About Karen
Karen Haggard is a licensed clinical social worker who helps people facing stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, and relationship struggles. She draws on 25 years of practice to offer steady, clear support when life feels overwhelming. Karen keeps sessions direct and compassionate so callers can talk about what matters most to them.
She focuses on practical skills like communication, sleep routines, and coping tools for panic or chronic worry. Karen also supports people dealing with grief, addiction challenges, bipolar mood shifts, and career stress.
Background and approach
Parents and caregivers can find help for burnout, role strain, and problems that come with complex family situations. Karen uses a mix of approaches tailored to each person’s needs. She pulls from acceptance-based methods, cognitive strategies, and relationship-focused work to build new patterns.
The goal is to create small, manageable changes that improve daily life. Her background includes long experience in community and clinical settings across Illinois. Karen holds an LCSW - Licensed Clinical Social Worker - and applies years of practice to real problems, not jargon.
Sessions are offered in English and she works with people from a range of backgrounds. Therapy with Karen typically begins by identifying immediate concerns and practical steps. From there she helps set short-term goals and teaches tools you can use between sessions.
She aims for straightforward guidance so progress feels visible and doable.
Online approaches that meet you where you are
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) focuses on clarifying personal values and taking small actions that matter. It helps when worry or avoidance gets in the way of living the life you want. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) looks at patterns of thought and behavior and teaches skills to shift unhelpful cycles, useful for anxiety, depression, and sleep problems. Attachment-Based Therapy pays attention to how past connections affect current relationships and helps people build safer, more effective ways of relating.Choosing the right approach is a team effort. Karen will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what has or hasn’t worked before. Together they decide which methods to try and adjust the plan as progress is made.
Online therapy offers flexibility and practical options. Video calls allow face-to-face conversation when visual cues help. Phone sessions work well when bandwidth is limited or a quieter check-in is needed. Live chat and text-based messaging are useful for short check-ins, skill practice between appointments, or when writing feels easier than speaking. These options make it simpler to fit therapy around work, caregiving, or busy days while keeping the focus on real change.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Trauma and abuse
Also works with
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Avoidant personality
- BDSM, kink, and alternative sex culture
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Co-morbidity
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- 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
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Gender dysphoria
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sex addiction
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Sexual dysfunction
- Sexuality
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Somatization
- Traumatic brain injury
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
- Attachment-Based Therapy
- Client-Centered Therapy
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
- Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT)
- Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
- Gottman Method
- Hypnotherapy
- Mindfulness Therapy
- Motivational Interviewing
- Narrative Therapy
- Solution-Focused Therapy
- Trauma-Focused Therapy
- Experience
- 25 years
- Licensed
- Illinois, Texas
- Languages
- English