Lya (Le-ah) has obtained her master's degree in Professional Counseling, Clinical Mental Health, from Concordia Irvine University’s Townsend Institute. She obtained her bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Concordia University Texas and received her master’s degree in Education, Curriculum and Instruction, from Texas State University.
Lya believes that God is our Healer, the One that satisfies our souls. Jesus is our sympathetic High Priest and is with us in our mourning and rejoicing—constantly interceding for us. She desires to be a vessel of grace, a safe person for all those she counsels as they experience God’s transforming grace and healing. Counseling through a biblical lens with the knowledge of attachment theory, emotionally-focused therapy, a trauma-informed lens, and neuroscience, Lya hopes to come alongside others as they seek to be fully known and fully loved and experience the healing satisfaction that God desires to give to them. Lya enjoys working with adolescents and their parents, adult males and females, and couples.
Lya has experience working with adolescents, parents, adult male and female individuals, and with couples with anxiety, depression, marriage conflict, grief, trauma, and OCD symptoms, as a counselor at the Austin Stone Counseling Center since August 2023. She has additional experience working with high school and middle school students as a biblical mentor in the school setting where she experienced working with students who have struggled with addictions, mental health issues, loss, self-harm, suicidal ideation, gender identity, faith questions, and grief. She has experience working as a middle school teacher for ten years and served students and their parents through meeting brokenness with empathy and grace and a commitment to building a trusting relationship that offers truth and grace over time. She has also served administrators, teachers, and parents as she has presented on topics of brain development and addictions, emotional intelligence, and empathy in relationships.
