About Peggy
Peggy Lingard is a licensed clinical social worker with four decades of experience. She moved to California for a career opportunity that reshaped her life and taught her to rebuild strength through action. Peggy brings a warm, straightforward presence to sessions and focuses on supporting real change rather than labels.
She encourages people to notice small steps that lead to larger shifts. Peggy uses practical tools like mindfulness, distress tolerance, and goal-focused problem solving.
Background and approach
She believes therapy works best when the person and therapist are partners, so she listens first and then tries approaches that fit each person. Her work covers a wide range of concerns, including anxiety, depression, grief, relationship and intimacy issues, addictions, and stress from caregiving or life transitions.
She also supports people dealing with identity and multicultural concerns, mood and personality challenges, and questions about life purpose and meaning. Peggy combines methods from acceptance and commitment work, cognitive strategies, client-centered listening, and skills drawn from dialectical practice and relationship-focused approaches. She values trying useful techniques while keeping the alliance central to change.
Outside of therapy she paints and connects with nature, and she invites people to explore strengths they might have forgotten. Peggy aims to help clients put small actions into place, tolerate hard feelings, and discover clearer steps forward.
How therapeutic approaches shape online care
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy focuses on noticing thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them, then moving toward actions that match what matters to you; it can help with anxiety, depression, and life changes. Client-Centered Therapy centers on being listened to and understood, which helps people feel less alone and more able to try new steps. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy looks at patterns of thinking and behavior and offers concrete techniques to reduce symptoms and build coping skills.Choosing the right approach is a collaborative process. Peggy will talk with each person about goals and preferences and suggest ways of working together. She often combines listening with practical skill-building so the plan feels useful and doable.
Online sessions are offered as video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to match different needs. Video lets people use visual cues for deeper conversation. Phone can be easier when bandwidth is limited or for a focused check-in. Live chat and text-based messaging are useful for shorter exchanges, between-session support, or when writing feels more comfortable. These options aim to make therapy more flexible and easier to fit into daily life.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
Also works with
- Addictions
- Anger management
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Compassion fatigue
- Coping with life changes
- Depression
- Divorce and separation
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- HIV / AIDS
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Personality disorders
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Relationship issues
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self-harm
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 40 years
- Licensed
- California
- Languages
- English