About Susan
Susan Smoot is a Licensed Professional Counselor in Virginia who helps people facing stress, anxiety, addictions, trauma and abuse, grief, and major life changes. She emphasizes a straightforward, respectful approach that centers each person's strengths. Her tone is encouraging and calm, aimed at people who may feel unsure about starting therapy.
Susan sees the person as the expert on their own life. She listens closely and helps identify practical steps to reduce symptoms and build coping skills.
Background and approach
Sessions focus on clear goals, manageable strategies, and steady progress rather than jargon or long lectures. With 25 years of experience, Susan has worked across many common concerns. She draws on evidence-based therapeutic techniques to address panic, social anxiety, communication problems, control issues, and struggles with guilt or shame.
She also supports people working through forgiveness, life purpose, and self-love. Susan frames therapy as collaborative. She helps people notice strengths, set realistic steps, and track small wins.
The work is paced to each person’s needs and comfort level. Practical matters are handled plainly. Sessions are offered through video calls, phone, live chat, or text-based messaging, and scheduling is done after completing a short matching questionnaire.
Susan describes the first step as a brave one and aims to make the rest of the process steady and understandable.
Practical therapeutic approaches for online care
Susan uses evidence-based therapeutic techniques to guide online work. One useful approach focuses on symptom reduction through structured skill building. This involves teaching concrete tools for managing anxiety, panic attacks, and stress so people can use them when symptoms rise. Another approach emphasizes processing difficult experiences at a steady pace to address trauma, grief, or patterns that lead to addiction. This helps people make sense of hard events and develop healthier responses.Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist and client talk about goals, preferences, and what feels most helpful. Together they try methods and adjust the plan based on what actually helps in daily life, keeping the process collaborative and flexible.
Online formats include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging. Video is good for a full conversation and visual cues, while phone sessions can be simpler when bandwidth is limited. Live chat or text messaging can fit short check-ins, quick skill coaching, or people who prefer not to be on camera. These options make scheduling easier and let people use therapy in ways that fit their day-to-day routines.
Questions people ask
What kinds of problems does Susan help with?
How would you describe her therapeutic style?
What is her professional background?
Where is she licensed and practicing?
Which languages are sessions offered in?
What session formats are available?
How does billing and cost work?
How do I begin working with her?
What this counselor works with
Also listed
- Experience
- 25 years
- Licensed
- Virginia
- Languages
- English