About Arielle

I meet my clients with humor and friendliness. I am direct and nerdy, and love to talk about history and data. I love to use stories, data and art to help my clients heal their trauma and cope with anxiety, ADHD and life changes. I truly believe curiosity and compassion are the keys to radical change.

If you want the more therapy lingo version: I combine Internal Family Systems (parts work), Narrative Therapy (how we tell our stories informs who we are), & Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (many things can be true at once, and we can approach ourselves & others with curiosity and compassion). I’m training in EMDR and am already amazed at the changes it can create in my clients. I also like to pull from Interpersonal Neurobiology, Somatic work, Emotion Focused Therapy and Contextual Family Therapy. As a systems focused therapist, I like to think about how you fit within systems: your school, your family, your workplace, your relationships, and how you can show up as your favorite self in those spaces.

I recognize that religious traditions are often powerful forces in my clients’ lives and I honor the affirming, inclusive and healthy relationships between my clients and their something bigger. I’m also a giant data nerd, and LOVE to read about new data scientists are collecting and analyzing about the human brain and how we heal from trauma.

I am committed to anti-racist and anti-colonial work, and draw from a feminist, queer-affirming & trauma-informed lens. As a queer therapist, I am strongly LGBTQ* affirming, and love working with my trans and nonbinary clients as they navigate other issues while being informed by those identities. 

When I’m not working, I am cooking, scrolling TikTok, reading novels and making art, or spending time with my friends playing board games and Magic the Gathering. I also love blues dancing, participating in my local Queer Jewish activist community and talking at my loved ones about obscure historical facts. I’m on the board for Alberta Shul and organize with Jewish Voice for Peace - Portland.

Education:

I attended Ursinus College where I have a BA in History with minors in International Relations, Gender & Women’s Studies and French. I have a Masters in Public Health (MPH) from Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health in Atlanta, GA with a specialization in Behavioral Sciences and Health Education, and a Master of Arts (MA) in Marriage, Couples and Family Therapy from Lewis & Clark College in Portland, OR. Before starting Wandering & Belonging Therapy, I worked at an agency that served refugees and at a group practice serving mostly queer, polyamorous and neurodivergent clients in Portland, OR.

Social Location:

I am a white, Jewish, queer/bisexual, non-binary femme person. I come from an interfaith family (I often joke that I’m a Jew, raised by agnostic atheists in mostly Buddhist countries, why are all my friends ex-Evangelical?). I have educational and class privilege. I grew up outside the US and moved here for college when I was 18 and identify as an Adult Third Culture Kid (ATCK). I have ADHD, which wasn’t diagnosed until I was 29, and I’ve experienced PTSD and clinically significant anxiety and depression. I currently live in Portland, OR, the traditional village sites of the Multnomah, Cowlitz and bands of Chinook, among others.