About Dr. Brake

I have ov­er 32 years of ex­per­i­ence in the field of psy­cho­lo­gy, first as a Li­cens­ed Psy­cho­lo­gical As­so­ci­ate and then as a Li­cens­ed Psy­cho­lo­gist (2002). I a­chiev­ed a Bach­e­lor's de­gree in Psy­cho­lo­gy from Bay­lor Uni­ver­si­ty, Mas­ter's in Cli­ni­cal Psy­cho­lo­gy from St. Mary's Uni­ver­si­ty, and Doc­to­rate in Coun­sel­ing Psy­cho­lo­gy from Our La­dy of the Lake Uni­ver­si­ty.

I have a private prac­tice in psy­cho­lo­gy and provide a wide variety of services. My approach is strength based, solution focused, and col­la­bo­ra­tive. The course of the­ra­py is often brief, and significant progress is fre­quent­ly made after only one, two, or a few ses­sions. Depend­ing on the problems, though, more ses­sions may be needed, and I work closely with my clients to set goals and moni­tor progress.

I conduct indi­vidual and family the­ra­py with children, ado­les­cents, and adults, in­clud­ing marriage the­ra­py. I help peo­ple with a wide variety of men­tal health prob­lems, in­clu­ding de­pres­sion, an­xie­ty, ADHD, and re­la­tion­ship prob­lems. I have ex­ten­sive ex­per­i­ence with grief and loss, trau­ma re­so­lu­tion, and is­sues re­lat­ed to dis­as­ter men­tal health. I al­so have ex­per­i­ence and en­joy work­ing with peo­ple fac­ing life is­sues or stres­sors even when there is not a spe­ci­fic men­tal health di­ag­nosis. For mar­riage and coup­les ther­a­py I use the Gott­man Meth­od and have com­plet­ed Lev­el 1 and Level 2 train­ing in Gott­man Meth­od Coup­les Ther­a­py.

I fre­quent­ly work with peo­ple strug­gling with is­sues of spi­ri­tu­al­i­ty and faith, and even if faith is not the pri­ma­ry is­sue, it is of­ten one of the great as­sets one has in ad­dres­sing life prob­lems. I am a Chris­tian, and my Chris­tian faith and be­liefs in­form my world view and work; how­ev­er, I nev­er force this or im­pose my be­liefs on­to oth­ers. I have fre­quent­ly worked with clients of other faiths, and I am both com­fort­able with and res­pect­ful of their faith and tradi­tions, and I let the client de­cide how much or lit­tle to in­clude.