pleasing patterns, I offer online therapy throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C.
