About Sheryl
Sheryl Derby, LCSW, brings 22 years of social work experience to her practice in Arizona. She earned a Master of Social Work with a Child Welfare emphasis from Arizona State University and builds sessions around the needs people bring. Her focus is on helping people manage stress, anxiety, depression, grief, and ADHD-related concerns.
She uses clear, practical strategies in session. Sheryl draws on cognitive behavioral methods and mindfulness to help people notice patterns and try new responses.
Background and approach
She also uses client-centered listening so each person’s goals shape the work. Her background includes work with veterans, families connected to child welfare, juveniles in the court system, and people who have experienced homelessness. That range informs a down-to-earth approach to real-life challenges like parenting, relationship conflict, sleep problems, and coping with big life changes.
Sheryl emphasizes strengths and skills that fit each person’s day-to-day life. Sessions often focus on identifying small, doable steps and practicing them between meetings. She likes to show how small changes in routine, thinking, or communication can ease stress and improve mood.
Away from work she cares for basset hounds, practices yoga, and volunteers with geriatric and hospice animals. She frames therapy as a collaborative effort to build tools that help people move toward greater calm and better functioning.
How therapeutic approaches translate to online care
Client-centered therapy focuses on listening and letting the client's goals guide sessions. In online work this means the therapist centers what matters most to the person and adjusts pace and techniques to match those goals.Cognitive behavioral therapy helps identify unhelpful thoughts and try different behaviors. Online CBT often uses short exercises, worksheets, and between-session practice to break down problems like anxiety, sleep issues, or mood shifts into manageable steps.
Dialectical behavior therapy offers skills for managing strong emotions and improving interpersonal effectiveness. Delivered online it can include skills coaching, emotion regulation tools, and practicing mindfulness during sessions to help with anger, intense mood swings, and relationship strain.
Choosing the best approach is a collaborative process. The therapist will talk with each person about their concerns, goals, and what feels most useful, then adapt techniques from these approaches to fit the client's life and preferences.
Online therapy with Sheryl uses video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to make care more flexible. Video offers face-to-face interaction for skill practice, phone works well for lower bandwidth or a quicker check-in, live chat can suit focused problem-solving, and text messaging supports ongoing, brief touchpoints between sessions. These options help fit therapy into busy schedules and different daily routines.
Questions people ask
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What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Trauma and abuse
- Parenting issues
Also listed
- ADHD
- Anger management
- Bipolar disorder
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Coping with life changes
- Depression
- Family conflicts
- Grief
- Intimacy-related issues
- Mood disorders
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Post-traumatic stress
- Relationship issues
- Self esteem
- Sleeping disorders
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 22 years
- Licensed
- Arizona
- Languages
- English
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