Holly Starr

Holly Starr is a licensed marriage and family therapist (LMFT) with 25 years of experience in California. She has a Master’s degree in Clinical Psychology and a background that began with suicide prevention hotline work and grief therapy supervision. Holly understands how big life shifts can leave people feeling anxious, ashamed, or stuck. She speaks directly and listens closely to help people start making small, manageable changes.

Holly has worked with adolescents, adults, and older adults in both residential and private practice settings. Much of her work focuses on depression, loss, grief, and relationship strain. She also helps people facing fertility concerns, postpartum depression, caregiver stress, and midlife transitions. Women’s issues are listed among her focus areas.

In sessions she combines careful listening with active observation. She helps people put difficult experiences into words and notice how thoughts shape actions. When appropriate, she uses approaches that look at attachment patterns, unconscious influences, and practical steps for change.

Holly says even small shifts can improve day-to-day functioning. Her early crisis work informs how she supports those moving through bereavement, intense sadness, or anxiety. She aims to create space for people to become more curious about their feelings and more intentional about next steps.

If you’re thinking about therapy, she asks only that you take the next small step. The Start Therapy button leads to a short matching questionnaire and scheduling according to therapist availability.

How these approaches shape online therapy

Attachment-Based Therapy looks at how early relationships influence current patterns. It helps people understand trust, closeness, and repeated conflicts in relationships and is useful for intimacy-related issues and attachment concerns.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, focuses on identifying thoughts that feed anxiety and depression and testing small behavior changes. It is practical and often helps with mood disorders, stress, and coping with life changes.

Psychodynamic and Jungian ideas help people notice deeper patterns and themes that return across a life story. These approaches can surface unconscious conflicts and family of origin issues that affect self-esteem or feelings of emptiness.

Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist will collaborate with clients to pick methods that match goals, needs, and preferences. That conversation may shift as new concerns or insights emerge.

Confirm current session options before booking since specific online formats are not listed in the biography. Online work can make it easier to fit therapy into a busy day, allow shorter check-ins when needed, and remove travel time. It also lets people keep therapy consistent through life transitions while they try approaches that address grief, anxiety, relationship patterns, or midlife change.