First of all, we do therapy in a home-environment. ( No uncomfortable institution that you have to sneak into hoping no one will see you!) We want you to be comfortable and feel like you are visiting a friend - because you are!

We set some goals right away - your goals - therapy is based on your needs. We share with you an overview of how treatment will progress and answer all your questions. You are then given a self-assessment to complete at home - so we can know you better and you can add goals you may not have thought about at our first session.

We then start sharing with you tools, strategies and techniques - specific to your needs - that will allow you to make rapid progress and boost your mood. We carefully explain all the skills and how to best apply them - we do not move on until you feel comfortable with the new skills and feel you can apply them effectively.

As you start to apply these skills in your day-to-day life you will notice improvement in yourself/mood. You will begin to feel skillful and confident in dealing with challenges and you will better understand those around you. (*many clients notice improvement in how others treat them!)

You will be given simple tasks to do or suggestions to try to help expand your skills and understanding between sessions. To further support you - we often provide you with audio/video tapes or handouts with specific skills included to help you continue your education between sessions and help you maintain a positive attitude and direction.

We constantly check-in with you to make sure treatment is providing the benefits that you really want and help you deal with any new challenges that arise in your life during treatment.

We also teach you how to continue to grow, learn and expand on your own once you leave treatment. By doing this - our clients can continue to improve over time even after treatment ends!

We also get quick results because of our philosophy - we don't want to help you feel better about having the problem(s) - WE WANT TO GET RID OF THEM! We firmly believe that your problems are solvable - and that together - we can solve them! For many people entering treatment this is hard to believe - they've had the problem and think they have tried everything. They may have even been in therapy before and their therapist told them they would just have to learn how to live with the problem better and practice more "acceptance." But they quickly learn in treatment at ACS that there is MORE! No one can solve every problem - but we can solve MANY that people thought were impossible to solve - we do it every day! Wouldn't you rather get rid of your problem(s) than live with them???

Second, we keep the therapy going between sessions (*we discussed some of these methods above). We keep you growing, learning and developing on a continuous basis - by the time you leave treatment - we hope it will be second nature for you! Besides, clients have a great time doing these easy and insightful assignments!

Another unique aspect of counseling at ACS is that we teach you how to stay motivated! What a great bonus! Most people fail in life because they can't stay motivated - its not a lack of skill or intelligence - but a lack of motivation. It's no different in therapy - if you learn new skills, but aren't motivated to use them - they don't work!!! Many people who are considered "Treatment Failures" are really clients that the therapist failed to motivate and teach motivational skills.

At ACS we are solution-focused. We don't spend a lot of time talking about the past (was it so great that you want to stay there?) - we are much more focused on creating a GREAT future for you and acquiring the skills and philosophies to do so.

That's a hard question to answer - because it depends on the number and severity of the problems you have - and on how hard you are willing to work on them.

But, to give you an answer - out of all the people we have treated it typically comes out to be about 15-20 sessions.

Some clients have relatively light problems and only require 4-6 sessions - others, with more challenging or numerous problems take 15-25 sessions.

At 2 sessions per week - later tapered to once per week - the typical client is done with treatment in about 9-12 weeks (about 2-3 months). To resolve life-long problems in just 2-3 months is amazingly fast!

*And the results last - because remember - we teach you how to use the skills and expand them!