Session Details
$250 for a 50-minute session
$300 per hour for half-day and all-day intensives
Ph. 615.335.4751
Carla Ponciroli Babb, Ed.S., ACS, LPC-MHSP
Carla is a Licensed Professional Counselor with over 25 years of experience helping families, couples and individuals understand the impact of their story on the way they see themselves and how they relate to others. She helps people rewrite whatever parts of their narrative aren’t working for them anymore through a trauma-informed lens. Her Developmental and Relational Trauma Training informs her work with all clients as she explores historical patterns and helps them understand what is getting in the way to leading a functional adult life.
Carla attended James Madison University and graduated with an MA and EdS in Counseling. She has additional training in Emotionally Focused Therapy for Couples (EFT) and Eye-Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing for Trauma (EMDR). She created Cypress Counseling group in 2011, where she works with individual adults and couples to help them find hope again, as well as consulting and supervising other counselors.
CLINICAL SPECIALTIES: Trauma/PTSD work, Women’s issues, Couples, Depression, Grief counseling, Anxiety/Stress Management, Relationship/Boundary issues, Personal Growth, Spirituality issues and Work/Life Balance
About Carla
When I tell people I am a counselor, usually the first response is something like, “How could you sit all day listening to other people’s sadness? Don’t you get depressed?” Or, “how can you work with couples in crisis? Doesn’t that kind of anger and hurt scare you?”
The answer is no.
That has never been what it is like for me.
I love working with those who are hurting and lonely. Not because I like being with lonely people, but because I believe that if you can understand what you are lonely for, you can find a level of intimacy you have never known before.
I love working with hurting couples, specifically those that are not sure they can stay together anymore because there is just too much distance between them from years of wounding each other. Not because I enjoy seeing people struggle, but because I get to help them pull the curtain back for each other and really show their partner what their pain is really about for them. What I know through years of working with couples, and from doing my own marriage work, is that it is never only about what we are arguing about. It’s usually this:
“Are you really there for me?”
“Am I a good enough wife or husband?”
“Do you really love me?”
“Do I matter to you?”
This is why I do this work. Because once the work of counseling has begun, you start to have hope again. Because once you see things from a new lens, you start to talk to yourself with a kinder voice. Because once you see your partner’s hurt without defensiveness but from understanding, you feel a connection with them that you thought was lost forever.
The work of counseling is like a life preserver.
It doesn’t rescue you out of the tumultuous waters and prevent you from getting knocked around by the waves… but it gets your head above water.
It allows you to take deep breaths. To rest and slow down in order to gain strength. To see across the waves to the shoreline. To have hope again.
To keep kicking and swimming until the waters start to quiet again. And they will always quiet again.
My life in Nashville has had lots of beauty in it and also sometimes I have found myself in the midst of those tumultuous waters too. I went to school at James Madison University and Paul, my husband, was in my master’s program .We graduated together then were married one month later. Together we began our counseling careers here in Nashville in 1998.
Paul and I have two awesome kids who we are trying our best not to mess up too badly. We also have our own story of learning how to be a couple, struggling as new parents, feeling distance in our relationship, and almost separating. We then fought hard for our relationship through our own counseling, and we came out the other side feeling a sense of intimacy we never knew before. I know personally the pain of growing up with divorced parents, the struggle of fitting in, the pain of living with someone with addiction, and the weight of having a parent with a life-threatening illness.
If I can help you, please reach out and let’s talk. I would be glad to spend time with you over the phone to see if I would be a good fit as a counselor for you.
First-Time Appointment Information
Reach out to Carla by Phone or Email
Carla Utilizes a Secure Online Portal for Completing Paperwork
Appointments Can Be In-Person or Through Telehealth