About Lisa
Lisa McCarton is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 20 years of experience based in Virginia. She offers calm, practical support for people facing stress, anxiety, grief, depression, bipolar mood questions, parenting strain, and relationship or career concerns. Sessions are conversational and focused on daily life problems rather than abstract theory.
Her early work was in a residential treatment setting after earning a Master of Social Work from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2000.
How Lisa works
She provided therapy and case management for children who had experienced abuse, gaining long experience with trauma, family conflict, and behavioral challenges. That background shapes how she listens and plans care today. Lisa uses clear, hands-on methods that help people change habits, manage strong emotions, and solve recurring problems.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is part of her practice and she pairs it with client-centered and attachment-based ideas to keep work practical and human. Motivational Interviewing and existential perspectives appear when people face tough life choices or need to reframe meaning. Sessions emphasize small, achievable goals and step-by-step problem solving.
Lisa helps people spot unhelpful thinking, test new behaviors, and practice skills between meetings. She speaks English and Spanish and brings a steady, organized approach to sessions. People looking for support with trauma, family stress, anger, ADHD-related struggles, or complicated life transitions may find her style useful.
Her focus is on usable strategies, one conversation at a time.
Lisa lists 9 ways of working on the entry:
What Lisa works with
The areas below are the ones Lisa selected when setting up a profile. The first few are listed as the main focus; the rest are also named.
- Stress, Anxiety
- Family conflicts
- Trauma and abuse
Also listed
- Abandonment
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Anger management
- Antisocial personality
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Career difficulties
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Eating and food-related issues
- Family problems
- Grief
- Impulsivity
- Intellectual disability
- Isolation / loneliness
- Life purpose
- Mood disorders
- Narcissism
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Relationship issues
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Training and background
| Register | LCSW |
|---|---|
| Years in practice | 20 |
| Languages | English, Spanish |
| Session format | Online: video, phone, live chat or messaging |
| Country | Virginia |
Memberships and registers are shown as supplied; they are not licences, and this directory does not verify them.
Online support options
Practical approaches for online therapy and change
Attachment-Based Therapy focuses on how early and current relationship patterns affect feelings and behavior. It helps people understand connection and safety needs, and learn different ways to relate in close relationships. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) looks at the links between thoughts, feelings, and actions. It helps people test unhelpful thoughts, try new behaviors, and build skills for anxiety, depression, anger, and daily stressors. Client-Centered Therapy centers the conversation on the person's experience. The therapist listens without judgment, reflects what comes up, and supports each person to set their own goals.Finding the right mix of approaches is part of the work. Lisa will talk with the person about goals, preferences, and what feels most useful. Together they decide which methods to try and adjust the plan as progress or obstacles appear.
Online therapy offers flexible ways to meet. Video calls allow face-to-face conversation and visual cues, phone sessions can fit a shorter break or low bandwidth, live chat works for quick check-ins, and text-based messaging helps keep progress going between sessions. These formats make it easier to attend sessions from different locations and to match the style of communication that feels most comfortable.
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Common questions
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A practical next step
Write down two things you would want to be different in six months. That is the most useful thing to bring to a first session, whoever it is with. If you would rather start now than keep reading, online sessions are the quickest route.
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