Wendy Goffena, LCSW

Wendy Goffena is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with nine years of clinical therapy experience and a long history in mental health services. She practices in Montana and draws on many years working in community mental health, medical social work, residential treatment, corrections, child protective services, and school-based programs. Wendy aims to make therapy straightforward and understandable for people who are stressed or overwhelmed.

She uses a client-centered style and believes people are the experts on their own lives. Sessions focus on clear goals and practical steps chosen together. Wendy often blends Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, and EMDR to meet each person where they are.

In sessions she helps people notice how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors connect and then practice new responses. She teaches skills for regulating strong emotions, tolerating distress, and improving interactions with others. When past trauma is getting in the way, she can offer EMDR as one option to process difficult memories.

Wendy has worked with a wide range of concerns including anxiety, depression, trauma and abuse, grief, anger, self-esteem, sleep problems, parenting stress, career shifts, and chronic health challenges. She also supports people facing life transitions, caregiver strain, and questions about purpose and midlife changes.

Outside of therapy she enjoys Montana's outdoors, hiking, fishing, gardening, and making art. Her background in education and long service in varied mental health roles informs a practical, down-to-earth approach to helping people move forward.

How specific approaches translate to online work

CBT, or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, focuses on spotting unhelpful thoughts and testing them with real-life experiments. It is useful for anxiety, depression, sleep problems, and stress because it teaches concrete skills to change thinking and behavior.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ACT, uses acceptance and mindfulness alongside clear values-guided action. It helps people tolerate difficult feelings while moving toward what matters to them, which can be useful during life transitions and chronic health challenges.

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, EMDR, is a trauma-focused option that guides people through processing painful memories so those memories have less hold over daily life. It is offered as one of several paths for trauma work when appropriate.

Finding the right approach is part of the therapeutic process. The therapist will work collaboratively with each person to choose and adapt methods based on goals, preferences, and what works in practice. That collaboration helps shape whether sessions emphasize skills practice, mindfulness, or trauma processing.

Online therapy offers practical flexibility. Video calls allow face-to-face work and guided exercises, phone sessions are helpful when bandwidth is limited, live chat fits quick check-ins, and text-based messaging supports ongoing reflection between scheduled sessions. These options help therapy fit into busy lives and different daily routines.