Cara Jones, PhD

Hi, I’m Cara. I bring deep care, attention to detail, and a wide-ranging background to my work with clients. I hold a Bachelor's of Science in Biomedical Computing and a Bachelor's of Arts in English, where I began studying literature of the Civil Rights movement. My PhD and experiences as a professor of Women’s & Gender Studies have centered on the stories Western medicine and popular culture tell about reproductive health. Combined, this work has shaped how I understand the relationship between individual suffering and the systems around it.

My path toward becoming a therapist grew out of my own personal experience as well: working through childhood trauma, attachment wounds, chronic pain and illness, and anxiety and depression. I have personally navigated relationship challenges, work stress, spiritual emergency, religious trauma, and medical trauma. My training as an end-of-life doula, an Internal Family Systems practitioner, and a trauma care practitioner deepened my commitment to holding space for others moving through intimate, personal processes. All of this has taught me to meet people exactly where they are, without judgment. My experiences have also taught me that within each of us is a deep place of knowing what is true for us.

In sessions, I work from an attuned, relational, depth-oriented, trauma recovery perspective. I make space for authentic expression, which can include thoughts, feelings, visions, movement, and body sensations, trusting that each holds important information. I believe that body, mind, and emotions are never truly separate. I follow my clients’ lead but am not afraid to step in when needed, seeing my role primarily as a guide rather than a director or educator.

I hold the therapeutic relationship as central to healing, regardless of modality, while recognizing that each person's relational needs and capacity differ. I welcome you to bring questions, concerns, and feedback, because I believe that healing unfolds through collaboration. In my experience, what moves people toward growth is acceptance of where they already are. When parts of us are polarized or pushed toward a strong healing agenda, it can create more unsafety, not less. I understand resilience and transformation less as dramatic turning points and more as small, quiet moments of noticing less reactivity to what once caused a big upset.

I am especially drawn to working with clients navigating childhood trauma and complex PTSD; spiritual or religious trauma; chronic pain, illness, and disability; medical trauma; grief and end-of-life concerns; and reproductive health experiences such as menstruation, fertility, and menopause. I work well with attachment wounds, highly motivated and psychologically-minded populations, neurodivergent people, and seekers drawn to life’s big questions. I have a particular interest in working with clients grappling with systemic issues of race, gender, class, sexuality, and ability, as well as activists and those who work to make the world we’re in better.

I bring a strong commitment to cultural humility, and I approach each client without assumption. I feel confident working with people across a wide range of gender identities and expressions, as well as racial and cultural identities and abilities. I am in an ongoing journey to grow my familiarity and competency around cultural experiences that I have not had, approaching that learning with care, deep respect and humility.

My unique mix of academic and embodied training shapes how I understand suffering. I see it not as individual pathology, but often as the result of systems that have failed or traumatized people, including families, schools, workplaces, governments, and medical institutions. Raised in a highly conservative Christian environment that I never fully accepted, and shaped by my own spiritual experiences, I am comfortable holding space for both the mystical and the mysterious as well as the practical and everyday.

If you are unsure about starting therapy, I’d like to say: I get it, I've been there myself. Therapy can be challenging work, and it can also be deeply meaningful. The most important thing is feeling your own willingness. The rest we can build together, through developing trust, voice, choice, and agency. My hope is that my clients leave our time together more fully connected to themselves, more able to love all parts of themselves, and more able to bring their unique light into the world.

Clinical areas of interest:

• Life transitions

• Depression, anxiety, perfectionism, codependency

• Complex and Developmental Trauma

• Spiritual and Religious Trauma

• Chronic Pain, Illness, and Disability

• Medical Trauma

• Reproductive Health

• Grief and End-of-Life

• Attachment and Relational Patterns

• Identity Development and Systemic Oppression

• Mind-Body Awareness & Connection

Certifications and trainings:

• Syzygy Dance Project Outreach Facilitator Training, May 2026 cohort

• Trauma Care Practitioner, Global Trauma Institute, Fall 2025 cohort

• Certificate in Somatic Embodiment & Regulation Strategies, Levels I–III, Linda Thai, Fall 2023 cohort

• Internal Family Systems Institute (IFSI):

o   Program Assistant, two Level 2 trainings (Deepening & Expanding; Shame, Anxiety, & Depression), 2025

o   Level 2 training, Multi-Topic: Trauma, Larger Systems, Self of the Therapist & Spirituality, 72 hours, Summer 2024 cohort

o   Program Assistant, four 100-hour Level 1 trainings, 2023–2024

o   Level 1 training, 100 hours, October 2022 cohort

o   Continuity Program, Fall 2022–present, including seminars on the sacred nervous system, values and beliefs in the therapy room, legacy and cultural burdens, direct access, intercultural competence, and somatic IFS

o   Online Circle Program, 40-hour training, 2021 cohort

• Death Doula Training, International End-of-Life Doula Association (INELDA), San Francisco, CA, December 2019 cohort

• Yoga Teacher Training, Agame Yoga, 200 hours, 2013 cohort

  
  

Education:

• Currently pursuing a Master's in Integral Counseling Psychology, California Institute of Integral Studies

• PhD, English, with focus on Women's & Gender Studies and Disability Studies

• MA, English

• BA, English, minor in Women’s Studies

• BS, Biomedical Computing, minor in Psychology