Dr. Shakena Mabry, LCSW

Dr. Shakena Mabry is a licensed clinical social worker with 12 years of experience. She practices in Maryland and focuses on helping people manage stress, anxiety, depression, and relationship concerns. She emphasizes practical steps and steady support for people who want clearer direction in their lives.

She believes clients know their stories best and brings a respectful, collaborative style to sessions. Conversations aim to identify strengths, clarify goals, and try simple, doable changes between meetings. She emphasizes building confidence and motivation over time rather than pushing quick fixes.

Her background includes working with people facing grief, trauma and abuse, addiction, and mood disorders such as bipolar and seasonal affective disorder. She also supports people dealing with parenting stress, caregiver strain, compassion fatigue, and challenges tied to identity and sexuality. These areas are addressed with attention to cultural and multicultural concerns.

Clinically she uses approaches such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Client-Centered Therapy, and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing when appropriate. She blends these methods to match each person’s needs and pace.

Sessions focus on practical skills for coping, emotion management, and relationship navigation. The aim is to help people build routines and responses that reduce overwhelm and increase meaningful connection with themselves and others.

How therapeutic approaches translate to online work

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) helps people notice painful thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them, then choose actions that align with personal values. It is often used when someone wants clearer direction or better coping during life transitions. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) focuses on identifying unhelpful thinking patterns and testing small behavior changes to reduce anxiety or depressive mood. CBT is useful for stress, social anxiety, and low mood. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a structured approach that helps process past distressing memories; it is commonly used for trauma and post-traumatic stress.

Choosing the right approach is a team effort. The therapist will talk through goals, preferences, and what has helped or not helped before. Together the client and therapist decide which techniques to try and adjust the plan as therapy progresses.

Online therapy can make it easier to fit sessions into a busy life, reduce travel time, and offer quicker check-ins between appointments. Because session formats were not specified in the biography, confirm current session options before booking. Licensed professionals typically adapt exercises, homework, and emotion-regulation skills to an online setting so work done between sessions still moves progress forward.