My work meets you when:
- You’re tired of shrinking, performing, or disappearing to succeed or connect.
- You’re longing for closeness—and bracing for it at the same time.
- Something in you can’t find enough trust to move forward.
- You want a life that fits, without having to abandon the parts of you that made it this far.
- Part you knows what’s happening, but the old pattern still takes over.
- A rupture shook more than the relationship. It shook you.
Therapy that helps you find connection —without losing yourself.
Dr. Christina Chick is a Stanford faculty member and licensed clinical psychologist who brings scientific clarity and real human warmth into the same room. Her style is engaged, emotionally attuned, and quietly incisive—helping clients find language for what’s happening underneath the surface, without disappearing inside it.
Licensed Clinical Psychologist, PSY 33812 (California)
Dr. Christina Chick, PhD
Every insight must translate where it counts–how you communicate, how you repair, how you set boundaries, and how you come back to yourself after rupture. That’s where we’re headed.
Designed for Real Life
I use attachment-based and emotion-focused therapy, trauma-focused methods including EMDR, and practical skills drawn from evidence-based approaches like Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy and Acceptance & Commitment Therapy. We match the method to your goals, not the other way around.
Evidence-Based + Integrative
Therapy works when you feel understood. I pay close attention to the emotional undercurrent: what’s beneath the words, what’s getting defended, and what keeps getting missed between intention and impact.
Emotionally Attuned
I’m engaged in the room. You’ll always know what I’m seeing and why it matters. We slow down the micro-moments that change the whole conversation–so you can see the pattern while it’s happening, and build new options right there.
Relational + Active
My Approach
- Repeating conflict cycles (pursuit/withdrawal, defensiveness, shutdown/escalation)
- Trust rupture and repair (including affair recovery)
- High-achieving adults under chronic pressure (identity, bandwidth, self-trust)
- Attachment-based work with closeness and distance (longing + bracing)
- Dating and intimacy patterns (self-protective strategies that block connection)
- Shame and self-criticism (shrinking, performing, self-doubt)
- Boundaries and people-pleasing (self-abandonment at home or work)
- Trauma-informed care (EMDR) for threat responses and stuck beliefs
- Early experiences shaping present-day beliefs (safety, worth, belonging)
- Real-life integration (communication, repair, boundaries, coming back to yourself)
Areas of clinical focus
- EMDR and trauma-informed therapy
- Parts-based work (including Internal Family Systems)
- Gottman-informed couples therapy
- Integration of CBT, ACT, and DBT
Advanced modalities
- Licensed Clinical Psychologist (California), PSY 33812
- Instructor, Stanford University School of Medicine
- Postdoctoral Fellow, Stanford University School of Medicine
- Postdoctoral Fellow, VA Palo Alto
- PhD, Cornell University
- BA, Dartmouth College
TRAINING & CREDENTIALS
Christina’s work is grounded in psychological science and shaped by years of research training, alongside a deeply relational way of listening. She pays close attention to the moments that shape everything that comes next: tone, timing, distance, and the protective moves people make when something tender gets touched.
Her clinical focus is on relationships—with partners, with family, with work, and with the self. She helps clients understand how early attachment experiences and core beliefs can echo into adult ambition, intimacy, conflict, dating, and trust–so connection doesn’t require self-abandonment. She supports individuals and couples in interrupting repeating dynamics so repair can take root. The goal isn’t just insight; it’s a different outcome in the moments that matter.
