About Heather
Heather Sardella is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) and holds the LPCC credential. She has 17 years of experience helping people who struggle with anxiety, stress, depression, trauma, and parenting challenges. She focuses on practical steps that reduce overwhelm and make daily life more manageable.
Heather uses a mix of approaches tailored to each person. She listens for what matters most and then suggests concrete tools to try between sessions.
Background and approach
Creativity is part of her toolbox, so clients may use writing, art, or problem-solving exercises during their work together. She has a long background supporting people dealing with relationship and communication problems, attachment concerns, and the effects of abuse or grief. Heather also helps those facing control issues, guilt and shame, isolation, and questions about life purpose and identity.
Her experience includes work with panic, mood disorders, and post-traumatic stress. In sessions she aims to be straightforward and calm. She frames the client as the expert on their own story and offers guidance and structure.
The goal is to help clients build skills and confidence to handle triggers and everyday stressors. Heather practices in California and conducts therapy in English. She offers video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging.
To start, people complete a short questionnaire to match with a therapist and then schedule sessions that fit their needs.
How therapeutic approaches translate to online care
Heather often combines evidence-based techniques that focus on symptoms and on relationships. Cognitive-style work helps identify unhelpful thinking patterns and offers practical exercises to reduce anxiety and panic, such as short breathing practices and thought-challenging steps. Trauma-informed approaches pay attention to safety and pacing, helping people process difficult memories at a pace that feels manageable.Finding the right approach is a collaborative process. Heather will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what feels manageable in therapy. Together they decide which techniques to try and adjust the plan as progress is made.
Online formats include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging. Video lets people use visual cues and do longer sessions, while phone sessions work well if bandwidth is limited or someone prefers not to use video. Live chat and text-based messaging are useful for brief check-ins, steps between sessions, or when a shorter connection fits a busy day. These options make it easier to fit therapy into work, school, or parenting schedules and to keep continuity when travel or relocation occurs.
Questions people ask
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What this counselor works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Family conflicts
- Trauma and abuse
Also listed
- Experience
- 17 years
- Licensed
- California
- Languages
- English