Arts for Healing

Art Therapy is an integrative mental health and human services profession that enriches the lives of individuals, families, and communities through active art-making, creative process, applied psychological theory, and human experience within a psychotherapeutic relationship.

Art Therapy, facilitated by a professional art therapist, effectively supports personal and relational treatment goals as well as community concerns. Art Therapy is used to improve cognitive and sensory-motor functions, foster self-esteem and self-awareness, cultivate emotional resilience, promote insight, enhance social skills, reduce and resolve conflicts and distress, and advance societal and ecological change.

As the owner and therapist at Whitmire Counseling and Supervision, Sarah provides initial assessments, treatment planning, and therapeutic services to adults, adolescents, and children. She specializes in working with trauma, anxiety, and life adjustments. Sarah also provides supervision to LPC-Associates and Art Therapists earning hours towards their ATR license.

Prior to starting her own practice Sarah got involved in private practice as a therapist at Spring Grove Counseling, providing therapy to individuals and families. While gaining experienced in telehealth therapy.
From August 2015 to February 2018, Sarah served as a Facility Mental Health Therapist with Harris County Juvenile Probation. Here she worked with adolescents in residential placements and with teens involved in the Specialty Courts with Harris County Juvenile Probation, this included providing court testimony and collaboration with specialty court probation officers.

Sarah’s professional experience also includes working as a Licensed Professional of Healing Arts Specialist at The Harris Center for Mental Health and IDD, where she worked with mentally ill reoffenders to prevent recidivism, conducted eligibility screenings and Texas Risk Assessments, taught Thinking for a Change (a cognitive-behavioral therapy program), and conducted clinical evaluations.

She also worked as a Behavioral Health Specialist at Brenham State Supported Living Center. She developed case plans for clients with intellectual disabilities and mental health issues and collaborated with an interdisciplinary team to foster the least restrictive living environment for clients. Sarah is a licensed professional counselor supervisor and board-certified art therapist.

She has completed additional training in various therapeutic modalities, including play therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Sand Tray Therapy, EMDR, cognitive processing therapy, and acceptance and commitment therapy. She has also attended several annual Coalition of Sexual Assault Advocacy in Action Conferences and the National Sexual Assault Conference and completed training in cultural competency, psychopharmacology, and clinical assessments in behavioral health. Additionally, she completed a three-day intensive training in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Certificate Course.