About Austa
Austa Murray is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who helps people manage stress, anxiety, depression, grief, trauma and relationship concerns. She supports those facing parenting strain, intimacy challenges, self-esteem struggles, bipolar mood symptoms, ADHD-related issues, and compassion fatigue. Her approach is warm and straightforward and she aims to move at a pace that feels comfortable for each person.
Austa emphasizes building a strong connection so clients feel heard and understood before tackling hard problems.
Background and approach
Sessions focus on practical skills, clearer communication, and figuring out steps that fit daily life. She uses plain language and listens for what matters most to the client. Her background spans more than two decades in varied mental health settings.
That experience includes individual and group work and interventions shaped by attachment and trauma perspectives. She draws on developmental thinking when helping people make sense of patterns that began earlier in life. In sessions she combines talk, skill building, and insight work.
Techniques come from client-centered and cognitive approaches, along with strategies for emotional regulation. Goals are collaborative and tailored to each person’s situation and priorities. People who choose Austa can expect a compassionate, nonjudgmental tone and an emphasis on learning tools that can be used between sessions.
She helps clients create a realistic plan for change and supports them while they try new ways of coping and relating.
How her methods fit with online therapy
Austa commonly integrates attachment-based ideas and cognitive behavioral strategies into her work. Attachment-based approaches focus on relationships and patterns formed early in life; they can help people understand trust, closeness, and repeated relationship patterns. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) looks at the links between thoughts, feelings and actions and teaches practical tools to change unhelpful patterns and manage symptoms.Finding the right approach is a joint process. The therapist will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what has or hasn’t worked before. Together they will choose methods and adjust them as needed so therapy fits the client’s life and needs.
Online formats make it easier to keep therapy consistent while balancing busy days. Video calls allow face-to-face connection and visual feedback, phone sessions can be a good option when bandwidth is limited, and live chat or text-based messaging work for brief check-ins or ongoing support between sessions. These options increase flexibility for scheduling, reduce travel time, and let people access licensed professionals from wherever they are located in Illinois.
Frequently asked questions
What kinds of concerns does Austa help with?
What is her general style in therapy?
How much experience does she have?
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How are fees and payment handled?
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Stress, Anxiety
- Family conflicts
- Trauma and abuse
Also works with
- Abandonment
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Co-morbidity
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Mood disorders
- Narcissism
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Relationship issues
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Sexuality
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trichotillomania
- Women's issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 22 years
- Licensed
- Illinois
- Languages
- English