About Cindy Collins, LPCC – Trauma, EMDR, and Attachment-Based Therapy in California
You’re Strong and Independent… But Running on Empty.
You keep showing up for everyone else, even when it’s taking a toll. It doesn’t have to stay this way.
Start feeling more like yourself again.
Schedule a free 15-minute consultation to talk through what’s going on and see if this my approach feels right for you.
Appointments are available, Monday through Thursday, 2-10pm, making it easier to fit therapy around a full work schedule.
How I Can Help You
Therapy with me is collaborative, grounded, and paced to meet you where you are.
You won’t be rushed—but you also won’t stay stuck. Together, we’ll explore what’s coming up, build insight, and support meaningful, lasting change.
I offer in-person therapy in Riverside, CA and online therapy across California, giving you flexibility in how you access support.
No matter the format, our work is centered on helping you feel more understood, more steady, and more connected to yourself.
You might be here because something inside feels heavier than what others can see.
On the outside, life may look “fine,” but internally you’re dealing with exhaustion, overwhelm, or emotional strain that is difficult to name or explain. Not because anything is wrong with you, but because you’ve likely been carrying more than most people can see.
You may notice:
Running on empty while still pushing through daily demands
Difficulty focusing, organizing thoughts, or following through
Repeating emotional cycles like anxiety, shutdown, or overwhelm
Long-standing family or relational patterns that still affect you today
Many people describe this as “functioning, but barely.” And from the outside, it often goes unnoticed.
This often reflects a nervous system that has been in survival mode for too long without enough space to reset.
Therapy can help not just by managing symptoms, but by working with what is happening underneath them so patterns can begin to shift at the root.
If this resonates, you do not have to carry it alone. I would be glad to connect and help you take the next step.
Cindy Lee Collins (she/her)
Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor (LPCC #22053)
In Practice for 5 years
California Baptist University, M.S. Counseling Psychology
Start feeling better — book your free 15-minute consultation
My Story
I have wanted to be a therapist since I was a pre-teen, though I also seriously considered law. I love to argue (or more accurately, present alternative explanations or look at things from a different angle). I'm inquisitive and tend to notice patterns and holes in information almost instinctively. These strengths fit both fields pretty equally, and for a long time my interest in them was genuinely split. But when it came time to choose, I knew being a therapist was my true desire; the thought of studying case law and other law topics sounded really boring and dreadful. So here I am!
I'm a self-proclaimed "avoidant" with an extremely guarded system, and I've always been upfront about that with my own therapists, usually right at the start. But time and again, we'd hit a wall. What I understand now, looking back, is that these therapists didn't know how to work with my system. That was incredibly frustrating as a client, and at my lowest points, it had me convinced I was broken beyond repair.
Being an intellectualizer (a very common avoidant strategy), I did what felt natural and researched everything I could to better understand myself, my past, and the way my system worked. I gained a lot of insight. But insight wasn't enough, and I think a lot of people reading this know exactly what I mean by that. That gap between understanding something and actually feeling differently about it is what led me to trauma therapy, and eventually to EMDR. My first experience of it caught me off guard. Despite my notoriously guarded system, I felt genuine relief.
Those experiences stayed with me. They're a big part of why I became the kind of therapist I am, because I know firsthand what it feels like to want to do the work and keep hitting a wall anyway. I never want a client to leave a session wondering if they're the problem.
The approaches I use aren't ones I stumbled into or checked off a training list. IFS helped me stop feeling at war with myself and actually get into relationship with the parts of me that had been quietly overworking and worrying for years. It also helped me become less avoidant so I could do the deeper work. EMDR helped me reach something talk therapy never could, because there are things the body holds that words just can't fully access. The Comprehensive Resource Model felt like a natural next step alongside both. I believe in these approaches not just clinically, but from my own experience of them.
I don't come to this work only from training or theory. I have a lived understanding of what it actually takes to feel safe enough internally to slow down, turn inward, and reconnect with yourself. I've seen what becomes possible when that shift happens. It's usually quiet at first, but it's real. People start relating to themselves and their lives in ways that feel more grounded and, honestly, more like themselves.
Therapy That Meets You Where You Are
My Approach
My approach is trauma-informed and focused on how the nervous system holds and organizes experience. Rather than only talking through what has happened, we work with the patterns in your emotional and physiological responses that keep those experiences active in the present.
Many of the challenges people bring to therapy are not just cognitive or insight-based problems. They are patterns that live in the nervous system, shaping how you react, relate, shut down, or overextend even when you understand the pattern logically.
In our work together, we look at what has shaped those responses over time and begin creating conditions for your system to shift out of survival-based patterns and into something more flexible, grounded, and sustainable.
With 5 years of clinical experience, I support adults who are wanting to:
Understand and shift long-standing emotional and relational patterns
Experience less reactivity and more capacity to pause and respond with intention
Reduce the sense of being pulled back into the same cycles, even with insight
Process unresolved experiences that continue to show up emotionally or somatically
Build a more stable and connected relationship with themselves and others
To support this process, I integrate evidence-based modalities including EMDR, IFS, CRM, and EFT. These approaches allow us to work directly with how experiences are stored and processed in the nervous system, rather than relying on insight alone.
I also offer neurodivergent-affirming and LGBTQ+-affirming care. This means you are not expected to mask, over-explain, or translate your identity in the therapy room. The work is shaped to support your full experience as it is.
Providing therapy in Riverside, CA, with secure online sessions available to clients throughout California.
What You Can Expect Working With Me
When we work together, the focus is on both immediate relief and deeper understanding and change:
We build emotional awareness and regulation at your pace.
We strengthen your nervous system’s ability to stay present and grounded.
We explore patterns that developed in response to past experiences — so they no longer unconsciously direct your life.
Alongside this, we pay attention to what’s happening in the here and now while also working with the deeper roots underneath it. Over time, this helps create more internal stability, flexibility in how you respond to stress, and a stronger sense of connection to yourself and others.
This isn’t about quick fixes. It’s about sustainable transformation and feeling more connected to yourself and others.
Professional Trainings
I invest in advanced training so I can offer you the most effective, evidence-based care.
2021 - Cognitive Processing Therapy (13 hours) - Medical University of South Carolina
2022 - Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)(40 hours) - Thrive Training and Publications, an EMDRIA approved training
2023 - The Comprehensive Resource Model(20 hours) - Life Source Affordable Counseling and Training Institute
2023 - Emotionally Focused Therapy Externship (29 hours) - Arizona Externship in Emotionally Focused Therapy, an ICEEFT approved training
2024 - Emotionally Focused Therapy Core Skills (52 hours) - Arizona EFT Core Skills, an ICEEFT approved training
2024 - The Comprehensive Resource Model Basic Training (40 hours) - Lisa Schwarz, creator of the model