Susan Frate

Susan Frate is a licensed independent social worker in Ohio with 25 years of experience. She focuses on helping people manage stress, anxiety, depression, anger, and the upheaval that follows major life changes. She encourages clients to build on their existing strengths and values as they work toward clearer goals.

Her approach is straightforward and collaborative. She listens and helps people name what is getting in the way. Sessions emphasize skills you can use between meetings, such as grounding, behavior changes, and practical problem solving. She also draws on mindfulness practices to help reduce reactivity and improve focus.

Susan integrates cognitive behavioral ideas to spot unhelpful thought patterns and replace them with more helpful alternatives. She uses acceptance and commitment principles to help people act in line with what matters to them even when feelings are strong. Elements of dialectical behavior therapy appear when people need tools for emotion regulation and distress tolerance.

She works with a wide range of concerns including trauma and abuse, grief, addiction, parenting stress, ADHD, relationship and intimacy-related issues, eating and sleeping problems, and career strain. Additional focuses include adoption and foster care, attachment issues, codependency, and forgiveness.

Susan aims to make the first step feel manageable. She explains options clearly and helps people set realistic short-term goals while keeping sight of longer term change.

How her approaches translate to online therapy

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) focuses on helping people clarify their values and take meaningful actions even when feelings are intense. It can be useful for anger, anxiety, and life transitions by turning goals into small, doable steps. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) looks at how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors interact and teaches concrete techniques to shift unhelpful patterns. It often helps with anxiety, depression, sleep, and eating-related problems. Mindfulness Therapy teaches simple attention and breathing practices to reduce reactivity and improve focus, which supports emotion regulation and stress management.

Finding the right mix of approaches is part of the work. The therapist will collaborate with each person to decide which methods fit their needs, goals, and preferences. That means trying practical exercises, checking what helps, and adjusting the plan as progress is made.

Confirm the current session options before booking because formats are not specified here. Online sessions can make it easier to fit therapy into a busy schedule, reduce travel time, and allow shorter check-ins when needed. They can also let someone use mindfulness exercises between appointments more easily. Ask about specific session formats and scheduling when you complete the matching questionnaire.