About Melissa
Melissa Benson is a licensed mental health counselor with 24 years of experience based in Florida. She focuses on common concerns such as stress, anxiety, grief, depression, addictions, and coping with life changes. Melissa aims to create a respectful and compassionate space where people can talk about what matters most to them.
She uses a conversational style and adjusts the plan to each person's situation. Sessions are practical and goal-oriented when needed, while also making room for emotion and reflection.
Background and approach
Melissa works with a range of issues from relationship and intimacy challenges to sleep, eating, and anger concerns. Her background includes long-term work supporting people with trauma and abuse, ADHD, bipolar concerns, and family-related problems. She also helps individuals facing aging and geriatric issues, substance use, and the aftermath of natural or human-caused disasters.
Her experience covers both everyday struggles and more complex patterns such as dependent or avoidant personality traits. Therapy sessions blend client-centered listening with techniques from cognitive behavioral therapy and mindfulness. Melissa also draws on motivational interviewing and solution-focused methods to help people find practical steps forward.
She tailors sessions to the client’s goals and pace. People who choose her often need steady guidance through big life transitions or support managing ongoing symptoms. Melissa encourages active collaboration so clients leave with clearer coping tools and a plan they can use between sessions.
Approaches that guide online sessions
Client-centered therapy emphasizes listening and following the person's lead. The therapist focuses on understanding your perspective and building a trusting conversation so you can make changes at your own pace.Cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, helps identify unhelpful thoughts and behaviors and replace them with more useful ones. This approach works well for anxiety, depression, sleep and eating concerns, and many everyday problems where practical strategies help.
Mindfulness therapy teaches simple attention and breathing practices to reduce reactivity and improve focus. It is useful for stress, anger management, and coping with strong emotions.
Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist will talk with you about goals, try techniques, and adjust methods based on what helps most. This is a collaborative process where your feedback shapes the path forward.
Online sessions are offered as video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to fit different needs. Video calls allow face-to-face conversation, phone sessions can be shorter check-ins or work when bandwidth is limited, live chat suits quick exchanges, and text messaging is useful for ongoing, flexible support between meetings. These options make it easier to fit therapy into a busy schedule and keep continuity over time.
Questions people ask
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What this therapist works with
Most often
Also listed
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Antisocial personality
- Avoidant personality
- Bipolar disorder
- Body image
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Dependent personality
- Divorce and separation
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- Guilt and shame
- Hearing impaired
- Hoarding
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Narcissism
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Phobias
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Relationship issues
- Self esteem
- Self-love
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 24 years
- Licensed
- Florida, Utah
- Languages
- English
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