David Volker

Hi there, I’m David! My name is David Volker, and I’m a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor (LPCC) based in Berkeley, California, and working with clients statewide via telehealth. I work with adults and primarily specialize in relational, somatic, gestalt, cognitive/behavioral, and existential support for the healing of emotional and nervous system dysregulation (including anxiety, depression, and thought disturbances) resulting from complex (relational/developmental) trauma (CPTSD).

My approach

My approach is client-centered and highly individualized to each of my clients‚ preferences for and needs from therapy. I hold a relational space of containment and intersubjectivity focused on truly attentive listening and presence, within which I may incorporate elements of Gestalt, Attachment Theory/parts work/psychodynamics, mindfulness/Somatic Experiencing/Polyvagal Theory, Buddhism, existential therapy, DBT, and ACT. I believe everyone is the expert of their own experience and, above all, work collaboratively and transparently to support my clients‚ deeper human needs for self-determination, self-discovery, safety, connection, and authenticity within and beyond the therapeutic space.

My focus

I specialize in support for the internal and relational healing journeys of those recovering from complex (relational/developmental) trauma, particularly attachment trauma resulting from the unique and particularly insidious boundary violations that often accompany Borderline and Narcissistic personality disorders. I have an eclectic background of experience with a wide range of life experiences and social locations. Still, I have also commonly worked with depression, anxiety, outsider experiences, highly sensitive people (HSP), and creatives.

My communication style

I believe that relational trauma is healed within relational contexts, and I aim to be a grounded, attentive, and co-regulating presence for my clients. Compared to other therapists, I believe my clients tend to find me to have a particularly calm, steadying presence. My primary focus is on listening and attunement, and my activity in making reflective statements, asking deepening questions, checking for understanding, and reflecting/connecting back to prior statements and ongoing themes, I think, tends to support my clients in feeling particularly heard and held.

My journey to mental healthcare

Like most therapists, my journey to the field of psychotherapy began with my own need and desire to understand my own experiences and that of those around me to be able to live with more authentic aliveness, meaning, vulnerability, and connection, and the safety and skills to regulate my experiences. I believe that many aspects of our collective worlds hold unhealthy defaults of insensitivity to vulnerability and suppression of feeling, unmetabolized (intergenerationally-inherited) trauma, and survival responses that ultimately lead to more suffering, including materialism, narcissism, and oppression. Therapy is one small window of opportunity to build experiences of relational safety and connection that I believe we all foundationally need to live more openly and happily.

My goals for you

In the initial assessment phase, I invite my clients to share their hopes for healing/growth broadly and therapy specifically, including what has/has not worked for them in therapy before. From that, we work to collaboratively develop an outline for a treatment plan, breaking these experiential goals down into smaller, more specific ‚ actionable‚ objectives as well as proposed ways of working together to move toward those aims. I check in with my clients every few months to prompt assessment and reevaluation of goals, progress on goals, and the success of our approaches so that clients remain driving agents of process and therapy can be as relevant and vital as possible.

My first session with you

I believe that fit, assessment, and truly informed consent are foundational for a successful therapeutic process. I inform my clients that the first few sessions will be getting to know you‚ period where clients feel out if I feel like a good fit, someone they feel comfortable talking to and whom they believe can help them‚ and I get more information about what's going on and what clients are looking for to assess if I believe I can help them as well. In support of this process of exploration, I ask but also invite and answer questions, transparently sharing a broad outline of my intentions for and approach to the therapeutic process.