Helping Professionals Interview Series: Karissa Mueller, MA, LPC
We are thrilled to have had an opportunity to connect with and interview Karissa Mueller, MA, LPC of Good Woman Therapy to learn more about her approach and expertise as a Licensed Professional Counselor in St. Louis!
Karissa provides Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy and specializes in working with adult women. Read more about how Karissa decided to become a therapist, how she approaches therapy and IFS below!
Why did you choose to become a St. Louis therapist?
It might sound strange, but growing up, I don’t remember knowing college and careers were a thing. Even when I decided to go I didn’t really get that college was supposed to be aimed at…like…a career. So I chose to major in (whatever that meant) something I loved - music - and six years later, living in Nashville, I realized I needed a better plan for my life than entry-level-administrative-and-data-entry-jobs-by-day-hobby-musician-by-night-rinse-wash-repeat-until-we-marry-prince-charming.
I’m a depth-chaser and a 1:1 type of person by nature. I also had a positive experience in therapy while in undergrad and saw in my therapist, who was in private practice, a template for a life I’d like to have: work he loved, on his terms. I wanted that - all of it: to help people, to support myself, and to do something I felt mattered. Once I got clear on that - the rest just followed.
As for why I’m in St. Louis - I met my husband, who grew up in Ballwin, in Denver. We stayed in Colorado for a while after we got married, but decided we wanted to live close to family once we started our own. I grew up in Idaho where there are no professional sports, and for some reason, the Cardinals were always my grandpa’s baseball team - I think he’d be happy to know I ended up here!
What kind of counseling do you provide?
I specialize in Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy. IFS is an evidenced-based therapy model that offers a gentle path to healing by acknowledging and nurturing the multiple facets of our inner selves. IFS is about making peace with our storyline and embracing every internal cast member, not silencing the inconvenient or painful parts.
Briefly, what is IFS Therapy?
IFS is a therapy that views the mind as multiple, rather than singular - meaning, each of us has a family of parts internally that comprise what we think of as “myself”, each with a different role to play in our lives. Those roles naturally come with different perspectives, priorities, feelings, and needs. And just like in external families, there is bound to be conflict or discord between our internal family members on occasion.
In IFS therapy, we work to bring these parts into harmony through Self-leadership. “Self” in IFS is you at your core - a sturdy internal leader inside, and “self-energy” is all the embodied, positive qualities of self - calmness, confidence, curiosity, compassion, etc. IFS says Self and self-energy naturally and organically exist inside everyone - they can’t be damaged or lost. IFS therapy is the process of discovering and learning to access that which is already there.
What should people expect from IFS therapy?
I like to think of IFS as therapy that empowers clients to be effectively introspective. I sometimes call it origin-story therapy. You can expect to meet your parts as they are in the present day-to-day, and then, rather than demanding they change right-here-right-now because whatever they are doing doesn’t seem helpful, we spend time discovering how they came to have the role and perspective they do. This naturally fosters a lot of compassion and appreciation for the parts of ourselves we’re usually frustrated by or critical of - and - it gives us immense clarity about the most effective path forward to getting un-stuck.
IFS therapy is a shift from talking about your thoughts and feelings to talking to your thoughts and feelings (or most accurately, to being in relationship with the parts holding xyz thought/feeling). Once talking to your thoughts/feelings stops feeling weird (and believe me, it feels weird to everyone at first) it will seem absurd that we ever didn’t relate to ourselves in this way.
As a counselor in St. Louis, what ages do you work with?
My practice is focused on adults, and specifically, women in their 30’s and 40’s - those decades where you’re “supposed” to have it all figured out but in reality, you feel like you’re just getting started, hoping no one notices that you don’t know what the hell you’re doing most of the time.
What happens during a first therapy appointment with you?
In an initial IFS session with me, it might seem like we’re just chatting casually—and in many ways, we are. However, as our conversation unfolds, I’ll start mirroring back your experiences in terms of '“parts”; You’ll be sharing about what brought you to therapy, and I’ll be introducing you to the IFS model in a way that feels relevant to your experiences. You’ll leave feeling better understood than you have in a long, long time, and we’ll have established how we can work together towards your goals.
Who are your favorite types of therapy clients to work with?
I thrive on working with ironically unhappy, introspective women who are functional-but-not-fulfilled. They are often self-aware and eager for personal growth, but their naturally occurring introspection doesn’t seem to be getting them anywhere - but that’s just because they don’t know how to use it effectively - yet.
They come to me feeling incredibly stuck - like they’re boxed in to somewhere they don’t want to be and they either don’t know why they’re stuck (not with any real accuracy, anyway), or they think things can’t be better until people, circumstances, or situations outside themselves change.
I help them learn to be effective in their introspection, to see with immense clarity the box they believe they are stuck in. Once we do that - once we define the proverbial box and how it came to be, the way out becomes really clear without requiring a lot of striving and effort.
Could you talk a little about how your approach plays into working with people recovering from anxiety?
From my perspective, anxiety is a symptom of being human - but how we relate to anxiety, that’s what matters. In my view, IFS is unique in that it views what other therapies would call “symptoms” and even diagnoses as the expression of parts. Instead of saying a client has Generalized Anxiety Disorder (or even, is “phobic”), IFS would say that there is likely a young, very scared part in the system. When “symptoms” of anxiety surface, we would think of it as coming from that young scared part in need of help, or from another part trying to help the scared one.
What is one thing you wish people knew about getting therapy in St. Louis?
Okay first - I love this question! I desperately wish people knew that therapy is not just for crises. It can be a space for growth, learning, and understanding oneself better in a way that everyday interactions don’t usually provide.
How can people learn more and contact you for counseling?
My website: www.goodwomantherapy.com is the best place to learn more - I put up blogs regularly to try and peel back the veil on what therapy, and specifically, IFS is about. I’m also on Instagram at @goodwomantherapy though my attendance there is spotty at best right now lol
For therapy inquiries - the best way to start is self-scheduling a free consultation from my website. For anything else, there’s a contact form on the contact page of my website - I respond to every email I receive!
Share one fun fact about you that most people don’t know.
This question is always hard for me! At this point in my life, I don’t think most of my STL friends/connections know that I used to have a lip ring, and I miss it dearly - enough that I occasionally daydream about getting one again. Never say never!
Curious to learn more about getting treatment for anxiety? Wondering if you need to connect with a therapist in St. Louis? Contact Compassionate Counseling St. Louis to set up a free 15-minute phone consult. We’ll talk about what’s going on and best next steps - and if we’re not the right fit, we’ll connect you with other wonderful St. Louis-based therapists, like Karissa!
Compassionate Counseling St. Louis provides specialized anger management and anxiety therapy in St. Louis for kids, teens, and college students. We work in Clayton, MO and serve kids, teens, and college students throughout St. Louis City, St. Louis County, Ladue, University City, Town and Country, Webster Groves, Creve Coeur, Kirkwood, Richmond Heights, and Brentwood.