Dr. Gisela Martinez

I am a Latina psychotherapist and Maryland LCSW-C with over 13 years of experience helping adolescents, adults, and families navigate emotional distress, relationship challenges, family dynamics, identity concerns, and major life transitions. I welcome clients from a wide range of backgrounds and have a particular passion for supporting immigrant, first-generation, Latina, and bicultural clients as they navigate cultural expectations, intergenerational patterns, family responsibilities, belonging, and the desire to build a life that feels authentic to them.

I provide therapy in both English and Spanish and strive to create a space where you can speak openly, feel understood, and explore your experiences without judgment. My approach is collaborative, culturally responsive, and trauma-informed. Together, we can identify patterns that may be keeping you stuck, strengthen coping and emotional regulation skills, develop healthier boundaries, and reconnect with your own needs, values, strengths, and voice.

My experience across outpatient and crisis settings, along with my Doctorate in Social Work and advanced training in culturally responsive practice and intergenerational trauma, informs my clinical approach. I believe therapy should be more than a place to talk—it should help you understand yourself more deeply and build practical tools to navigate the challenges you face.

Whether you are struggling with depression, relationship or family stress, identity concerns, emotional overwhelm, relational wounds, or a difficult life transition, you do not need to have everything figured out before beginning therapy. My goal is to help you gain insight, make meaningful changes, and move forward with greater clarity, confidence, and resilience.

"My approach to therapy is relational, culturally grounded, and trauma-informed, shaped by more than 13 years of clinical work with young adults, families, and individuals navigating crisis, trauma, depression, identity concerns, and major life transitions. I work with clients to slow down what feels overwhelming, understand the patterns that developed for survival, and build practical tools for emotional regulation, communication, boundaries, and healing.

My style is warm and collaborative, but also active and honest; I believe therapy should feel supportive while also helping clients make meaningful connections between their lived experiences, family history, culture, relationships, and current stressors. I integrate evidence-based approaches such as ACT, CBT, IFS, Narrative Therapy, crisis intervention, and strengths-based care, while remaining attentive to the impact of immigration, bicultural identity, systemic stress, and intergenerational trauma. Most importantly, I strive to create a space where clients feel seen with nuance, dignity, and cultural understanding."

In our first session, I focus on understanding what brings you to therapy, what you have been carrying, and what you hope will feel different. I will ask about your current concerns, personal and family history, relationships, culture, strengths, safety, and goals, while giving you space to share at a pace that feels comfortable.

My style is direct, collaborative, and culturally responsive. I want you to feel respected and understood—not reduced to a diagnosis—and to leave with a clearer sense of what we can begin working on together. I pay close attention to how culture, identity, family expectations, intergenerational patterns, and systemic stress may shape the ways you cope, relate to others, and heal.

The first session is not about having all the answers. It is about beginning to build trust, identifying what matters most to you, and creating a treatment plan that feels practical, meaningful, and connected to your lived experience.