After our new client consultation, you are welcome to think about or talk over our meeting and decide if you'd like to move forward.

If so, send me an email or client portal message, and I'll send you the intake documents. Those documents will be a mix of administrative paperwork, consent forms, and questionnaires about you and your relationship.

You're welcome to request an intake appointment online through the client portal after you finish your intake paperwork. I typically don't approve the intake appointment until everyone has finished their paperwork. From there, we meet for your intake assessment so that we can get started on identifying your goals, clarifying your concerns, and building a therapeutic relationship.

Every relationship is different, and each relationship has different levels of distress. Generally, I recommend meeting with me once a week for at least a few weeks in a row to allow me to get to know you and to hopefully get you some momentum toward change, and then from there either continuing once a week or reducing to every other week. If your relationship is in high distress or has some risk factors I'm concerned about, I'll let you know if I think weekly is a more appropriate fit for the immediate future.

Most couples or families I meet with work with me for six to 18 months. It's also not uncommon for couples and families to stay on my caseload at a maintenance schedule (once every month or two), or to take breaks and come back a year or two later. I've worked with some clients as long as seven years.

All of that to say, expect six to 18 months of at least every other week therapy, but know that you're welcome to stick around as long as you need.

I generally meet with couples and family members together, but meeting separately for an individual session can be quite valuable.

Sometimes, a person needs to verbally describe the "rough draft" of their thoughts or feelings before addressing it in more detail in a couples or family session. Sometimes a person hasn't figured out how to be honest with their partner about something and wants my support to disclose this thing in session. Sometimes, meeting separately allows a person to talk more in depth about something that I need to know more about, but that their partner or family member tends to take personally, feel shame about, or be reactive to.

An individual session is not individual therapy (though hopefully the individual session feels therapuetic!) Everything we talk about in an individual session is meant to come back to the relational therapy process.

Yes, I do provide individual therapy! I'm well experienced in providing individual therapy and welcome you to meet with me for a consultation to see if I'm a good fit for your individual therapy needs.

As long as you and your family members are physically in a state I am licensed in at the time of the appointment, I can see you. I am currently licensed in Illinois, Oregon, Washington, and Arizona.

It can be confusing trying to figure out where your therapist can and can't provide therapy (honestly, many therapists are confused by this as well). It doesn't matter if you are a resident of the state I'm licensed in - it matters that your body is physically located in one of those states when we are doing therapy.

I'm glad you asked. You're spending time, emotional energy, and money on this process - I hope that all clients can walk away from that investment feeling that they saw tangible and long lasting change.

Show up to session with your full attention, and with a willingness to challenge yourself to do things differently. Be honest in session about your thoughts, concerns, and needs. Try your best to really and truly understand where your partner is coming from, and be willing to take accountability for the ways you are contributing to the pain in your relationship. If you think your partner is the only problem in the relationship, be open to the idea that the problem isn't just you, or just your partner - it's the relationship dynamic that happens between you.

Don't wait until your crisis point to look for therapy - getting support and help as early as possible greatly increases the likelihood of therapy making an impact. Waiting for things to be "bad enough" to justify therapy might also mean you create pain and harm that was unnecessary in the process of waiting to feel like therapy was warranted.

At this time, I am only providing services online. Should I start to receive enough demand for in-person sessions in the Chicago / North Shore area, I will likely obtain office space again.

Erin Runt Therapy is based in Illinois. I am located in the Chicago suburbs, outside of the Evanston area.

I relocated here from Portland, Oregon in 2021. Prior to my relocation I'd worked closely with many professionals in the field, and was able to build trust and a good reputation within the therapist / mental health community for my therapy approach and client experiences. For that reason, if you've been referred to me from your provider in Portland, Oregon or Southwest Washington, that's why!

Erin Runt Therapy has a limited number of discounted fee spots that are currently full. I will update my website should a discounted fee spot become available.