Portland Therapy for Anxiety, C-PTSD, & Grief

That familiar dread before work presentations, even though you've done them a hundred times. Your PowerPoint is perfect, you know your material inside and out, but your heart still races and your palms sweat. You rehearse what you’ll say in the elevator, anticipating every possible question, every way it could go wrong.

The inability to decompress after high-stakes workdays. You're home in your Pearl District loft, but your mind is still in that conference room. You pour a glass of wine, put on Netflix, but you're mentally replaying every interaction, analyzing what your boss meant by that comment, wondering if you said too much in the team meeting.

Declining social invitations because the thought of networking events makes you want to hide. Portland's vibrant food and drink scene should be exciting, but the prospect of making small talk with strangers while trying to appear "successful" feels exhausting. You'd rather stay home than risk feeling awkward or exposed.

Creative projects that used to bring you joy now feel impossible to start. You moved to Portland for the creative community, but something shifted after that difficult relationship ended, or when your parent died, or since that traumatic experience. The ideas are there, but every time you sit down to create, you feel stuck, heavy, disconnected from the passion that used to drive you.

Feeling overwhelmed in places that used to feel like home. Saturday Market becomes too stimulating. The Alberta Arts District feels too crowded. Even your favorite coffee shop on Hawthorne can trigger unexpected waves of anxiety or sadness. You find yourself leaving places abruptly, making excuses, feeling like something’s wrong with you.

Watching your relationships suffer because you're not the same person you used to be. Your partner doesn't understand why you can't just "get over it." Your friends in Portland's tight-knit creative community notice you're different: less present, more guarded, harder to reach. You want to be close to people, but grief or trauma has built walls you don't know how to tear down.

Family dynamics that feel impossible to navigate while you're grieving. Everyone processes loss differently, and your household has become a minefield of different coping styles. One person wants to talk about it constantly, another pretends nothing happened. You're trying to hold space for everyone else's grief while your own feels pushed aside or misunderstood.

The daily commute becoming a breeding ground for anxious thoughts. Those 45 minutes on I-5 or Highway 26 turn into worry sessions. Traffic gives your mind too much time to spiral: about work stress, family tensions, all the things you should be doing differently. By the time you get home to Beaverton, you're emotionally depleted before your evening even begins.

The isolation that comes with suburban routines, especially when you're struggling. Portland's suburbs can feel disconnected from the support systems downtown. You're surrounded by neighbors, but nobody really knows what you're going through. The weekly routine of work-grocery store-home feels suffocating when you're carrying grief or trauma. You long for authentic connection but don't know how to reach out.

The pressure to maintain appearances in communities where everyone seems to have it together. Lake Oswego dinner parties, Hillsboro school events, neighborhood gatherings… they all require a version of yourself that feels increasingly hard to access.