About Melissa
Melissa Averett is a Licensed Professional Counselor with 14 years of clinical experience. She earned a master’s degree in education counseling from Southeastern Louisiana University and has worked in both residential and outpatient settings. Melissa focuses on clear, practical steps to help people manage stress, anxiety, ADHD-related challenges, depression, and life transitions.
She spent four years in a residential program supporting women in recovery from addiction. She then spent nine years providing outpatient counseling to adults for a wide range of concerns and mental health conditions.
Background and approach
This mix of settings shaped a straightforward, skills-oriented approach to therapy. In sessions she uses a client-centered style to build rapport and help a person identify goals. She pairs that with cognitive behavioral techniques to spot unhelpful thoughts and change them into more realistic ones.
The therapist also teaches concrete skills like healthy boundaries, assertive communication, and coping strategies. Melissa talks plainly about choices, consequences, and self-care. She supports people working through grief, trauma, family problems, relationship struggles, and addictive behaviors.
She also addresses issues such as low self-esteem, anger, sleeping problems, and compassion fatigue. Her work emphasizes warmth and empathy while keeping sessions focused and practical. People who want a collaborative, skill-building approach that connects everyday problems to useful strategies may find her style helpful.
Approaches and how online work supports them
Melissa uses client-centered therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy in online sessions. Client-centered therapy focuses on listening without judgment and helping a person set their own goals; it can help when someone needs support, validation, and a clearer sense of direction. Cognitive behavioral therapy teaches people to notice unhelpful thoughts and change them into more balanced thoughts, which often helps with anxiety, depression, and behavior patterns.Deciding which approach fits best is a collaborative process. The therapist will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what has or hasn't worked in the past. Together they choose techniques and adjust the plan as progress is made.
Online formats include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging. Video calls are useful for face-to-face conversation and teaching skills that benefit from visual cues. Phone sessions are helpful when bandwidth is limited or when someone prefers not to be on camera. Live chat and text-based messaging can be used for shorter check-ins, tracking progress, or fitting support into a busy day. These options provide flexibility so therapy can fit into everyday life.
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What this therapist works with
Most often
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Anger management
- Avoidant personality
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Dependent personality
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Relationship issues
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self-love
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Visually impaired
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 14 years
- Licensed
- Louisiana
- Languages
- English
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