Erin Carnahan(She/Her/Hers)

Erin Carnahan is a licensed mental health counselor based in Oakland, CA who provides online therapy to individuals who are exploring and integrating their multiple marginalized identities, undergoing life transitions, and/or trying to live a full, authentic life in spite of all the chaos and uncertainty of oppressive systems.

Many of Erin’s clients have experienced religious/spiritual trauma, to varying degrees of directness, from evangelical Christianity and are unpacking the lasting harm of "purity culture" to deconstruct the shaming, dehumanizing normative beliefs. Erin offers a unique space and rare safety for people whose identities don’t fit neatly in one box to question their identities and beliefs without being judged, gaslit, or dismissed. She is queer- and trans-affirming, neurodiversity-celebrating, and welcoming to ex-vangelicals, Third Culture Kids/Adults, poly and kink community, and all members of the LGBTQIA+ community.


Erin’s practice is grounded in Client-Centered, intersectional Feminist, and Narrative Therapy. She frequently incorporates trauma-informed and neurodivergent-affirming forms of mindfulness-based Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT). She collaborates with clients to unpack traumatic experiences and develop personalized strategies to dismantle and heal from harmful, intergenerational legacies of imposed and internalized beliefs.

In session, Erin continually works to help clients situate their experiences in the layered sociocultural and political contexts of their lives (e.g. acknowledging power imbalances in interpersonal relationships, identifying systems of oppression, deconstructing cisheteronormativity). By validating her clients’ experiences, Erin supports and empowers them towards greater acceptance and celebration of their intersectional identities and a life that is genuinely their own. 


Erin's style is warm, collaborative, and unconditionally accepting. She brings in nearly 10 years of clinical experience, plus a lifetime of lived experience, to collaboratively co-create a healing environment with clients, respecting and empowering their autonomy and self-knowledge.