Our Story
Above All, Understanding and Passionate Care
The Attached Counseling Collective was born out of the shared passion of two therapists, now husband and wife, who met while working on an inpatient mental health unit. Connecting over their desire to help others achieve positive and lasting change, they established the Collective to bring together skilled counselors with diverse expertise and specialties to serve and empower our community with the tools they need for emotional resilience, healing, and secure relationships.
Dedicated Therapists Who Understand
We are a collective of highly trained, licensed counselors helping adaptable individuals and couples relate well through counseling
Meet the Attached Counseling Collective Team
About Us
Victoria Hicks LPC, LMFT, CPCS
"I have been to over 20 different countries because of my love for travel. Through this experience, I have developed a love for people across all cultures. I know how to meet clients where they are and to really understand them in their context which has been pivotal in my work."
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What Victoria is Passionate about
Victoria’s heart has always broken over divorce as she has seen the lasting effects of broken marriages on others. She desires to help couples and individuals with the skills and healing needed for successful relationships. She believes that maybe her work can help reduce the rate of divorce and help people finally find meaning through relationships.
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How Victoria helps
First and foremost Victoria focuses on collaborating with her client. We will spend time figuring out where you get stuck and help you get unstuck, whether that is as a couple or individual. Working together to get to the root of the problem is a big part of our work so we can find the true healing that you are seeking. With couples, the hope is that you get unstuck in your unhealthy pattern of relating and find the way back to each other. Victoria draws from Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), trauma-informed perspectives, attachment theory and is EMDR certified.
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Areas of focus
Relationship Issues, Couples & Premarital, Trauma & EMDR, Anxiety, Spirituality
Jacob Hicks LPC, CSAT
"I've been a drummer since my teens, so I've learned that being in tune with yourself and being genuine in your experience is essential to finding the flow and rhythm to your life.."
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What Jacob is Passionate about
Jacob helps couples and individuals to experience healing from negative experiences and unhelpful ways of thinking. He believes that people must feel heard and understood before they can create the lasting change that they are looking for. That change begins in the therapy room by creating moments of successful vulnerability for both individuals and couples. You don’t have to struggle alone.
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How Jacob helps
Jacob helps couples develop insight into the negative cycle that occurs between you and your partner. Armed with a new awareness, you’ll learn more helpful ways of communicating with your partner that allow both of you to feel heard and cared for. Jacob's extensive training & experience with those struggling with sex addiction guides him in helping clients understand the cycle of addiction that they experience from a more holistic perspective, including relapse prevention strategies, understanding the impact of trauma on addiction, and learning about more effective strategies for creating connection with others.
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Areas of focus
Mercedes Mitchell LPC, NBCC
"I know first hand how beneficial it would’ve been having a therapist to talk to growing up as a kid but unfortunately I did not. So I knew I wanted to be that outlet for others, especially in the black community due to the taboo thought of therapy. I find fulfillment in helping youth find their voice and learn to advocate for themselves."
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What Mercedes is Passionate about
Mercedes' wants clients to get to the best version of themselves. Being there for clients who feel unseen or unheard. Working with adolescents are her true passion. She wants to be a representation for black and brown youth to feel comfortable being vulnerable and safe to identify their emotions.
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How Mercedes helps
She meets clients where they’re at to see what their needs are. She takes the time to build the right foundation to ensure my clients feel safe and that they can trust her. She is aware it looks different for everyone so treatment is based on their goals and what is most beneficial to reaching them. That may include CBT to shift unhealthy thinking, DBT to teach mindfulness techniques and interpersonal skills, or identifying healthier ways to effectively communicate.
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Areas of focus
Adolescents, Depression & Anxiety, Anger management, Effective communication, Millennial therapy
Christa Hammaker LAPC
"My studies and experiences in life have brought me to helping refugees resettling in the states, to studying French abroad, and living in a remote area of Indonesia. These experiences have provided me with an interest and openness to various perspectives and ways of life, an understanding of disorientation, and motivation to be trained in trauma processing. "
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What Christa is Passionate about
Christa desires to help clients navigate their identity and life after traumatic events. By recovering hope as you pursue meaningful transformation after life-altering events, honoring what has been lost and its continued role in who you are, a cross-cultural move, recovering connection with others by establishing necessary boundaries and/or through opening up to greater vulnerability and trust in relationships, and finding a place to process past spiritual hurt and healing.
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How Christa helps
Christa helps clients process their emotions by being a grounded presence that can provide settledness as they grieve or process traumatic events. Christa is a witness to the life events shared so that clients are no longer alone in their grief or pain. She assists them in identifying for themselves what they have and are going through. If a client is interested in using EMDR for this process, she is trained to integrate that in sessions.
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Areas of focus
Grief & Loss, Helping Professionals, Relational Stress, Spirituality, Cultural Adjustment & Identity.
Joshua Simpson LAPC
"I know firsthand what it’s like to grow up in a broken home where love and connection were strained, where wounds were left unhealed. But I’ve also come to know the power of restoration—the healing that could have been possible had there been space for it. ."
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What Josh is Passionate about
Healing isn’t just an individual journey—it’s a communal one. Josh believes that restoration happens in connection, that healing extends beyond the therapy room into families, faith communities, and cultural spaces. Whether you’re navigating personal trauma, family estrangement, or a crisis of faith, his goal is to help you find meaning, connection, and restoration in a way that honors your lived experience.
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How Josh helps
Josh's work is deeply rooted in understanding and repairing the wounds that stem from broken attachments—whether in families, faith communities, or personal identity. He specializes in working with individuals who have experienced spiritual abuse and religious trauma, helping them untangle the pain of betrayal, manipulation, or toxic theology while rediscovering their own sense of meaning and faith. Using a blend of Logotherapy and Attachment Theory, he guides clients in reconnecting with their intrinsic values and repairing relationships with themselves and others.
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Areas of focus
Teens, Women & Men's Issues, Trauma & Stress, Spirituality
Melissa Portell Berrios LAPC
"Being bilingual enriches my ability to connect with individuals from diverse backgrounds, allowing me to offer compassionate and relatable support. My greatest joy is helping people build resilience and embrace healing."
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What Melissa is Passionate about
Melissa wants to help clients navigate grief and loss due to her own experience with loss. Having navigated grief, including the loss of a beloved pet after 14 years, I understand the deep emotional impact loss can have. This experience drives me to help others who are grieving, and I’ve even created a project in honor of my pet, which fuels my passion for supporting those going through pet loss. Additionally, I launched the journal prompt series My Unique Grief Journey, offering self-paced tools for expressing and processing grief.
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How Melissa helps
Melissa takes a holistic approach to healing by integrating the body, mind, and emotions. She believes true healing happens by addressing the whole person. She offers alternative methods such as writing, movement, breathwork, or sound to help release and transform difficult emotions. Together, she’ll help uncover the root of struggles and explore what works best for clients, using practical tools to help manage life’s challenges. Nurturing both mind and body, empowers clients with ways to bring balance and peace back.
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Areas of focus
Grief movement, Life transitions, Grief & loss, Anxiety, Dating & Singleness.
Heather Wheeler LAPC
"As a married person committed to the health and wellbeing of my marriage, I have been to couples therapy and have an appreciation for the vulnerability, time, and effort it takes to open yourself up and trust the process."
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What Heather is Passionate about
Heather has always deeply resonated with the fact that we are wired for connection, and believes that if we can reconcile in our closest relationships, distress and conflict become less powerful. She is also passionate about helping individuals get in touch with their internal world with acceptance and ownership, so that they can move through life and relationships feeling more empowered to make choices.
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How Heather helps
Heather focuses on building trust and safety as she gets to know her clients, and models identifying with feelings and thoughts to help clients begin to do the same. She listens for what is painful, difficult, and what seems to pop up again and again. Once there’s an understanding of an unhelpful pattern, she can go deeper with clients to uncover the causes with compassion, and move toward new patterns of relating to internal feelings and past experiences. Heather is informed by Attachment Theory and Emotionally Focused Therapy.
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Areas of focus
Families, Couples, Life transitions, Teens, Christian Counseling
Our Values
We're Committed to...
Excellence
We believe in excellence by providing the most expert, high quality and ethical care to each client.
Community
We believe in community because counselors should not practice alone. Instead, cultivate a culture of support and connection with counselors and their clients.
Growth
We believe in growth for our clients and counselors. We seek this in our training and in our work with clients.
Our Space
We pride ourselves on providing a space that is comfortable, refreshing and calm as you approach life's struggles. We have a private suite with a large waiting room, in suite bathroom and comfy couches. Coffee, water and even a free library is provided for our clients.
