Anxiety & Complex PTSD Therapy Throughout Oregon
Anxiety Therapy for a Calmer, Safer Body & Mind
I provide specialized anxiety and CPTSD treatment to adults throughout Oregon via secure online telehealth. Learn more about how online therapy works in Oregon.
Finally Find Relief From Lifelong Anxiety…
You can instantly tell when someone's mood is just off, even before they say anything. It can be a subtle shift in their tone of voice, less enthusiasm when they greet you, or even their vibe in a text message (“Sounds good.” is obviously a red flag because they would normally say “Sounds good!”)…
The problem? This constant radar system is always “on” — at an exhausting 11/10.
You excel in a crisis. When Your friend went through a difficult break up, you dropped everything to come over with tea, tissues, a Rom Com, and a list of breakup books. You’re the friend who creates structure and takes care of the logistics when things get chaotic.
The problem? Even when you make yourself essential, you still feel unseen.
You don’t understand why you take small criticisms so hard. Your boss or coworker will make a casual comment, and it throws you off balance. Your heart races and your chest feels tight. you replay the interaction and can’t seem to just let it go…
The problem? You have an emotional hangover that lasts for days afterwards. Meanwhile, you button it up, carry on, and pretend like everything is fine (we both know it’s not).
Why Anxiety Treatment Hasn’t Worked For You…
You’re smart and self-aware. you can recognize & Describe these patterns when they happen — but this hasn’t helped you feel any better.
Many therapists would tell you that you need better coping skills. But I disagree…
When you just talk about anxiety, you eventually hit a ceiling…
Talk therapy and developing coping skills has to do with the thinking, logical, and rational part of your brain.
But your brain's protective responses, like anxiety when receiving criticism or the urge to people-please, are stored in your brain’s emotional regions.
These areas respond to your experiences, not your explanations.
This is exactly why you can tell yourself something like, "I shouldn't take feedback so personally," but yet you still have intense physical and emotional reactions.
When Anxiety Is Actually Complex PTSD: Getting to the Real Root
Your anxiety, people-pleasing, and that radar that's always “on” — these aren’t random. These are old ways of protecting yourself from a deeper belief that you aren't good enough just as you are.
Think about it…
Why do you rehearse conversations in advance? Because some part of you believes that your unfiltered thoughts aren’t acceptable.
Why do you sacrifice to the point of exhaustion for others? Because some part of you believes that your worth depends on what you do for them.
Why do you feel devastated by criticism? Because some part of you believes that mistakes are evidence and proof that you’re not good enough just as you are.
Many people spend years treating anxiety without relief because they’re actually experiencing complex PTSD.
Here’s the difference:
Typical anxiety responds to things you’ve probably been taught in past therapy, such as breathing exercises and meditation.
Complex PTSD, on the other hand, includes:
Hyper-awareness (also called hypervigilance) that started in childhood
Feeling unsafe even in safe situations
People-pleasing that exhausts you
Anxiety plus disconnection from your body
If traditional anxiety treatment hasn't helped, we might need to look deeper.
Online Art Therapy & Somatic therapy For Anxiety & CPTSD
This is why I use therapy methods that go beyond just talking: these modalities help you access emotions at a deeper level, where long-term change happens.
I combine art therapy (also known as expressive arts therapy or creative arts therapy) and somatic therapy (also known as body awareness) when working with my clients.
Meeting online offers my clients some advantages because you’ll be exploring these approaches in the same environment (your home, your office, or your home office!) where you experience many of your anxious thoughts and reactions.
When you create art that captures a feeling you couldn't previously name, or notice tension in your body during certain conversations, you're not “learning a skill,” you're recognizing your own experience.
This recognition by itself changes your experience in a way that endless “self-improvement” cannot.
When You Heal the Root of Your Anxiety, Your Life Can Completely CHange…
You stop having so many feelings about your feelings. Instead of analyzing why you’re sad and why you shouldn’t be, you just... feel sad. And it passes. The emotion moves through you in minutes instead of days because you’re not fighting it or avoiding it anymore. Imagine how many hours you’ll get back in your week when you’re no longer hung up in anxiety spirals!
People start seeing the real you because you finally show up. No more curating yourself for each audience. Your work self, friend self, and partner self become the same person. The exhaustion of maintaining multiple versions of you disappears. Your relationships deepen, and conflict decreases.
No more exhausting “what did they mean by that” conversations with your partner
Friends stop saying “I had no idea you felt that way” after knowing you for years
You get promoted because your boss starts recognizing your innovation, not your people-pleasing performance
Your anxiety becomes a messenger instead of an enemy. You recognize that your chest tightness before family calls is telling you about a limit or boundary that needs to be set, not a “you-problem” that needs to be fixed.
You stop spending $200/month on CBD, supplements, and anxiety apps that never worked anyway
You prevent burnout before it costs you your job
You catch relationship issues while they’re still fixable, not after months of resentment.
The inner war ends. The part of you that pushes to achieve and the part that needs rest stop fighting each other. Your chronic pain mysteriously improves. That TMJ, those tension headaches, the digestive issues your doctor couldn't explain…they ease up when you stop physically holding the battle in your body.
Everything makes sense once you stop blaming yourself. The people-pleasing wasn't weakness, it was survival. The hyper-awareness wasn’t paranoia, it was protection. You stop trying to fix what's “wrong” with you and start healing what happened to you. You stop recreating the same painful patterns:
No more dating the same unavailable person in different bodies
No more jobs where you’re undervalued
Ultimately, you save yourself years of repeated cycles because you finally understand the purpose of those cycles and how to break them
You become better company for yourself and others. Saturday nights alone stop feeling like failure. You enjoy your own thoughts. Paradoxically, people start to want to be around you more because you're not desperately needing them to fill a void:
Friends stop feeling drained by your need for reassurance
Your partner gets to be your lover, not your therapist
You attract healthier people because you’re not repelling them out of desperate energy
The compound effect: When you're not spending hours a week managing anxiety, $500/month on coping mechanisms, and half your energy maintaining masks, you have the resources to actually build the life you want.
People often find that once they stop reacting from anxiety, opportunities they couldn’t see before become obvious. Promotions they never thought to pursue. Relationships they didn’t believe they deserved. Creative projects they had abandoned years ago.
The energy you used to spend surviving becomes available for living.
who THIS IS for
This is for you if…
You’ve experienced success in your life but you continue to feel a sense of emptiness, invisibility, and loneliness you haven’t been able to shake
You’re ready to try something different besides performing and earning; you’re done trying to optimize yourself
The idea of somatic and art therapy is appealing to you because either you don’t like the idea of talk therapy, or it hasn’t worked well for you in the past
who THIS IS not for
This is not for you if…
You are only looking for more “techniques” or “skills” to manage your anxiety
You’re not ready to really commit to therapy — you’re still deciding if this is something you want
You need in person therapy sessions, evening or weekend availability, or you need to use in-network insurance benefits for anxiety counseling
Meet Jen, Your Anxiety Therapist
I don’t do therapy that lets you hide behind your “I'm fine” mask.
I’m Jeniffer Duncan, LPC, LAT. I am a Licensed Professional Counselor providing specialized anxiety therapy throughout Oregon via secure telehealth sessions. Oregon Board of Licensed Professional Counselors License #C3022.
Specializing in art therapy and somatic approaches for high-achieving individuals who feel anxious and invisible despite external success.
I provide specialized anxiety and Complex PTSD treatment to clients throughout Oregon
My online therapy services make it easy to access support from anywhere in the state of Oregon.
Find Anxiety Therapy in Your City:
Anxiety Therapy in Salem
Anxiety Therapy in Bend
you’re in the right spot.
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This is for high-achievers who have everything together on the outside but are exhausted from constantly reading everyone's mood, people-pleasing, and hiding your real self because you're convinced you have to earn the right to be loved.
This is not for the type of person who wants a quick fix or who doesn’t have the time and capacity to put the required work in. -
Yes, I am currently accepting new clients. I generally work Monday through Wednesday. I have limited afternoon availability, so please contact me to inquire about hours.
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No, I only see clients online.
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Please scroll down to my contact form, or send me a message on my contact page and I will respond within 48 business hours with my availability.
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My fee is $250 for 55-minutes. If you prefer to work more intensively, I offer 90-minute sessions for $375. If you’d like to schedule a half-day or a multi-day therapy intensive, please see my rates page for more information about package options.
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No, I am not in-network with any insurance company. I would be happy to provide a Superbill (an itemized receipt) for you to submit to your insurance company for reimbursement.
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I primarily use art therapy (also called expressive art therapy, or creative art therapy) and somatic therapy.
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Yes, but only when it will be helpful and effective for you. If you’ve already had a lot of talk therapy, it’s likely time to try a more body-based approach.
FAQs About working with me
Let’s Get STarted
Contact Me To start Anxiety counseling
Complete this form and I’ll be back in touch via email, text, or phone within 1-2 business days.
Call or Text
503-974-4140
jduncanlpc@gmail.com
MAILING ADDRESS
4207 SE Woodstock Blvd. #398 Portland, OR 97206
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Yes. Many people with anxiety live full, successful lives. Therapy can help you manage symptoms so anxiety doesn't control your choices.
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Therapy that addresses root causes, not just symptoms. Art therapy and somatic therapy help by working with your body and emotions, not just your thoughts.
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Often early experiences where you learned the world wasn't safe, relationships where you had to be “perfect,” or trauma that taught your nervous system to stay on high alert.
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Panic attacks, avoiding normal activities, constant worry that interferes with work or relationships, physical symptoms like racing heart or trouble sleeping.
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Anxiety can be significantly reduced with proper treatment. Most people learn to manage it so well it doesn't interfere with their lives.
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Somatic therapy, art therapy, and trauma-focused therapies that help you process experiences stored in your body and emotions, not just talk about them.
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Learn to recognize when past experiences are affecting present relationships. Therapy helps you understand your patterns and develop healthier ways of connecting.
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Through therapy that helps you process what happened and learn that not all relationships will hurt you. Art and somatic therapy let you work through feelings without just talking.
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Therapies that work with your body and nervous system, like somatic therapy, combined with creative approaches like art therapy. Traditional talk therapy alone often isn't enough.
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No. Relational trauma is ongoing harm in relationships. PTSD is a specific set of symptoms that can result from any traumatic event, including relational trauma.
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Anxiety typically focuses on specific worries about the future: work deadlines, health concerns, or social situations. It usually responds well to breathing exercises, CBT, and sometimes medication.
Complex PTSD often looks like anxiety on the surface, but it’s rooted in past experiences, usually from childhood.
Along with anxiety symptoms, you might also notice:
Feeling unsafe when you're actually safe: Your heart races when someone walks behind you at Whole Foods. You can't relax even in your locked apartment. You check your phone obsessively to make sure you didn't miss an "urgent" text that doesn't exist.
Constantly monitoring others' moods: You know your partner's upset by how they closed the car door. You can tell your coworker's stressed before they speak. You scan every room you enter for emotional temperature, exhausting yourself before conversations even start.
People-pleasing that drains you: You say yes to helping friends move even when you're sick. You apologize for existing: "Sorry, can I just squeeze by?" at the grocery store. You spend 20 minutes crafting a two-sentence email to make sure it doesn't offend anyone.
Disconnecting from your body when stressed: During conflict, you feel like you're floating above yourself watching. You go numb when receiving feedback. You realize hours later you haven't eaten, need the bathroom, or that your shoulders are up by your ears.
Anxiety is about what might happen. Complex PTSD is your nervous system still protecting you from what already happened. This is why traditional anxiety treatment often doesn't work: it’s treating the symptom, not the cause.
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If breathing exercises make you more anxious, if CBT feels like mental gymnastics that doesn't help, or if anxiety medication barely takes the edge off, your anxiety might actually be trauma.
Traditional anxiety treatments assume your nervous system just needs calming. But if your anxiety is actually complex PTSD, your nervous system is still in protection mode from old threats. You can't breathe your way through a trauma response any more than you can think your way out of a broken leg.
When anxiety doesn't respond to normal treatment, it's often because we're treating the alarm (anxiety) instead of addressing why the alarm system got installed in the first place (usually early relationships).
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Absolutely. In fact, much of what we call "anxiety" in adults started as childhood survival strategies. If you grew up walking on eggshells, monitoring a parent's mood, or being the "perfect" child to keep peace, your nervous system learned to stay on high alert.
These patterns get wired into your nervous system before you even have words for them. Fast forward to adulthood: your boss's tone triggers the same response as your critical parent did. Sunday dinner with family activates the same survival mode you needed as a young kid.
This isn't traditional anxiety that started in adulthood; it's your nervous system still running childhood software. That's why it feels so automatic and why logic doesn't touch it. Your body is responding to the past, not the present.