Karen Kavaloski

Karen Kavaloski is a licensed counselor with 15 years of clinical experience who brings a rich and varied background to her work. She began her professional life in nursing, spending nearly 30 years in that field before shifting careers to pursue counseling, and she was originally licensed as a counselor by the State of North Carolina in 2009 while working in Arizona.

A Marine wife for almost three decades, Karen has traveled extensively and balances a busy family life with three children and five grandchildren. She deeply understands the challenges some families face, as her youngest son and one grandchild are both described as severely autistic. She is also a cancer survivor, and these personal experiences inform her compassionate, strengths-based approach.

Her professional credentials include counseling licensure in Michigan and clinical counseling certification in New Mexico, and she practices from Missouri. Beyond her foundational training in nursing and counseling, Karen holds a Master of Business Administration and a Doctorate in Christian Ministries.

Over the past 17 years she has focused primarily on trauma and substance abuse in adult clients, with about three years of work specifically with teenagers in these areas. She has also spent roughly five years working with prison reentry and supporting individuals and families affected by incarceration in state and federal systems.

Karen believes clients are the experts in their own lives and works collaboratively to help individuals and families build stable, meaningful foundations. Her therapeutic toolbox includes focused solution approaches, internal systems work, mindfulness and compassion-based techniques, cognitive and cognitive behavioral interventions, dialectical methods, emotional freedom techniques, and neurolinguistic strategies. She is also the author of the Sacred Self Book Series, available on Amazon.

Outside of clinical work, Karen spends her free time reading, meditating and praying, gardening, and maintaining daily light exercise. She consciously practices active engagement in body, mind, and spirit and encourages others to do the same.