About Maria
Maria Conforti is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with 16 years of experience. She practices in Illinois and offers therapy in English and Italian. Maria combines practical skills with a straightforward, compassionate style.
She has worked in many settings including independent practice, group homes, incarceration, community resources, and nonprofit programs. That variety shaped a flexible approach to relationship struggles, trauma, grief, ADHD concerns, and coaching for life changes. Her background includes work with parenting and custody situations and group programs for young people.
Background and approach
Maria draws on somatic ideas along with cognitive behavioral and attachment-based methods to match each person’s needs. She also uses client-centered techniques to build a respectful, collaborative space. Sessions focus on identifying what matters now and learning tools to move forward.
Her style is direct but warm. She aims to point out patterns that keep people stuck, and then help them practice different ways of responding. Maria encourages forgiveness and practical steps rather than staying focused on past hurts.
The goal she describes is to teach skills people can use on their own. She asks for honest effort from clients and offers steady support while challenging them to grow. For those ready to do the work, she helps build routines and strategies that fit everyday life.
How Maria Blends Approaches Online
Somatic-informed work pays attention to the body and how sensations connect to emotions. It can help people notice tension, grounding, and physical responses tied to stress, trauma, or relationship patterns.Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ACT, focuses on clarifying values and taking concrete steps toward them. It teaches skills to accept difficult thoughts while committing to actions that move life in a meaningful direction.
Attachment-Based Therapy looks at how early relationships shape current patterns. It helps people notice how they relate to others and practice new ways of connecting and communicating.
Finding the right mix of approaches is part of the work. The therapist collaborates with each person to decide what methods fit their goals and comfort level. That plan can shift as needs change over time.
Online sessions - via video calls, phone, live chat, or text messaging - make regular work easier to maintain. These formats offer flexibility for busy schedules, let people join from different locations, and support varied ways of communicating during the therapy process.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Relationship issues
- Trauma and abuse
- Grief
Also works with
- Abandonment
- ADHD
- Antisocial personality
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Avoidant personality
- Body image
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Dependent personality
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- Fertility issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Men's issues
- Multicultural concerns
- Narcissism
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Personality disorders
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Self-love
- Sex addiction
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Sexual dysfunction
- Sexuality
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Somatization
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
- Attachment-Based Therapy
- Client-Centered Therapy
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
- Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT)
- Existential Therapy
- Gottman Method
- Jungian Therapy
- Mindfulness Therapy
- Narrative Therapy
- Solution-Focused Therapy
- Somatic Therapy
- Trauma-Focused Therapy
- Experience
- 16 years
- Licensed
- Illinois
- Languages
- English, Italian