Wendy Goffena, LCSW

Wendy Goffena is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with nine years as an LCSW and a long history in mental health services. She practices in Montana and brings experience from community mental health, medical social work, inpatient treatment, corrections, child protective services, and outpatient programs. Wendy offers a steady, down-to-earth approach for adults navigating big life challenges. She centers therapy on the person in front of her and treats people as the experts on their own lives. Sessions focus on identifying strengths, setting real goals, and building skills that fit daily life. Wendy uses practical tools to address stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, grief, anger, parenting strains, career crossroads, and midlife crisis concerns. Wendy draws from a mix of therapy styles to meet different needs. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy helps people notice links between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Dialectical Behavior Therapy teaches mood regulation, distress tolerance, and better communication. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy brings in acceptance and values-based action, and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing can be used for processing trauma. Her background includes work with adults across a wide age range and with a variety of challenges, including complex grief, chronic illness, caregiving stress, and issues around identity and life purpose. She has worked in both rural and institutional settings, which informs a practical, no-nonsense style. Outside of clinical work she enjoys Montana’s outdoors, hiking, fishing, gardening, and art. That grounded lifestyle shows up in her straightforward, supportive manner in sessions.

How selected approaches translate to online work

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) helps people notice what matters to them and take small actions that match those values. It focuses on acceptance, mindfulness, and building flexibility to move toward a meaningful life. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) looks at the links between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors and uses practical exercises to change patterns that cause distress. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) offers structured tools to process past traumatic memories that continue to affect daily life.

Finding the right approach is part of the work together. The therapist will talk with each person about their goals and preferences and then suggest which methods might help most. Decisions about which approaches to use are collaborative and can shift as needs change.

If you are interested in online sessions, please confirm the current session options before booking, since formats are not listed here. Online therapy can make it easier to fit appointments into a busy week, shorten travel time, and allow for check-ins from different locations. It can also let people try skill practice and worksheets during a short break, and choose a way of meeting that matches their comfort with video or audio. Licensed professionals will work with each person to make sessions useful and practical for their daily life.