GET TO KNOW VALERIE

Valerie Kowalski, LMSW, DBT, CBT, REBT

Associate Therapist

Valerie Kowalski is a highly trained mental health professional with extensive experience helping adolescents and adults navigate emotional, behavioral, and interpersonal challenges. She specializes in working with individuals experiencing anxiety, depression, mood disorders, personality disorders, substance use concerns, relationship difficulties, trauma, life transitions, emotional dysregulation, and complex mental health presentations. Valerie is known for her thoughtful, analytical approach and her ability to create individualized treatment plans that address each client’s unique strengths, challenges, and goals.

Valerie believes that effective therapy begins with meeting clients where they are while empowering them to build greater autonomy, confidence, and emotional well-being. Her therapeutic style is collaborative, structured, and solution-focused, combining compassion with practical skill development. She works closely with clients to strengthen coping skills, improve emotional regulation, develop healthier thought patterns, increase self-awareness, and create meaningful, sustainable change.

Drawing from a variety of evidence-based treatment approaches, Valerie integrates Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), mindfulness-based interventions, motivational interviewing, and trauma-informed care into her work. She tailors treatment to each individual’s needs, helping clients better understand the connection between their thoughts, emotions, and behaviors while building the tools necessary to navigate life’s challenges more effectively. Valerie also provides couples therapy using the Gottman Method to strengthen communication, trust, and relationship satisfaction.

Valerie earned her Master of Social Work degree from the University of Michigan School of Social Work, where she specialized in interpersonal and humanistic practice. In addition to her clinical work, she spent several years contributing to research examining the intersection of intimate partner violence and substance use. She also served in the Peace Corps in Zambia, an experience that broadened her cultural perspective and deepened her appreciation for resilience, adaptability, and human connection. Her professional background includes nonprofit social services, homeless shelter administration, and work with individuals and families facing significant mental health, social, and environmental stressors.

In addition to her clinical experience, Valerie has completed extensive post-graduate training in REBT, DBT, CBT-informed interventions, trauma-informed care, Gottman Method Couples Therapy, psychopharmacology, group therapy, suicide assessment and intervention, obsessive-compulsive disorder treatment, mindfulness-based approaches, substance use disorders, and LGBTQIA+ affirmative care. She has also received specialized training in personality disorders, racial trauma, EMDR-informed treatment approaches, sexual health concerns, professional ethics and boundaries, and crisis assessment through New York State’s 9.58 designation process.

Valerie is committed to ongoing professional development and regularly participates in advanced continuing education to remain current with emerging research and evidence-based practices. Her goal is to help clients build healthier relationships with themselves and others, strengthen emotional resilience, and develop the skills necessary to create a more balanced, fulfilling, and meaningful life.