Mariah Dancing, LMFT, ATR

Oakland
Email:
mariahdancingarttherapy [at] gmail.com

I offer Art Therapy services for individuals of all ages, groups, families and couples. During the COVID-19 Bay Area shelter-in-place order, all sessions will be held remotely using Simple Practice and Zoom. Similar to in-person sessions, remote sessions will be spent checking in, making art, sharing and discussing the art and discussing anything else that comes up organically in the process. Some choose to do less talking and to focus more on art-making and guided mindfulness exercises. Others chose to do primarily traditional talk therapy with only a few minutes of simple reflective art at the beginning or end of the session. The format is flexible, fully adaptable and individualized. For new clients, I offer a free 15 minute phone consultation. 

Parent Reviews

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I am grateful for every minute our child spends with Mariah. Mariah’s warmth, gentle ways and intuition in combination with her love of children and use of color, art, texture and music makes an incredibly joyous and safe space for children to come into their own. Her extra support and insights helped us be better parents without ever feeling judged. I am excited for any child or family that gets to spend time with Mariah. 

Mariah is such a unique and special person we all feel blessed to have had her in our lives on a daily basis. We would have kept working with her for as long as she wanted to be with us but we moved 2.5 hours outside the Bay Area. We all feel such a loss not having her in our lives and our son talks about her and tells us he misses her daily. As first time parents I don't think we totally knew what we needed in a child care provider. Mariah consistently exceeded all of our expectations and helped us navigate our little guys early experiences with such care. It was a pleasure to learn from her and to witness how safe our son felt with her. To whomever she works with next, consider yourself lucky because you just won the childcare jackpot!

Mariah Dancing is an outstanding individual who we cannot recommend highly enough. She has gracefully helped our children thrive and fully express themselves comfortably and safely. She makes them feel heard and fully understood, and is able to adapt each session to their needs at that time. Her warmth and compassion are essential to helping guide their well-being, and her individualized methods have been crucial for helping our kids navigate stressful situations. I initially was tentative about the successfulness of sessions over Zoom, but there has been no issue with it, and the kids actually enjoy talking to her and creating art from their own home space.

If you are looking for a skilled therapist who is particularly gifted with children, I highly recommend Mariah Dancing. She worked with our neurodiverse daughter from a young age and through art therapy helped her develop greater tools for self regulation, self expression and self soothing. Mariah is extremely compassionate and kind in her approach, which was exactly what our daughter needed. To this day, our daughter still turns to art as a way of calming herself. Her early work with Mariah provided her with a strong social emotional foundation that she continues to build upon.