About Tara
Tara Whitecotton is a licensed clinical social worker who helps people facing stress, anxiety, grief, depression, and major life changes. She works with individuals on relationship concerns, parenting worries, and challenges like trauma, eating issues, and bipolar mood changes. Her style is direct and compassionate, aiming to make sessions practical and easy to follow.
Tara focuses on skills people can use between sessions. She teaches coping strategies, communication tools, and ways to manage upsetting thoughts.
Background and approach
Sessions are conversational and goal-oriented, with an emphasis on small steps that add up to real change. She draws on approaches such as cognitive behavioral techniques, mindfulness, and acceptance strategies to match a person’s needs. Motivational interviewing helps when someone feels stuck or unsure how to start making changes.
Tara tailors methods to fit each person rather than using a one-size-fits-all plan. With three years of experience practicing in Illinois, Tara brings a practical, problem-solving approach. She sees clients as partners in the work and respects their lived experience.
Her LCSW credential indicates licensure in Illinois and is listed as IL LCSW 149029547. Tara supports people dealing with a range of life stresses including career strain, caregiver burnout, chronic illness concerns, attachment and abandonment issues, and body image problems. Her aim is to help people build resilience, improve daily functioning, and find clearer direction during hard seasons.
Therapeutic approaches and online care
Tara commonly uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy to help people change patterns that cause distress. CBT focuses on identifying unhelpful thoughts and testing new behaviors to reduce anxiety and depression. ACT helps people clarify values and build action toward a meaningful life while accepting uncomfortable feelings.She also draws on Client-Centered Therapy to provide a warm, respectful space where a person’s goals guide the work. The therapist and client decide together which combination of methods fits best, and that match is reviewed as goals and needs evolve.
Online therapy with Tara is offered through video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to make scheduling easier. Video is useful for deeper work and visual connection, phone works well when bandwidth is limited, live chat can be a shorter check-in, and messaging supports brief updates between sessions. These options allow sessions to fit into busy days and different routines while staying focused on achieving clear goals.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Stress, Anxiety
- Family conflicts
- Grief
Also works with
- Abandonment
- Adoption and foster care
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Cancer
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Co-morbidity
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Family problems
- Fertility issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Relationship issues
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sexuality
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 3 years
- Licensed
- Illinois
- Languages
- English