tl;dr
Nova is excellent. You will be respected, your time will be used efficiently without feeling like you're "just another client", and you will have 100% of her attention during your sessions. She has a caring, thoughtful personality and I can't imagine anyone who wouldn't gain from time with her. Nova was highly effective for me: after 11 sessions we both agreed we had successfully achieved the outcome I'd desired upon beginning to work together. I've always been suspicious of psychologists trying to milk you along, and this suspicion was never raised for even a second with Nova; we were done in less than 1.5 months, and I always felt meaningful progress was made during each session. I highly recommend her.
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More detail if you want it:
Had a particular psychological issue that I wanted to address--and quickly! I called and "interviewed" 8 (cognitive behavioral) psychologists in San Francisco before coming across Nova. Over the phone I could tell that she was very likely what I was looking for, and once we began working together I was sure of it.
In the first session I expressed my desire to work through the issue aggressively with two sessions per week. Nova matched or exceeded my intensity and commitment to solving my problem in every single session. Initially I wanted to have highly structured sessions, with each having some sort of theme, but Nova suggested a more organic, free-flowing approach, which I (honestly somewhat reluctantly) agreed to. Definitely glad I trusted her--Nova's process was perfect. I'd write a "self growth journal" in which I'd document my successes and pain points between sessions and give the highlights at the beginning of each session. We'd synthesize what worked and how to continue or even grow those successes in the future, and then tackle where I'd felt I'd fallen short--and why. There were a few sessions that I honestly thought were beautiful conversations, discussing philosophical beliefs I'd subconsciously developed long ago and to my day-to-day detriment. If there was time permitting, we'd discuss anything new I wanted to address that wasn't covered in my "need to work on" area of my self-growth journal.
All of the sessions were efficient without feeling like I was just "another client". She definitely cares about you, and is energized by diving into what you have going on and how to help. She sits directly across from you and does not become distracted and is throughly, thoughtfully engaged at all times. I don't think I'm a particularly emotional person, but I know Nova engaged me emotionally and if other clients were more emotional, I think she'd engage them equally well. She strikes me as someone who is able to adapt easily and effectively to a wide range of personality types.
It took only I believe 11 sessions (2x p week means about 1.5 months!) before I had worked through things with her. It's been about 2 months since I stopped and I'm happy to report that the changes seem to be permanent. I can honestly highly recommend Nova to just about anyone. read more