Shirley Williams, LCSW, CSW

Shirley Williams is a Colorado licensed clinical social worker (LCSW) with 35 years of experience. She holds a Master of Social Work and has worked across health care, hospice, schools, foster care and adoption, and pregnancy services. She helps people with relationship and family concerns, trauma and abuse, grief, parenting struggles, anxiety and stress, and related issues such as attachment, abandonment, and caregiver strain.

Her approach combines trauma-focused methods with somatic practices. She integrates Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) alongside narrative therapy techniques. She also uses movement, sound, and clay work when it fits a person’s needs and interests.

Shirley trained early in Intensive Family Therapy and later completed a 1,000-hour massage therapy program, followed by national certification and Colorado licensure in massage and bodywork. That background informs how she links bodily experience and emotion in sessions. Over the years she has worked with people connected to disability care and hospice, including those supporting animal caregivers.

In practice she introduces expressive tools in both virtual and in-person settings. She has incorporated techniques such as The Flash Technique within EMDR work to address traumatic memories. Sessions often include practical exercises, movement or grounding strategies, and conversational exploration of patterns and storylines.

People who come with parenting strain, sleep or eating problems, or intimacy concerns will find an approach that addresses body-based responses as well as thoughts and behaviors. Shirley frames therapy as a collaborative process where methods are chosen to fit a person’s goals and everyday life.

Approaches you may use in online sessions