Jennifer Fitkin, LCSW, CSW

Jennifer Fitkin is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker - LCSW and a Clinical Social Worker - CSW with two decades of experience. She trained in psychology and social work at the University of Northern Iowa and built a career across multiple settings. She brings calm, practical help for people feeling overwhelmed by stress, anxiety, parenting pressures, mood struggles, addiction, or major life changes.

Her background includes work in residential programs, community services for foster care and juvenile justice, and a correctional setting focused on rehabilitation. She has held clinical leadership roles including clinical supervisor and clinical director at a residential program that focused on attachment concerns. Those roles shaped how she organizes care and supports people through complicated histories.

Jennifer draws on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Attachment-Based Therapy, mindfulness, and motivational interviewing. In sessions she focuses on small, manageable steps people can use right away. She also pays attention to habits like sleep, movement, and nutrition because those routines affect mood and energy.

Her style is strengths-based and goal-oriented. She works with individuals on issues such as parenting stress, grief, relationship and family patterns, trauma and abuse, substance and process addictions, ADHD, and problems with impulsivity and control. She has experience leading individual, group, and family work and helps people sort practical next steps.

Outside of therapy, she enjoys hiking, paddleboarding, backpacking, and camping. She is a CrossFit Level 1 Trainer and often speaks about how physical activity supports mental health. Her dog Boomer sometimes makes an appearance during telehealth sessions.

How therapeutic approaches translate to online care

Jennifer commonly uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy in her online work. CBT focuses on identifying unhelpful thoughts and trying alternative behaviors to shift mood and stress. It is useful for anxiety, depression, and parenting-related worries. ACT helps people clarify values and take meaningful actions even when difficult feelings remain; it can be helpful for grief, addiction, and life transitions.

She treats approach selection as a collaborative process. Early sessions focus on your goals and what feels most useful, and then she tailors exercises and tools to match your needs. That teamwork helps make therapy feel practical and relevant from the start.

Online formats include video calls, phone sessions, live chat, and text-based messaging, which allow flexibility around work, caregiving, and travel. Video calls are good for deeper conversations and teaching new skills, phone sessions can fit into a busy day or require less bandwidth, and chats or texts work well for brief check-ins or ongoing prompts between meetings. These options make it easier to keep momentum and try behavioral changes in real life.