Lisa Smith

Therapy can help you gain insight and learn practical strategies to strengthen your relationships and live life more fully and joyfully. Working together, I can help you explore and learn to manage problems and feelings that may seem overwhelming.

Individual Therapy

As a client-centered psychotherapist, I’ll listen deeply to you and will help you identify your counseling goals, as well as obstacles to achieving those goals. I specialize in helping clients with relationships, sex and sexuality, anxiety, trauma, and LGBTQIA+ issues.

I provide an affirming, supportive environment to explore your issues. Depending on your goals, therapy may include psychodynamic approaches, cognitive behavioral therapy, solution-focused therapy, mindfulness, EMDR and other trauma therapies, expressive arts therapy, sex therapy, ketamine-assisted therapy, and other approaches.

Couples Counseling

When working with couples, I draw from Existential Couples Therapy, Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy (EFT), Imago Relationship Therapy, Gottman Relationship Therapy, and sex therapy because I’ve found that they’re the most successful approaches to healing and strengthening relationships. I work with queer and heterosexual couples, and monogamous and ethically non-monogamous relationships. I’m a kink- and BDSM-affirmative clinician. Click here for more information about the relationship issues that I specialize in and how I provide couples therapy.

Sex Therapy

I’m a Certified Sex Therapist and am passionate about helping individuals and couples have a more fulfilling sex life. My clients have told me that sex therapy has helped them feel more positive and joyful about their sexuality, and has enhanced the eroticism and playfulness in their sexual connections. Click here for more information about how I provide sex therapy.

Ketamine Assisted Therapy

Ketamine Assisted Therapy (KAP) is an integrative psychedelic-assisted modality that combines ketamine treatment with deep psychotherapy. I provide KAP to individuals, couples, and therapy groups.

Ketamine is currently the only legal psychedelic medicine approved by the FDA for clinical use. When provided by a trained therapist, KAP is a safe and legal form of psychotherapy that can enhance and deepen traditional therapy, promote psychological flexibility, and lead to better clinical outcomes.

Research suggests that KAP can help with symptoms of PTSD, trauma, anxiety, depression, and other issues. KAP is also being used within couples therapy to help clients explore and strengthen their relationships.

Click here for more information about how I provide KAP.

Training and Experience

• MS, Counseling, Johns Hopkins University
• MS, PhD training, Sociolinguistics (Multicultural Communication), Georgetown University
• BA, University of California, Santa Cruz

Advanced Postgraduate Training

• Sex Therapy Clinical Program, University of Michigan
• Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy Externship
• Imago Relationship Therapy
• Gottman Couples Therapy
• Fellowship, Contemporary Forms of Psychoanalysis, ICP+P
• EMDR Therapy, Trauma Institute
• Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT) for PTSD
• Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy, Polaris Insight Center
• Internal Family Systems (IFS) and Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy, Ketamine Training Center
• Psilocybin Assisted Psychotherapy, workshops with Bill Richards, Brian Richards, & Mary Cosimano, Horizons NY
• MDMA Assisted Psychotherapy, Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS)

Experience

• Aida Therapy, Washington, DC
• Montgomery County Commission for Women Counseling and Career Center,  Rockville, MD
• NIH Clinical Center, Bethesda, MD
• American University, Kogod Center for Career Development, Washington, DC
• Georgetown University and Chiang Mai University, Thailand, Adjunct Faculty
• U.S. Department of Education, Senior Advisor

Credentials

• Licensed Professional Counselor, Washington, DC
• National Board Certified Counselor
• AASECT Certified Sex Therapist

Affiliations

• American Counseling Association
• Mid Atlantic Group Psychotherapy Society
• International Center for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy
• American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Sex Therapists
• Association for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Issues in Counseling
• SAIGE: Society for Sexual, Affectional, Intersectional, and Gender Expansive Identities
• American Psychedelic Practitioners Association

Articles

• Four Things to Know about Depression in Lawyers
• Who am I? To Choose the Right College, Look Inward First. In U.S. News & World Report: America’s Best Colleges

Presentations

• Modern Love: A Comparison of the Relationship Satisfaction of Same-Sex Married Couples and Heterosexual Married Couples in their 20s, Johns Hopkins University
• Multicultural Communication Training, NIH Clinical Center
• Maintaining Inner Peace workshop, presented with Elizabeth Nyang, LCPC, Montgomery County Commission for Women
• Strategies to Reduce Anxiety in a Challenging Economy workshop, Kogod School of Business, American University
• Enhancing your Support System workshop, Montgomery County Commission for Women
• Depression in Lawyers: A Group Therapy Approach to Treatment, Johns Hopkins University
• Exploring Life Stories through Art & Writing, An Experiential Workshop Series for Therapists, Art Spa, Washington, DC
• Creative Self-Care for Therapists Workshop, Art Spa, Washington, DC

202.540.8244

lisa@lisasmithpsychotherapy.com