Jeff Duckworth

I'm a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) and Certified Advanced Alcohol and Drug Counselor (CAADC), which means I sit at the intersection of two things that almost always show up together: trauma and substance use. Most of my clients are dealing with one, the other, or both, and they're usually exhausted from trying to manage it alone or from therapy that didn't take their substance use seriously. I'm not here to fix you. I'm here to collaborate with you, meet you exactly where you are, and help you move forward with intention. That might mean we're untangling something from your past that still runs your present, or it might mean looking honestly at a relationship with alcohol or drugs that's stopped working for you. Either way, my priority is building a space where you feel safe, understood, and capable of actually changing your life, not just talking about changing it.

I believe preoccupation is the primary source of dysfunction for most people. The mind gets stuck looping on the same memory, the same fear, the same craving, and that loop runs the show until someone interrupts it. My approach is built around breaking through that preoccupation so you can take back control. I do this using Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART), which works directly with traumatic memory and tends to create relief faster than a lot of traditional talk therapy, alongside Internal Family Systems (IFS) work to help you understand the parts of yourself that developed to survive hard things, even when they're not serving you anymore. With substance use specifically, I treat it as connected to the trauma underneath it rather than as a standalone behavior to manage.

The first session is mostly about orientation, both ways. I want to understand what's actually brought you in, not just the surface version, and you should leave with a sense of whether this feels like the right fit. We'll talk through your history with trauma and substance use as much as you're ready to, what's worked or hasn't worked for you before, and what you're hoping is different on the other side of this. You won't leave with homework or a worksheet, but you should leave with some clarity about where we're headed and what working together will actually look like. My goal from session one is to remove the feeling of being stuck and start building forward motion.