Alaina Kahn MS, LCSW-C
Psychotherapist
Adolescents & Young Adults
Alaina studied social work at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, with a focus on clinical behavioral health. Utilizing values work, ACT, dialectics, and a heavy dose of validation, Alaina focuses on allowing your goals and interests to guide the treatment.
Alaina knows from her experiences as both a clinician and a client that the therapeutic relationship alone can be a powerful influence in growth and self-discovery.
Adolescents
Alaina specializes in improving relational patterns, anxiety and procrastination cycles, grief and trauma work, and adolescence. With teens, Alaina sees a lot of social substance use, sexual behaviors, and social media dynamics. She keeps an open mind and never takes the role of reprimanding.
LGBTQ+ Adolescents
She is passionate about working with gender and sexual minorities as individuals navigate identity exploration, coming out, coping with discrimination, or building relationships within the community.
DBT
Prior to joining A Step Forward, Alaina worked in a full DBT program and has received extensive training in dialectics as well as emotion regulation, distress tolerance, mindfulness, and interpersonal effectiveness. During her time as a DBT clinician, Alaina effectively treated self-harm, chronic suicidality, eating disorders, and relational trauma.
Using DBT, Alaina provided skills-based training as well as insight-oriented therapy to support clients as they expanded their repertoire of ways to response to distress and dysregulation.
A Message from Alaina
“My work is so meaningful to me because I get to build real relationships with my clients -- that means they get to see me and my personality, so it doesn't feel like a medical appointment I'm very confident working with higher risk teens coming from hospitalizations or managing suicidal ideation or self harm.
I've helped countless young people build lives worth living -- whatever that means to them. It's so important to me that therapy is an individualized experience to the client, led by what matters to them. Depending on the client and their needs, I like to infuse humor and lighthearted moments in the therapy room.
And as always, I am especially excited to work with queer youth. With the right support, identity exploration and community building for young queer people can be incredibly empowering. I love being able to provide a consistently affirming space while extending advocacy through parent education and other routes.”