Andrea McLellan, LMFT

Andrea McLellan is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) in California with 14 years of clinical experience. She works with adults on stress, anxiety, depression, relationship strain, parenting concerns, trauma and abuse, addictions, grief, intimacy problems, and codependency. She also supports people dealing with sleep and eating problems, anger, self-esteem, career issues, and mood disorders such as bipolar concerns.

Andrea uses straightforward, goal-focused methods in sessions. She favors solution-focused work and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help people set realistic steps and reduce distressing symptoms. She also draws on Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Motivational Interviewing, Narrative Therapy, and psychodynamic ideas when those perspectives fit the client's situation.

Andrea has experience beyond the therapy room. She teaches psychology at a university and serves as a court-recognized expert in cases of sexual assault and child abuse. That forensic work informs how she looks at family patterns and long-term effects of childhood exposure to family chaos and trauma.

She pays attention to how family systems, attachment, and early loss shape present behavior. In sessions she helps clients identify underlying motivations, take responsibility where needed, and practice steps that rebuild a sense of self. Practical goal-setting and symptom relief are priorities.

Andrea also notes the particular strain placed on first responders and other public servants who repeatedly encounter others' pain. She can assist with processing acute stress responses and related emotional arousal. Outside work she enjoys hiking, the beach, bird-watching, and camping.

Online sessions and therapeutic approaches