About Barbara
Barbara Pettibone is a Clinical Social Worker licensed in Colorado with a long history in mental health care. She brings steady presence and plainspoken support to people facing major life changes. Many who reach out are looking for help with stress, anxiety, grief, depression, or relationship and intimacy concerns.
Barbara draws on 46 years of experience in both inpatient psychiatric hospitals and outpatient settings. She helps people sort through loss, health changes, and the practical strains of aging.
Background and approach
She also works with adults coping with career shifts, caregiver stress, body image concerns, and challenges tied to mood and personality. Her style is straightforward and collaborative. She says the client is “the boss” and invites people to set goals together.
She blends different methods to match what each person needs, including insight work, mindfulness, and behavior-focused strategies. Sessions focus on clear steps people can take between appointments. That might include learning new coping skills, working on communication, or making sense of painful events.
She aims to be honest, warm, and supportive while people take those steps. Barbara enjoys helping older adults navigate the changes that come with aging, but she also works with younger adults who need help with life transitions and emotional struggles. She welcomes international clients and conducts sessions in English.
Approaches that translate to online care
Attachment-Based Therapy helps people understand how early relationships shape current patterns. It looks at how connection and trust affect emotions and close relationships, which can help with intimacy issues and attachment concerns when talked through online. Client-Centered Therapy focuses on the person in front of the therapist. It uses empathetic listening and reflection so people feel heard while they work on self-esteem, decision making, and life changes. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) teaches practical skills to change unhelpful thoughts and behaviors. It is useful for anxiety, depression, stress, and for learning concrete coping strategies during and between sessions.Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist will discuss options and help pick methods that match goals, preferences, and comfort with different techniques. This is a collaborative process and adjustments are made as progress unfolds.
Online therapy offers flexibility in how and when people connect. Video calls allow face-to-face conversations, phone sessions can fit a quick check-in or work break, live chat is useful for short exchanges, and text-based messaging supports ongoing reflection between appointments. These formats make it easier to fit therapy into a busy life while still focusing on real, practical change.
Frequently asked questions
What concerns does Barbara commonly address?
What is her general therapeutic style?
How long has she worked in mental health?
What credentials and location are listed?
Which languages are supported for sessions?
What session formats are available?
How does billing and cost work?
How do I begin working together?
Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
Also works with
- Abandonment
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Avoidant personality
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Narcissism
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Post-traumatic stress
- Relationship issues
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Somatization
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Attachment-Based Therapy
- Client-Centered Therapy
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
- Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT)
- Existential Therapy
- Jungian Therapy
- Mindfulness Therapy
- Psychodynamic Therapy
- Solution-Focused Therapy
- Somatic Therapy
- Trauma-Focused Therapy
- Internal Family Systems
- Systemic Therapy
- Experience
- 46 years
- Licensed
- Colorado
- Languages
- English