About You

A perfectly imperfect human, figuring it out as you go

Maybe you're here because something happened.

Maybe you're here because something keeps happening.

Or maybe nothing in particular has happened, but something about your life, your relationships, or your experience of yourself just doesn't feel quite right.

You might recognize yourself in some of these questions.

Sound familiar?

Do you feel an ache or a heaviness that you can't quite name?

Are you feeling strangely disoriented or unmoored?

Are you standing at a threshold you didn't plan for?

Do you feel like you're too much? Or somehow not enough?

Are you navigating a loss that has changed not just your circumstances, but your sense of who you are?

Do you and your partner keep having the same argument, just with different words?

Are you feeling lonely in a relationship that's supposed to feel like home?

Do you find yourselves caught in patterns neither of you knows how to change?

Are you longing to feel understood by someone you love?

Are you wondering how you got here—and what happens next?

Or maybe it's something else entirely.

Maybe your life looks pretty good from the outside, but you're not sure it feels like yours.

Maybe you've spent so much time being who other people need you to be that you've lost touch with who you are.

Maybe you're confronting the reality that life isn't quite as predictable, fair, or controllable as you once imagined.

Maybe you're beginning to question things you've always taken for granted.

Or maybe you're simply curious. About yourself. About your relationships. About what it means to be alive, to love, to lose, to change, to become.

You don't have to be in crisis to be in therapy.

And you don't have to know exactly what you're looking for.

You are more than what's troubling you.

Whatever brings you here, I don't imagine that your difficulties tell the whole story of who you are.

You arrive with a history, relationships, contradictions, hopes, disappointments, defenses, longings, and ways of making sense of the world. Some of these have served you beautifully. Others may have become limiting, painful, or simply outgrown.

You may be looking for relief. You may be looking for understanding. You may be hoping something in your life or your relationship can change.

And perhaps you're not entirely sure what you're hoping for yet.

That's okay.

I believe therapy can offer a place to explore not only what's painful or difficult, but also what's meaningful, possible, and not yet known.

A place where you don't have to have it all figured out.

A place to be curious about the person you are, the person you've been, and the person you might be becoming.

We can begin wherever you are.

You don't need a perfectly articulated reason for reaching out. You don't need to have the right words, the right questions, or even a clear idea of what therapy is supposed to accomplish.

We can start with what you know, what you feel, what you're wondering about - or what you can't quite put your finger on.

And see what we discover together.

Let’s connect

Julie Stroud (she/they)
Licensed Clinical Social Worker
(CA LCS 130472)
julie@juliestroudlcsw.com
(510) 631-0471 (phone & text)

925 The Alameda Suite 16
Berkeley, California 94707