About Maria
Maria Rivera is a licensed clinical social worker with 15 years of experience. She offers practical, down-to-earth support for people facing stress, anxiety, addiction struggles, mood challenges, and relationship strain. She focuses on clear goals and small steps that fit daily life.
Sessions are conversational and goal-oriented. Maria treats trauma, abuse histories, anger, grief, and issues tied to self-esteem and body image. Her practice also addresses parenting concerns, adoption and foster care questions, attachment and commitment worries, and challenges linked to aging, chronic illness, or caregiving stress.
How Maria works
She works with people dealing with ADHD, bipolar disorder, eating concerns, and co-occurring conditions. Maria's approach draws on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Client-Centered Therapy, and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, among other methods. She combines evidence-based tools with motivational interviewing and solution-focused techniques to help clients make manageable changes.
Clients can expect to explore values, build coping skills, and try practical strategies between sessions. The work is collaborative - Maria helps set clear, achievable targets and adjusts plans as needed. Her style aims to be kind, straightforward, and focused on what helps in everyday life.
Maria lists 5 ways of working on the entry:
What Maria works with
The areas below are the ones Maria selected when setting up a profile. The first few are listed as the main focus; the rest are also named.
- Stress, Anxiety
- Addictions
- Relationship issues
Also listed
- Abandonment
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Cancer
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Co-morbidity
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- HIV / AIDS
- Hoarding
- Immigration issues
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intellectual disability
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Process addiction (porn, exercise, gambling)
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Trichotillomania
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Training and background
| Register | LCSW |
|---|---|
| Years in practice | 15 |
| Languages | English |
| Session format | Online: video, phone, live chat or messaging |
| Country | North Carolina |
Memberships and registers are shown as supplied; they are not licences, and this directory does not verify them.
Online support options
How her approaches guide online care
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) helps people notice what matters to them and act on those values even when feelings are hard. It is useful for anxiety, stress, and coping with life transitions. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) focuses on identifying unhelpful thoughts and testing new behaviors to reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety. It works well for eating concerns, mood issues, and managing everyday stress.Finding the right approach is part of the work. Maria will talk with each person about goals and preferences and then suggest strategies that fit their life. The process is collaborative - she adjusts methods based on what helps the person make steady progress.
Online sessions include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging to match different needs. Video is useful for deeper conversational work and skill practice. Phone sessions can be easier when bandwidth or hands-free options are needed. Live chat and text suit quick check-ins, brief reflections, or times when writing feels more comfortable. These options aim to make regular therapy easier to fit into a busy life while keeping focus on practical change and daily coping.
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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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