One on One Therapy & Psychotherapy
One-on-one therapy, or individual therapy, focuses on clarifying internal thought processes with present day reality. Dr. Smerling regularly meets with individuals who are experiencing crisis, conflict, and loss of confidence. She provides an empathetic ear and a mindful approach to handling life’s challenges.
During individual therapy, Dr. Smerling establishes long-term supportive therapeutic relationships for some, and short-term issue-focused relationships for others.
Short-term Therapy
Individuals who are specifically focused on a challenging life-crisis may benefit from a short-term approach in therapy. In these instances, Dr. Smerling focuses on helping her clients in a proactive and timely manner. Once they have made significant progress and their shorter-term therapy goals are achieved, Dr. Smerling maintains contact with them and remains available for check-in appointments and follow-up consultations.
Long-term Therapy
Long-term therapy is often used in scenarios in which patients are struggling with deep-seeded issues resulting from more extreme situations, traumas, and persistent challenges. They can vary in length, and the treatment model is determined as needed. Each session is tailor-made based on the needs and goals of the patient, as well as their progress in therapy.
What Can You Expect from One-On-One Therapy?
Individual one-on-one therapy – often known as psychodynamic therapy – involves a meeting with Dr. Smerling to discuss your current life’s situation, break down any barriers that might be interfering with your mental, emotional, and psychological well-being, and minimize internal suffering. Dr. Smerling offers individual therapy sessions for 45 minutes to an hour, wherein she helps her patients to understand their problems, their relationships, and their own selves in order to navigate their everyday lives.
Dr. Smerling works in a collaborative manner, which helps you to set both short-term and long-term goals, which may include targeting and removing negative thoughts, feelings or self-doubts, facing certain fears or deep-seeded issues, or changing patterns in your mindset and behavior.
What is Treated Through One-on-One Therapy (Psychotherapy)?
One-on-one therapy can be used to treat a wide range of mental health conditions, whether it’s mild to severe depression, anxiety, addiction, substance abuse or ADHD. However, many of Dr. Smerling’s patients don’t have a specific condition or just one ailment from which they suffer, but they are often seeking therapy for help with stress pertaining to their career, ambitions, personal issues, relationship problems, family strains, and many more private matters.
As a seasoned and collaborative psychotherapist, Dr. Smerling is here to support her clients in making changes to their lifestyle based on their personal goals, to lend a neutral perspective, a listening ear, and to provide a variety of approaches and strategies that promote personal positive change in thoughts, behaviors, and emotional well-being. The variety of approaches are tailored to meet each individual’s needs.
Get Started with Individual Therapy
If you’re interested in receiving psychotherapy with Dr. Smerling, follow these next steps to get started:
Book a Consult: Booking your initial consultation is simple and can be done directly on our website. Select “Book Online” in the lower left-hand corner of the screen and select a date and time that works best for you. You can also give us a call at (212) 794-6057to book this first visit.
Attend Your First Session: This first appointment will allow for Dr. Smerling to get to know you and to set up some initial goals for your therapy sessions.
Schedule Follow-Up Appointments: It’s wise to book your next appointment at the conclusion of each session. This will both ensure progress with your therapy continues unimpeded and that your appointment is on the schedule before filling up.
Do you have any questions? Reach out to Dr. Smerling online with any additional questions or concerns you may have regarding one-on-one therapy sessions at our office on the Upper East Side.
One-on-One Therapy FAQ
What is individual therapy?
Individual therapy, often referred to as one-on-one therapy or psychotherapy, where a single person meets with a therapist or a trained professional in order to work through their personal issues they are facing, whether in their current present-day reality or in their past, and improve the individual’s overall emotional and mental wellbeing.
What is the difference between family therapy and individual therapy?
In individual therapy, the attention is on one person and each session is entirely focused on their personal therapy needs. Whereas in family therapy, the entire family system is the focus and each therapy session serves to help the family function in a more positive manner.
Can individual therapy help a relationship?
In any relationship, it’s important that both parties are self-aware individuals. Not only can one-on-one therapy serve to help your personal growth, but this also extends itself to positively affect the relationships in your life. Of course, if you are looking to target your relationship specifically, Dr Smerling provides couples therapy that will focus on the dynamic inner workings of your relationship itself, and how to improve communication and interaction. Individual therapy is often the foundation for a healthy partnership.
How long does therapy last?
Therapy can last anywhere from a few sessions to several months or even many years. It mainly depends on your personal wants and needs. Some may come to therapy with a very specific problem in mind that they want to tackle and solve right away, and they may feel that just a couple of sessions is sufficient. Others come to therapy with the intent of having a long-term relationship with their therapist, in order to approach not only the problems that they currently know of, but to also uncover any deep-seeded issues, trauma-related concerns, and behavioral patterns and character traits which have been obstacles to emotional health.