I Know This Terrain...
I specialise in working with adults whose lives have been shaped by OCPD, perfectionism, rigidity, and relentless internal standards.
Many of the people who find me have already spent years trying to understand themselves. They may have read extensively, tried therapy, or become very good at explaining the pattern. What they are often still looking for is someone who understands how deeply it runs and knows how to work with it.
That understanding is at the centre of my practice.
Some of it from the inside.
My practice focuses specifically on OCPD. That means we can spend less time deciding whether your experience makes sense and more time understanding it.
Those descriptions can contain some truth, but they rarely capture the experience underneath.
They miss the constant pressure to do things correctly. The weight attached to ordinary decisions. The harshness of an internal standard that is rarely satisfied. They miss how exhausting it can be to care deeply about doing the right thing and still feel that you are falling short.
I understand the strengths within these patterns as well as their cost. My work begins from that fuller picture.
Neil Howell, LMFT
this work is personal to me
I came to psychotherapy through my own family. My mother lived with a severe mental illness, and growing up I saw both the suffering she endured and the suffering it caused. That experience left me wanting to understand these struggles and help people carry them.
I also know some of this terrain from the inside. I understand the pull of a well-made list or schedule and the way those same lists and schedules can quietly become burdens. I know how easy it is to become so absorbed in the details, or in doing something correctly, that finishing becomes difficult.
Over the years, I saw how few therapists knew what to do with these patterns. I also experienced how much relief Schema Therapy could bring, both in my own life and in the lives of my clients.
That is why I chose to focus my practice here.
The Path That Led Me Here
Many people arrive with a good understanding of their patterns. They've read the books, listened to the podcasts, or spent time in therapy. They know what they're struggling with, yet life still feels shaped by the same patterns.
What matters to me is understanding what's happening beneath the surface. Rather than focusing only on symptoms or behaviours, I want to understand the deeper patterns driving them. That's where lasting change becomes possible.
I believe therapy should be thoughtful, collaborative, and grounded in curiosity rather than judgment. It should create space to understand yourself more fully while helping you build a different relationship with the patterns that have shaped your life.
MY philiosophy
Schema Therapy is an evidence-based approach that helps us understand the long-standing patterns that influence how we think, feel, and relate to ourselves and others.
Together, we'll explore where those patterns developed, how they continue to show up in your everyday life, and what keeps them going. Rather than simply managing symptoms, the work focuses on creating greater flexibility, self-understanding, and lasting change.
Sessions are collaborative and active. We'll spend time understanding your experiences, making connections, and developing new ways of responding that feel realistic and sustainable.
my approach
The aim is to help you hold your standards with greater freedom that leaves room for relationships, rest, and a life beyond constant correction.
These patterns usually developed over many years. They deserve careful work and enough time for change to become real.
Patience
Coping skills can be useful. My focus remains on the patterns underneath the symptoms and the forces that keep them going.
Depth
I would rather have a direct conversation about what is helping than rely on a comfortable assumption that therapy must be working.
Honesty
What Guides my work
Flexibility
- BA in Linguistics, UC Berkeley
- Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist (California & Michigan)
- licensed since 2018, practicing since 2012
- Trained through the ISST's International Training & Certification Program in Individual Schema Therapy
- RO DBT Senior Clinician.
Qualifications
"The standards you've lived by may have helped shape your life. They don't have to shape every moment of it."
I also cook most nights and continue to work on the space between getting everything exactly right and not caring enough. Both ends have produced some bad dinners.
outside of therapy
I do a lot of my thinking on a bike, climbing the hills around the East Bay. It is often where things begin to sort themselves out.
