Ellie Lipton, LCSW, LICSW

  • Ellie provides individual psychotherapy to teens and adults, specializing in:

    • Depression

    • Anxiety

    • Life transitions

    • Sex and sexuality

    • Gender exploration/gender identity

    • Disordered eating/body image

    • Chronic Illness

    • Grief/loss

    • ADHD, Autism, and AuDHD

    • Relationship issues and attachment

    • LGBTQIA+ specific themes

    Individual therapy can occur in-person in Long Beach, California and virtually across California and Massachusetts via secure telehealth platforms. I work collaboratively with each client to identify what you want to get out of therapy and build a therapy plan that honors your unique strengths and challenges.

  • Relationships are complex and require intention to remain healthy and fulfilling. Ellie works with monogamous and non-monogamous/polyamorous partnerships around issues of:

    • Communication

    • Conflict

    • Cross-cultural issues and power imbalances

    • Family planning, including queer family planning and fertility issues

    • Relationship structure changes, including polyamory and consensual non-monogamy

    • Sex and sexuality, including kink and desire discrepancy issues

    • Parenting disagreements and challenges

    • Working together/shared business ownership

    • Gender transition and identity

    • Mixed neuro-type dynamics, mixed disability-status dynamics

    My approach is informed modalities such as Psychobiological Approach to Couples Therapy (PACT) and Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT). I work well with partnerships who are motivated for change.

    Couples and relationship therapy is offered in-person in Long Beach, California and virtually across California and Massachussetts via secure telehealth platforms.

  • Family therapy can be a powerful tool for addressing disconnection and improving closeness. Ellie works with family constellations such as:

    • Families adjusting to a new normal after major life events

    • Parents and adult children wanting to heal from past ruptures and improve closeness

    • Parents seeking support to understand their children’s’ behaviors and big emotions

    • Families wanting help in accepting and embracing queer and transgender children

    My approach to family therapy is informed by Family Systems Theory, Structural Therapy, Open Dialogue, and Psychodynamic Therapy. We will start by identifying what each family member wants to get out of family therapy. Keeping your goals at the center, we will work collaboratively to improve communication, understanding, and empathic conflict resolution between family members. This may look like exploring the dynamics within the family unit, implementing new communication skills, practicing emotion regulation and boundary setting, and more.

    Family therapy is offered in-person in Long Beach, California and virtually across California and Masachussetts via secure telehealth platforms.

    FAMILY THERAPY

    Athlete mental health

    Athletes experience unique, often invisible challenges, from understanding who you are outside of your sport to expectations and performance pressure. Ellie has specialized training and experience working with youth, collegiate, and professional athletes, as well as coaches and loved ones of professional athletes. Athlete specific therapy can address:

    • Identity, inside and outside of sport

    • Gender and sexuality as an athlete

    • Coping with injuries and returning from injuries

    • Coping with performance anxiety, pressure, and stress

    • Locker room and teammate dynamics

    • Power and control

    • Disordered eating and body image issues

    • The intersections of non-sport related mental health issues with performance and emotions about sport

    If you are seeking individual or couples athlete specific mental health support, please indicate this in your inquiry. If you are an organization or team seeking short-term mental health support in response to a crisis, loss, personnel change, or related issue please reach send me an inquiry or email to discuss options options.

  • Athletes experience unique, often invisible challenges, from understanding who you are outside of your sport to expectations and performance pressure. Ellie has specialized training and experience working with youth, collegiate, and professional athletes, as well as coaches and loved ones of professional athletes. Athlete specific therapy can address:

    • Identity, inside and outside of sport

    • Gender and sexuality as an athlete

    • Coping with injuries and returning from injuries

    • Coping with performance anxiety, pressure, and stress

    • Locker room and teammate dynamics

    • Power and control

    • Disordered eating and body image issues

    • The intersections of non-sport related mental health issues with performance and emotions about sport

    If you are seeking individual or couples athlete specific mental health support, please indicate this in your inquiry. If you are an organization or team seeking short-term mental health support in response to a crisis, loss, personnel change, or related issue please reach send me an inquiry or email to discuss options options.

  • Many people experience a change in mood and cognitive functioning after getting infected with COVID. The SARS-CoV-2 virus can cause significant damage to the brain, including damage to the autonomic nervous system, neuroinflammation, and a reduction in serotonin production and storage.

    Ellie provides specialized therapy to individuals struggling after COVID infections, including people with Long COVID diagnoses. This work can include:

    • Believing your experiences and empowering you with psychoeducation on the mechanisms that cause emotional and cognitive changes post COVID infection.

    • Processing the ways that illness has disoriented and disrupted your life, including isolation, coping with changes in your daily functioning, new relationship challenges, and navigating medical systems.

    • Building nervous system resilience through somatic approaches, trauma specific interventions, mindfulness practices, psychoeducation, and emotional processing.

    • Gently exploring the various factors impacting the changes in your mood and mental functioning.

Ellie may be a particularly good fit if you are looking for therapy while navigating:

• Identity exploration • Life transitions • Queer family planning • Sex and sexuality • Gender exploration • Relationship challenges • Perinatal and postpartum experiences • Parenting • Long COVID • Injury, illness, and relationship to your body • Athlete-specific issues

Approach

My therapy style is influenced by psychodynamic theories, relational psychotherapy, attachment theory, contemplative psychology, somatics, and social justice theories. My approach is eclectic and client centered, meaning I tailor my work with each client to their unique strengths and challenges.

Here are some beliefs that inform my work:

  • Individual pain is rarely isolated from other factors like structural oppression, family dynamics, work and family expectations, etc.

  • Suffering in silence hardens pain.

  • Therapy can be a space of enormous growth and healing.

  • Relationships, including the therapy relationship, have transformative power.

  • Our early experiences of relationships and attachment tremendously impact how we relate to the world, and through exploring those relationships we can create new narratives and ways of being that are more fulfilling, reciprocal, and safe.

Education and Experience

I began working in the mental health field in 2014, and I obtained my Masters of Social Work degree at Smith College School for Social Work in 2018. My work has taken place in many settings - community mental health, college counseling, intensive outpatient programs, and sports organizations. I have experience working with people across the lifespan, from infants to adults, who come to therapy for a wide range of challenges. My work includes general therapy, as well as specialized therapy for LGBTQIA+ folks and athletes.

As part of my specializations, I have completed extensive training in LGBTQIA+ affirming and competent care. Relatedly, I authored the Glossary chapter in Sex Therapy with Erotically Marginalized Clients: Nine Principles of Clinical Support.

I am a member of the Alliance of Social Workers in Sport and have completed specialized in training in athlete mental health. My work with athletes has included youth, collegiate, and professional athletes, as well as trainings to coaches on mental health issues.

In addition to working directly with clients I provide clinical supervision, including to all associates at Ellie Lipton Therapy Group. I am also a part-time Adjunct Professor at Smith College School for Social Work.

Our modern world is deeply chaotic and built on structures of oppression and marginalization. Therapy can be a powerful tool to process experiences, strengthen resources and resilience, and heal. Please reach out through the link below to set up an initial call or appointment.

Schedule a consultation call or initial appointment