Individual Relationship Therapy in San Francisco, California
For women working through dating or relationship stress, communication struggles, and recurring patterns - on your own, or alongside couples work.
When love feels confusing, exhausting, or unfulfilling
You may look like you have it together on the outside, while privately feeling anxious, disconnected, emotionally exhausted, or deeply unfulfilled in your relationships.
Maybe you keep repeating the same painful dynamics. Maybe you're constantly overthinking, questioning yourself, or feeling stuck between wanting love and protecting yourself from hurt. Perhaps you're in a relationship that looks "fine" from the outside, but deep down, something feels missing. Or maybe you're trying to decide whether to stay, leave, or begin again after heartbreak.
Relationship struggles can impact every part of your emotional life - your confidence, nervous system, sense of self, and ability to feel safe and connected.
Therapy can help you better understand the patterns shaping your relationships and create healthier, more fulfilling ways of relating to yourself and others.
You may be struggling with:
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Repeating the same painful relationship patterns finding yourself drawn to emotionally unavailable or inconsistent partners, over-functioning in relationships, or wondering why the same dynamics keep showing up.
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Overthinking and second-guessing yourself in love analyzing conversations, questioning your feelings, worrying about making the wrong choice, or struggling to tell the difference between anxiety and your intuition.
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Fear of rejection, abandonment, or being alone making it difficult to express what you need, set boundaries, walk away, or feel secure even when things are going well.
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Feeling lonely or disconnected in your relationship perhaps things look "fine" from the outside, but you feel unseen, emotionally distant, or unsure whether the relationship is truly fulfilling you.
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Losing yourself in relationships prioritizing your partner's needs, minimizing your own, working harder to maintain the connection, or realizing you've slowly become disconnected from yourself.
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Past experiences that continue to affect your relationships today attachment wounds, difficult family dynamics, past relationships, or trauma that influence how you experience trust, vulnerability, intimacy, and conflict.
Therapy for Dating Anxiety, Overthinking, and Emotionally Unavailable Partners
Dating and relationships can bring up some of our deepest fears and insecurities - even when we're confident and grounded in other areas of our lives. You might find yourself replaying conversations, analyzing texts, wondering if someone is losing interest, or feeling consumed by uncertainty when you really like someone.
Maybe you keep finding yourself drawn to people who are inconsistent or emotionally unavailable. You know you want something secure and mutual, yet the relationships that feel the most exciting somehow leave you questioning where you stand.
Sometimes what feels like "chemistry" is actually connected to uncertainty or unpredictability, while someone who is consistent and emotionally available can initially feel unfamiliar - or even less exciting.
You might find yourself wondering why you're so drawn to the people who leave you guessing, yet questioning your feelings when someone actually shows up.
These patterns can be incredibly confusing, especially when you already understand yourself pretty well. You may know about attachment styles, recognize your tendencies, and still find yourself responding in ways you promised yourself you wouldn't.
Therapy gives us a place to slow all of this down and understand what's happening underneath. Together, we can explore what draws you toward certain partners, what gets activated when connection feels uncertain, and how earlier experiences may be shaping the way you experience dating and relationships today.
The goal isn't to make you less invested in finding love or to teach you how to stop caring. It's to help you date and build relationships from a more grounded place - where you can trust yourself, recognize emotional availability, communicate what you need, and choose relationships that feel secure, mutual, and fulfilling.
Understanding the Pattern Is Only the Beginning
You may already know exactly what you do in relationships. You know you overthink. You know you stay too long. You know you sometimes ignore your needs or become anxious when someone pulls away.
And yet, knowing the pattern doesn't always stop it from happening.
That's because relationship patterns often run deeper than what we understand intellectually. They can be shaped by early relationships, past experiences, attachment wounds, and the ways you learned to protect yourself when connection didn't feel safe or certain.
In therapy, we won't just talk about what you do - we'll get curious about why it makes sense that you do it. From there, we can begin changing the pattern at its roots so you're not simply trying harder to behave differently. You're actually learning a different way of relating to yourself and the people you love.
How we'll work together
Understand What Keeps Happening
We'll slow things down and look at the patterns showing up in your relationship - who you're drawn to, what happens when you get close, where you tend to lose yourself, and the moments you begin to question what you want or need. Together, we'll start making sense of why these patterns keep repeating.
Heal What's Underneath
Relationship patterns rarely come from nowhere. We'll explore the attachment wounds, past relationships, family experiences, and protective strategies that may still be influencing how you experience love today - with curiosity and compassion rather than judgment.
Choose Differently
Understanding the pattern is only part of the work. We'll practice new ways of relating, communicating, setting boundaries, and trusting yourself so you can make choices from a more grounded place. The goal is to help you stop repeating what's familiar and begin creating relationships that actually feel good to be in.
Frequently Asked Questions
What if I understand my relationship patterns but still can't seem to change them?
Awareness is important, but knowing why you do something doesn't always change what happens when emotions take over. We'll work with these patterns as they show up in real time, helping you recognize your reactions sooner and practice new ways of responding that feel more aligned with what you actually want.
Why do I keep questioning myself in relationships?
Relationships can bring up fears and insecurities that make it difficult to separate your intuition from anxiety, old wounds, or the desire to make something work. Therapy can help you better understand what's driving the doubt so you can feel more grounded and confident in your own judgment.
Can therapy help with dating and finding the right partner?
Absolutely. Dating can bring up everything from anxiety and overthinking to difficulty setting boundaries or recognizing whether someone is truly a good fit. We'll explore how you approach dating, who you're drawn to, and what happens as relationships develop so you can date with greater intention and self-trust.
Why do I lose myself when I'm in a relationship?
Sometimes the desire to maintain connection can lead us to minimize our needs, over-accommodate, avoid conflict, or slowly move away from ourselves without realizing it's happening. We'll explore where those tendencies come from and help you learn how to stay connected to yourself while also being deeply connected to someone else.
What if Healing Could Take You From...
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Repeating the same relationship patterns, even when you know better
Building healthier, more secure relationship patterns
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Second-guessing yourself and wondering if you can trust your own feelings
Strengthening self-trust and emotional clarity
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Feeling triggered without always understanding why
Better understanding attachment wounds and relational triggers
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Struggling to say what you need or set boundaries without guilt
Improving communication and boundaries
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Feeling discouraged, anxious, or unsure of yourself while dating
Navigating dating and relationships with more confidence
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Overthinking every interaction or feeling consumed by relationship anxiety
Reducing anxiety, overthinking, and emotional reactivity
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Carrying hurt from past relationships into new ones
Healing from painful past relationship experiences
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Going back and forth about whether a relationship is right for you
Gaining clarity around relationship decisions
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Losing touch with yourself when you're in a relationship
Feeling more grounded, connected, and authentic in love
My approach is warm, relational, and insight-oriented. Together, we explore not only what is happening in your relationships, but the deeper emotional dynamics underneath them - so you can move toward relationships that feel healthier, calmer, and more fulfilling.
Other services
Individual therapy is one way we can work together. These other offerings may also be a fit.
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Therapy Intensives
When a relationship decision or stuck pattern needs more room than a weekly session, an intensive gives us a longer stretch to go deeper in one sitting.
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Couples Therapy
If you're in a partnership and keep hitting the same wall together, couples therapy is a space to slow the cycle down and feel more connected again.
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Attachment Wounds Therapy
For the fears that follow you from one relationship to the next - the panic when someone pulls away, or the pull toward people who stay just out of reach.
You do not have to keep repeating the same cycle
Healthy relationships are not about perfection. They are about emotional safety, authenticity, connection, and the ability to remain connected to yourself within the relationship.
Whether you are dating, partnered, healing from heartbreak, or questioning your relationship, therapy can help you better understand yourself, heal old patterns, and create more fulfilling relationships moving forward.
Meet Elisenda
I'm Elisenda, a relationship therapist who helps women better understand themselves and the patterns shaping their romantic relationships. My approach is warm, direct, and collaborative, with a focus on getting beneath the surface of what keeps you stuck.
I work with women who are single, dating, partnered, or questioning whether a relationship is right for them. Maybe you keep choosing the same type of partner, lose yourself in relationships, overthink everything, or struggle to trust what you want. Together, we'll make sense of those patterns and help you begin choosing differently.
This work is deeply personal to me. Earlier in my own life, I spent years trying to make a relationship work while slowly losing touch with myself in the process. I know how hard it can be to recognize that while you're in it, and I'm passionate about helping other women stay connected to themselves while finding the love they want.