Stacey Sugar
Empathy-driven therapy with practical tools
MD, LCPC, LPCC California
- Experience
- 14 years in practice
- Focus areas
- Stress, Anxiety, Relationship, Family
- Approaches
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Attachment-Based Therapy
- Languages
- English
About Stacey
Stacey Sugar brings a cognitive behavioral lens combined with attachment-focused and client-centered perspectives to her California practice. She guides clients through exploring longstanding patterns, helping them reframe unhelpful thoughts and recognize how past relationships influence present behavior.
Background and approach
With 14 years of clinical experience and credentials including MD, LCPC (MD LCPC LC4288), and LPCC (CA LPCC 10045), she integrates practical skill-building with deeper exploration of emotional and relational dynamics. Stacey emphasizes the idea that people can revise how they relate to their life stories rather than accept a fixed outcome.
She helps clients uncover unconscious defenses and develop insight that supports change, offering tools to improve communication, manage anxiety and stress, and work through grief, trauma, or intimacy and relationship challenges. Her approach supports growth at a client's own pace, with attention to commitment issues, codependency, body image, and other concerns relevant to personal and relational wellbeing.
Clients seeking guidance on coping with life transitions, addictions, self-esteem, depression, or complex family and attachment issues will find an experienced clinician who balances empathy with evidence-informed strategies. Stacey invites those ready to examine deeper emotions and make concrete changes to start a collaborative therapeutic process.
Therapeutic approaches and online care that fit your life
Stacey combines Cognitive Behavioral Therapy with attachment-based and client-centered elements to address both thinking patterns and relational dynamics. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy focuses on identifying and reshaping unhelpful thoughts and behaviors to reduce symptoms like anxiety, depression, and stress, offering practical strategies for immediate problems. Attachment-Based Therapy explores how early relationship patterns influence current intimacy and communication, which can be especially useful for people facing commitment issues, codependency, or family-of-origin concerns. Client-Centered Therapy prioritizes the client's experience and promotes growth through empathy, attentive listening, and collaborative pace-setting.Choosing the right approach is an ongoing conversation rather than a single decision. Stacey treats therapeutic direction as a collaboration, working with each person to match methods to their goals, preferences, and the specific challenges they bring. Together they may blend techniques to balance insight-oriented work with concrete skill development.
Online therapy offers flexibility through video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging, making it easier to fit sessions into busy schedules and to maintain continuity across life changes. These options allow for consistent access to a licensed professional and make it possible to continue therapeutic work from different locations while tailoring interaction style to what feels most helpful to the client.
Frequently asked questions
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Areas of expertise
Primary focus
Also works with
Additional focus areas
Therapeutic approaches
Experience
14+ years
Licensed
Maryland, California
Languages
English