VIRTUAL DATING & RELATIONSHIP THERAPY IN SAN FRANCISCO & CA
Make it make sense.
What am I missing?
Shannel is a licensed marriage and family therapist, relationship expert, and EMDR-trained therapist helping women who are tired of second-guessing themselves in love.
Wherever you are, we’ll start there.
Relationship Transition Therapy looks different for everyone. We’ll start where you are and build your therapy plan from there. From dating to breakups and everything in between, what feels most like your situation?
1. DATING
You're dating but struggling to find someone who is genuinely compatible.
2. AMBIVALENCE
You're in a relationship but questioning whether you should stay or leave.
3. BREAKUPS
You've had a breakup and are struggling to let go and move forward.
Dating
Dating is wild. One minute you’re strangers, the next you’re analyzing their punctuation.
You’re navigating apps, mixed signals, inconsistent communication, and people who aren’t compatible. It can make even smart, capable women question their own judgment.
You know what you want and what you’re no longer willing to put up with. So why does dating still leave you questioning yourself?
“Am I being too picky?”
“Is this my anxious attachment style?”
“Am I overthinking this?”
“Are there any good options left out there?”
So you work even harder on yourself, assuming you must be the problem. Or you focus on someone’s potential and take on the work of helping them get there.
You read the books. Learn about attachment. Examine your childhood. Work on your boundaries. Get better at communicating. Follow dating coaches on Instagram.
And still, you end up in connections that leave you confused, disappointed, or doing far more of the work than the other person.
Dating asks you to live with a lot of uncertainty. Will you meet someone? Will this connection go anywhere? How long will you have to keep doing this? It can be very lonely and overwhelming to not know how it will all unfold.
After 14 years as a relationship therapist, here’s what I know: not everything is an attachment issue. Not every date that goes nowhere means it’s hopeless. And not every relationship can be fixed by looking inward. You've done a lot of the work. Now let's integrate it.
Somewhere along the way, we've become so focused on figuring ourselves out and decoding the other person that we've forgotten something important: dating is relational. It's what happens between two people.
How do you feel around this person? What happens when you express a need? Are you drawn to them, and do you feel desired in return? Is there room for curiosity, honesty, and play? When something feels off, is an old fear getting activated, or is the relationship giving you something worth paying attention to?
When you're in the middle of it, it's hard to see clearly. You talk to your friends. They love you, they know you, and they have opinions. And now there's ChatGPT, ready to analyze his text in seconds.
I will help you get out of your head, pay attention to what's happening in real time, and decide what to do next. Pull up a chair, grab your favorite snack, and let’s work together.
You want to stop
Overanalyzing their words and behavior for clues about how they feel
Trying to think your way out of uncomfortable feelings
Talking yourself into or out of liking someone
Pulling away when vulnerability or uncertainty feels uncomfortable
Ignoring red flags even when they’re obvious
Staying too long out of fear that you won't find someone better
And you want to start
Learning to listen to what your body, thoughts, and feelings are telling you
Making room for uncomfortable feelings without immediately reacting to them
Distinguishing fear from genuine incompatibility
Getting clear on what you need and expressing it
Enjoying what's unfolding without needing to know where it's headed
Walking away when a relationship consistently isn't working for you
How I can help you…
Here are the practical areas we’’ll cover together:
Dating apps
Building a profile that feels like you and using apps more effectively without wasting your time.
Meeting people IRL
Finding creative ways to meet people who share your same interests and values.
Flirting & showing interest
Getting comfortable showing interest, expressing your needs, and setting boundaries.
Early dating & compatibility
Exploring mutual attraction, shared values, and whether there's potential for a good fit.
Dating with discernment
Trusting patterns you notice instead of decoding every interaction.
Getting out of your head
Breaking the cycle of overthinking so you can make sense of what’s happening in real time and decide what to do next.
Ready to stop decoding every interaction and start trusting what you notice? Schedule a free 30-minute phone consultation.
Relationship Ambivalence
What if you’re not sure you want to stay?
You have a loving partner, but something keeps tugging at you. Part of you wonders if this is enough. You’re stuck somewhere between:
“I can’t keep doing this”
and
“I’m not ready to leave”
And you’re gripped by fear. Fear of choosing wrong, hurting the person you love, being alone, or giving up too soon. You’ve made the pros-and-cons list. Your friends have lots of opinions.
And while AI can give you another perspective, it doesn’t know your history, your patterns, or how you’ve changed over the course of this relationship.
So you keep analyzing and second-guessing, for months or even years. And the more you try to figure out what you should do, the more paralyzed you feel.
Or maybe the stakes are painfully higher. You’re already married, thinking seriously about separation, and wondering how it would affect your kids, your friendship circle, your finances, your home, your extended family, and the life you’ve spent years building together.
Not every doubt means the relationship is wrong. And not every doubt is something to work through. Part of this work is figuring out which is which.
For the past 16 years, I’ve helped women put words to thoughts they’ve been afraid to open up about, become more comfortable accepting uncertainty without rushing to resolve it, and develop the clarity and discernment to know what is true for them.
Clarity doesn’t come from thinking harder. It comes from stepping out of the loop with someone who knows how to help you separate fear from fact, patterns from problems, and uncertainty from what you already know.
It feels hard to decide because it is hard. So grab your tea, get comfortable, and let’s talk it through.
What we’ll work on together…
✓ Get out of the overthinking loop and understand what's keeping you stuck.
✓ Separate fear from relationship concerns that deserve your attention.
✓ Explore what's realistically possible in this relationship.
✓ Understand your patterns and role without judgment.
✓ Get honest about what you want, need, and are no longer willing to compromise on.
✓ Look at what has changed, including what you've both tried.
✓ Reconnect with the parts of your life that make you feel alive.
✓ Prepare for what comes next, whether you decide to stay or leave.
You don't have to make this decision alone. Let's work toward clarity together. Schedule a free 30-minute phone consultation.
Breakups
You never imagined having to learn how to live without them.
Maybe the relationship lasted only a few months, and you’d finally started to feel hopeful about someone. Maybe you built a life together, talked about marriage, children, and a shared future. Or you’re recently divorced, trying to make sense of the end of your marriage and resentful about how it unfolded.
However you got here, the end of a relationship is heartbreakingly painful.
You replay conversations looking for answers.
One minute you’re furious, the next you’re sobbing on the ground, and the panic hits hard.
You’re so used to talking to each other every day that you reach for your phone without accepting what is gone.
You obsess over what you should have said or done differently.
Underneath it all is the terrifying question: What if I never feel this way about anyone again?
Everything in you wants your old life back. You’re grieving someone who was deeply woven into your everyday routine, into your nervous system, and someone who is still out there, but no longer a part of yours.
And somehow, you’re still supposed to go to work, feed yourself, answer emails, and keep up with your responsibilities.
After 16 years as a relationship therapist supporting women through breakups, here's what I know: you don't need someone telling you to “love yourself,” insist it was meant to be, or pushing you to get back out there before you're ready.
You need someone who understands how much this hurts, can help you make sense of what you're feeling, navigate the moments when you crave reaching out, and have concrete, creative ways to move forward.
We'll practice loosening your grip on the answers you may never get, meeting yourself with compassion when the pain resurfaces, and opening up to a future you can't fully see yet.
Time passing isn’t enough. It’s what you do with that time that matters. So get comfortable, grab your favorite snack, and let’s talk.
You want to stop
Judging yourself for feeling lonely, rejected, or afraid
Treating painful feelings as something to fix or escape from
Searching for answers you may never get
Thinking about them all day, even when you want to move on
Questioning your worth or what you brought to the relationship
Fearing you’ll never feel this way about someone again
Feeling like the odd one out among coupled friends.
And you want to start
Understanding the science of heartbreak and meeting yourself with compassion
Learning to sit with painful feelings without being overwhelmed by them
Focusing on what you can control and how to respond to difficult moments
Finding parts of yourself that make you feel alive
Trusting yourself and your decisions
Building a future that feels exciting and yours again
Understanding what this relationship taught you
Take the First Step
Thanks for your interest in working with me. Please fill out this brief form and be in touch within 48 hours to schedule a free 30-miute phone consultation.
