Amanda Eilers, LAPC

My mission as a therapist is to help my clients feel less alone and ashamed in their struggles by accompanying them with an empathetic, unflappable presence. I approach client concerns with a wide-angle lens, exploring a range of contributing factors such as internal thought processes, attachment experiences, and intergenerational family patterns. I welcome and warmly encourage my clients to share and bravely explore thoughts and feelings they have perhaps written off as “scary”, “bad”, or otherwise uncomfortable. I will guide clients to strengthen distress tolerance and improve emotional containment using techniques from Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT). Informed by Internal Family Systems (often known as “parts work”) I firmly believe that all emotions matter and every behavior makes sense. I help clients discern unconscious patterns in thinking and relating, with the goal of being empowered to act consciously, intentionally, and in a manner that reflects their values and desires. I welcome clients to process with me the existential questions about purpose, suffering, and death that often arise during times of transition, aging, and loss. 

I received my Masters in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Messiah University, then completed a certificate program in Traumatic Stress Studies from the Trauma Research Foundation. Over the last decade I have worked in a range of community-facing roles including as a foster parent and as a case manager for families facing homelessness. Much of my work as a therapist has been in an inpatient psychiatric facility helping clients in crisis who have serious, chronic mental health diagnoses.

I work with individual adult clients (18+) that are experiencing symptoms of mood disorders, grief and loss, trauma, and attachment issues. I specialize in working with foster and adoptive parents.