About Ellen
Ellen Thornton-Love greets people who are feeling overwhelmed by stress, anxiety, grief, or the strain of parenting. She is a licensed clinical social worker, LCSW, practicing in Oregon with twenty years of experience. Ellen aims to create a calm, respectful space where people can start to sort out what matters most to them.
She listens first and then helps set practical goals. Sessions focus on clear steps you can try between meetings.
Background and approach
Ellen draws on straightforward tools to ease panic, manage mood shifts, and handle relationship tensions rooted in family of origin and attachment concerns. Her work also addresses trauma, sexual assault and abuse, and effects of chronic illness or pain. She uses techniques that help people process loss and reduce the grip of painful memories.
When self-harm or suicidal feelings come up, Ellen helps people find immediate safety strategies and longer-term coping plans. Ellen combines Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy with a client-centered stance. She also uses motivational interviewing and solution-focused techniques to keep work goal-directed and practical.
The focus is on what will move someone forward right now. People who reach out can expect conversations tailored to their situation. Ellen supports exploration of finances, midlife transitions, parenting stresses, and caregiver burden alongside core mood and anxiety concerns.
Her style is direct, compassionate, and geared toward realistic change.
How Ellen’s Approaches Work Online
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy helps people notice difficult thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them, then move toward what matters in life. It can be useful for anxiety, grief, and chronic stress. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy focuses on identifying helpful and unhelpful thoughts and testing small behavior changes to reduce symptoms like panic and low mood.Ellen uses a client-centered attitude to keep sessions focused on each person’s needs. Finding the right mix of approaches is part of the process. She works together with clients to decide which methods fit their goals, pace, and preferences so the plan stays practical and realistic.
Online sessions are offered by video call, phone, live chat, or text-based messaging to make therapy more flexible. Video calls allow face-to-face conversation when visual cues matter. Phone sessions can be shorter check-ins or an option when bandwidth is limited. Live chat and text messaging can support quick check-ins, exercises between sessions, or people who prefer writing to speaking. These formats help fit therapy into work, family, and caregiving schedules while keeping the focus on progress and usable tools.
Frequently asked questions
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What credential does she hold and where does she practice?
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
Also works with
- Attachment issues
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Communication problems
- Depression
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Impulsivity
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Self-harm
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 20 years
- Licensed
- Oregon
- Languages
- English