About Mary
Mary Alfinito is a licensed clinical social worker with four decades of experience in New York. She helps people dealing with stress, anxiety, depression, grief, ADHD, and trauma. She also supports those facing LGBT questions, self-esteem struggles, career worries, and big life changes.
Her style is straightforward and compassionate. Sessions focus on clear goals and practical skills people can use between visits. She encourages honest talk about difficult feelings and offers tools to reduce distress and improve daily functioning.
Background and approach
Mary draws on approaches that emphasize thinking patterns, skills for emotional regulation, and trauma-focused work. She blends these methods to match each person’s needs rather than using a single technique for everyone. That means talking through problems, practicing new skills, and reviewing what helps most.
Over a long career she has worked with a wide range of concerns including attachment and abandonment issues, autism and Asperger syndrome, chronic illness and pain, caregiver stress, and communication problems. Her background also includes work around codependency, body image, and forgiveness. Sessions are offered in English and available by several online formats.
The first steps are simple: complete a short matching questionnaire and schedule a session. Mary aims to make the process clear and manageable for people who are nervous about starting therapy.
How these approaches fit into online therapy
Mary uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help people spot unhelpful thoughts and change behaviors that keep problems going. CBT is practical and often focuses on steps you can try between sessions to see real changes. Dialectical Behavior Therapy emphasizes skills for managing strong emotions and improving how you handle stress and relationships; it can help when feelings feel overwhelming or reactive.Finding the right approach is part of the work. Mary will collaborate with each person to choose methods that match their goals, needs, and preferences. That means testing what helps, adjusting the plan, and keeping the focus on useful, achievable steps rather than a one-size-fits-all program.
Online therapy offers flexibility through video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging. Video lets people use visual cues and full conversation. Phone sessions work well when bandwidth is limited or you prefer not to be on camera. Live chat and text are useful for shorter check-ins, coaching-style support, or fitting therapy into a busy schedule. These options make it easier to keep therapy consistent around work, school, or caregiving commitments.
Questions people ask
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What this therapist works with
Most often
Also listed
- Abandonment
- ADHD
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Body image
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Depression
- Divorce and separation
- Emptiness
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Gender dysphoria
- Guilt and shame
- HIV / AIDS
- Impulsivity
- Intellectual disability
- Isolation / loneliness
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Post-traumatic stress
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-love
- Sexuality
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 40 years
- Licensed
- New York
- Languages
- English
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