Dr. Ehsan Shabahang

I'm Dr. Ehsan Adib Shabahang, a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) and National Certified Counselor (NCC), and the founder of AtReef Therapy PLLC in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I hold a PhD in Psychology with a concentration in social psychology, where my research focused on cross-cultural relationships, along with a master's degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling.

Before training as a therapist, I worked as a cultural advisor and diplomatic liaison, work that put me in close contact with how people build trust, communicate, and repair relationships across real differences. That background still shapes how I practice today, especially with couples and individuals navigating intercultural relationships, identity, and belonging across cultures.

I work primarily with two populations. The first is couples dealing with recurring conflict, emotional distance, betrayal, trust repair, or difficulty with intimacy and vulnerability. The second is individual adults, often high-achieving professionals, navigating anxiety, burnout, perfectionism, identity questions, and major life transitions. Many of my clients function well on the outside but recognize that intelligence, success, or effort alone hasn't resolved a pattern that keeps showing up in their relationships or their inner life. I'm multilingual in English, Persian, and Dari, and I see clients through secure video telehealth.

My approach is integrative, depth-oriented, relational, and performance-focused. I draw on relational and depth psychology, Jungian psychology, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), and Gottman Method Couples Therapy, and I integrate these according to each client's specific concerns rather than applying one fixed model to everyone. I'm also the developer of Self-Reflective Relationship Therapy (SRRT), a research-informed framework I use to help clients build self-reflection, emotional responsibility, and stronger relational patterns.

I don't treat symptoms as isolated problems. Anxiety, burnout, and relationship conflict are often connected to deeper patterns in how someone regulates emotion, tolerates vulnerability, or relates to achievement and self-worth. My work looks at both the immediate concern and what's sustaining it.

At the same time, insight on its own isn't the goal. I focus equally on translating understanding into observable change: how you communicate, set boundaries, regulate emotion, and make decisions. I also work directly and honestly. I'll name a pattern plainly rather than talk around it, because that directness is usually what moves the work forward faster.

Your first session with me is where I get a clear picture of what's bringing you to therapy and what you're hoping will change. For individual clients, that means walking through your history, current concerns, and the patterns you want to understand or shift, whether that's anxiety, burnout, perfectionism, or a relationship pattern that keeps repeating. For couples, I spend time hearing from both partners about the relationship's history and the specific cycles of conflict, distance, or disconnection that brought you in.

You won't leave the first session with everything resolved, but you should leave with a clearer sense of the pattern underneath the presenting concern, not just the surface complaint, and a working understanding of how I approach treatment: integrative, direct, and focused on real behavioral change rather than insight alone. Sessions are conducted through secure video telehealth, so you can meet with me from wherever is most convenient. By the end of the first session, most clients have a concrete sense of what our work together will focus on going forward.

Please note that couples therapy is offered on a private-pay basis and is not billed through insurance. I’m happy to provide a superbill that you may submit to your insurance plan for possible out-of-network reimbursement.