Jennifer LaPenta , LCSW

Jennifer LaPenta is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) who focuses on helping people navigate stress, anxiety, depression, and life transitions. She works with adults facing relationship concerns, parenting strain, grief, trauma, and issues related to women's health. Her approach is collaborative and straightforward, aimed at practical change.

With 19 years of experience, she blends client-centered care with cognitive behavioral techniques and solution-focused strategies. Jennifer helps clients notice unhelpful thinking, test new behaviors, and build manageable routines. Sessions emphasize skills that can be used between meetings to reduce anxiety and improve mood.

She also draws on narrative and psychodynamic ideas to look at life patterns and family of origin issues. That means looking at the stories people tell about themselves and where those stories came from. This can be helpful for people working through identity, intimacy, or long-standing family concerns.

Jennifer has worked with people dealing with caregiver stress, aging and geriatric issues, hospice and end-of-life concerns, and compassion fatigue. She supports those facing isolation, career stress, eating and self-esteem struggles, and LGBT-related concerns. Her work often includes concrete plans for coping and self-care.

Sessions are offered in English and she sees clients in Connecticut and internationally via online formats. Her style is warm and practical, aiming to help people find clarity and small, sustainable steps forward.

How Jennifer Uses Talk-Based Methods Online

Client-centered therapy focuses on the person's goals and experience. The therapist listens deeply, reflects what she hears, and helps clients set their own pace. This approach is useful when someone needs a steady, nonjudgmental space to sort feelings and make decisions.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, looks at how thoughts affect feelings and actions. Jennifer uses simple CBT tools to help people notice unhelpful thoughts, test them, and replace them with more helpful ones. That can ease anxiety, change avoidance patterns, and improve daily routines.

Narrative therapy attends to the stories people tell about their lives. Together they identify recurring themes and consider new, more empowering narratives. This can be especially helpful for identity questions, relationship patterns, and issues tied to family of origin.

Finding the right approach is part of the work. Jennifer will collaborate with each person to choose methods that match their needs, goals, and preferences. She may combine approaches and adjust over time as progress is made.

Online sessions offer practical flexibility. Video calls allow face-to-face conversation and visual cues, phone sessions can work when bandwidth is limited, and live chat or text-based messaging supports brief check-ins and ongoing support between sessions. These options make it easier to fit therapy into a busy life and keep momentum during change.