An Inclusive Therapist In Austin For Your Journey To The Top

Inclusive

Sex Positive

Insurance Accepted

Custom Treatments

In-Person or Online

Austin Therapy Services

Individual Therapy Services

One-On-One Therapy

If you're looking for a therapist in Austin, I offer individual one-on-one counseling services, available online through Google Meet or in person at 8810 Business Park Dr #100, Austin, Texas 78759.

To find me, turn off the feeder road at the sign that says 'Large Oaks Plaza,' and you will find the counseling office in the second brown building on the left, across from the Z club. Once in the entryway, take the door to the waiting room on your left.

My standard rate for sessions is $150 per hour.

Two men holding each other before Relationship counseling in Austin, TX

Making Entwined Lives Stronger

Relationship Counseling

As a couples therapist in Austin, I offer counseling services, available for couples, throuples, and more. These services are typically offered in a blend of group sessions (1.5 hours/ $225) and individual sessions (1 hour).

An Alternative Way To Heal

Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy

I am proud to offer psychedelic integration and psychedelic assisted psychotherapies in Austin through my partnership with Journey Clinical.

Click the link below to learn more about Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy.

Creating Lasting Mindfulness

Meditation Coaching

People often find meditation intimidating or believe that they can't meditate. I believe that this is generally a misconception about what meditation actually is.

I'm eager to help you start your journey or deepen your practice as a path to increased peacefulness, greater insight, and stronger powers of compassion for your self and others.

A Way To Bring Peace

Chado Tea Ceremony

Having studied the Japanese tea ceremony, I offer my clients this unique and beautiful ritual for mindfulness and focus at no additional charge.

Chado is generally best when offered as part of a longer therapy session (lasting 1.5 hours).

Specialties

While this is not an exhaustive list of topics I’m familiar with, this is a great starting point!

Depression/Anxiety

Religious Trauma

Sex Therapy

Kink/BDSM

Neurodivergence

LGBTQIA+

Gender/Sexuality

Polyamory

An LGBT couple that found their therapist in Austin

“As an educator and counselor, I’m guided by a loose set of principles and beliefs about who we are as sexual beings, as members of a society and as humans. My greatest passion and profession are in understanding these things about ourselves and each other, so we are empowered to make our life and our world everything it can be.”

Christy, the sex therapy for Valence Counseling, is a therapist in Austin that offers inclusive counseling

Valence Counseling is owned by Christy Powell, an LGBT Friendly therapist in Austin

Meet Your Therapist

About Christy

Christy is a licensed professional therapist in Austin who highlights the issues of gender, sexuality, and religious trauma. Christy works to normalize, educate, and entertain while providing kink, poly, and queer-affirming therapy, online or in person.

Education

  • Atheist Community of Austin, Secretary of the Board of Directors
  • Lubbock Christian University, M.S. in Clinical Mental Health Counseling
  • Texas A&M University, B.A. in Psychology
  • Luminary Counseling PLLC, LPC Intern
  • Capital Area Counseling, Pre-graduate Intern
  • Austin Travis County Integral Care, Qualified Mental Health Professional/ Crisis Unit
  • Austin Lakes Hospital, Mental Health Technician, Medical Records Specialist

Recent YouTube Videos

Frequently Asked Questions

Do you accept insurance?

Yes! As a therapist in Austin and beyond, I am able to process insurance payments for individual, 53-minute long sessions or group sessions for people with coverage from

  • United Health

  • Oscar

  • Oxford

  • Aetna

  • Curative (pending)

I am currently out-of-network with all other insurance providers though you may be able to ask your carrier about your out-of-network benefits- depending on what they cover I am happy to provide you with a superbill to receive reimbursement from your insurer. Learn more about the out-of-network process through this step-by-step guide. Unfortunately, I’m not able to process insurance payments for couples therapy or KAP.

How much are your fees?

My current rate is $150 per 53-minute therapy hour, 80-minute sessions are $225.

Are you currently accepting new clients?

Currently, I’m accepting potential clients on a waitlist-basis. Please reach out to discover if there is availability or to be added to the waitlist. 

What is sex therapy?

In brief, sex therapy is just therapy about sex. I work with all sorts of folx on all sorts of issues but I specialize in topics related to gender, kink, queer and trans identities, polyamory, purity culture, and yeah, sex. Though there’s nothing sexual about the therapy itself I do work with several body-based approaches including meditation, polyvagal theory, and somatic experiencing. I also team with Lauren Mason Yoga to provide collaborative and body-informed care.

How long does therapy last? How frequent should it be?

In short, as long as it needs to and as often as it should be. Everyone’s needs and resources are going to be different. When I work with someone new it’s generally my hope that we can start by getting together once a week, at least for the first month or so.

With couples, we’ll often start with a couple of group sessions before occasionally breaking out and meeting one-on-one. Most folx will experience some form of relief within 3 or so weeks, with lasting change in as little as a few months.

But again, everyone’s needs and resources are going to be different, and that’s okay. We’ll work together to find a strategy that works with what you have and meets your needs.

Are you seeing people in person, or just online?

Both! I have an in-person office located off Mopac between Jollyville and Far West at 8810 Business Park Dr #100, Austin, Texas 78759.

Will you see my partner/spouse/child/friend?

Maybe. Counselors are encouraged to avoid dual relationships, which is to say if you are my client I don’t want you to also be my dentist or my barber, or the parent or partner of my other client. In the real world there are definitely some inevitable exceptions to this idea- if I know you are a barista at such and such coffee shop I’ll likely avoid the place but if I sit down with my family for dinner and you happen to be the one bringing out our menus I’m not going to announce ‘THIS PERSON IS MY CLIENT’ and storm out of the restaurant. In fact, if you and I do bump into each other out in the world, trust that unless you initiate conversation I will pretend we’ve never met in order to protect your privacy. 

Many if not most therapists will refuse to work with or perhaps even speak to couples on an individual basis. The thinking here is that when working with a couple, ‘the couple’ itself is the real client, rather than the actual people in the relationship. Personally, I reject this framework whole cloth. When I work with a relationship I often ask if we are here in order to heal or improve a relationship or to find a healthy way to end it, or perhaps trying to figure out which is best for us. The idea is always that the relationship and the work we are doing on it is in service of the constituent members, the people not the institution.  

When I work with a relationship I typically invite each individual member to meet with me one-on-one. The purpose of these meetings isn’t to be conspiratorial or to keep secrets from each other but I also recognize that even as we are working towards better communication and greater intimacy there may still be things you aren’t ready to tell your partner, that they aren’t ready to hear or that you could use some help in knowing how to say. While I don’t require a perfect one-to-one ratio I do expect that we keep the number of individual sessions more or less equal between partners in order to avoid not only my own biases, but the appearance of those biases so that everyone can feel safe and comfortable within the counseling relationship. 

Further Reading: Is It Ever Okay to Treat a Couple and an Individual in It? When is individual and conjoint therapy appropriate and clinically indicated? By Dr. David Ley for Psychology Today 

What is Legacy Pricing?

Over the course of my practice, I have had to adjust prices as I’ve gone from intern to LPC and as inflation and Austin’s cost of living continues to rise. For many of the clients who have found me at various stages of my career my current price points would be challenging or unreachable and so since opening Valence Counseling I have never raised prices for established clients.

If we choose to work together I commit to maintaining a lifetime price point commensurate with the one agreed to in our original contract to the best of my ability and currently have no plans to increase anyone’s rates.

Compassionate Pricing

I recognize that counseling can be very expensive and, like most aspects of American healthcare, exists in a financial system that many of us find untenable. I strive to be accessible by working with insurers and offering affordable care through my partnership with OpenPath, the use of legacy pricing, and pro bono work.

To reduce that burden I invite all of my full-pay clients to request up to a $50 reduction in fees for any reason. No income verification, no hardship waiver, just a commitment to pay what you are able to.

In an effort to work towards a more just world compassionate pricing is offered upon request to all teachers, sex workers, non-profit employees as well as families of trans youth.

Are you an atheist?

Yes- therapists are generally encouraged to keep their personal values and beliefs if not a secret then at least out of their clinical work but with my rather public advocacy and educational work with the Atheist Community of Austin it would be silly to say otherwise.

As a member of the Board of Directors, show producer, and host on the Atheist Experience Network I can plainly say I am an atheist, an empiricist, and a materialist to the extent that such things matter. That said while many of my clients come to me from the atheist or #exvangelical community I work with all sorts of folx.

Many of my clients, past and present, hold beliefs in a god or gods or other beliefs about the supernatural and we continue to do beautiful work together. I have no interest in using my clinical work to ‘convince’ or ‘recruit’ anyone to any sort of belief system- I just want to meet you and see what sorts of ideas I can help you wrap your mind around on the way to growth and healing.

“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change”

Carl R. Rogers

Please expect to hear from me within 3 business days. Since it’s important to find the right therapist in Austin, we’ll begin with a quick consultation to make sure your needs will match my services.