Michelle Ellis, AMFT & APCC
Integration Therapist
Michelle's Background
Michelle began her journey as a yoga instructor, and as her path unfolded, wove
mindfulness and meditation into her teaching. During that time, themes of shame, grief, trauma, and end-of-life work kept surfacing for her with students and in her own life, and she felt deeply drawn to each of them. This led her to fold death doula work into her practice, and eventually toward deepening her healing work by shifting into therapy.
After earning her undergraduate degree in psychology from Cal Poly Humboldt,
Michelle chose to deepen her commitment to holistic care by pursuing a graduate
degree in Integral Counseling Psychology at CIIS, where she developed her interest in transpersonal and Gestalt approaches, as well as psychedelic-informed and sex therapy.
Experience and Approach
Michelle strives to create spaces where themes of shame, grief, trauma, guilt, death and dying, sex, sexuality, and our relationships with others and with ourselves can be safely explored. Her work is client-centered, trauma-informed, and strengths-based. Alongside her transpersonal and Gestalt lens, she draws on narrative therapy, IFS parts work, and somatic work, tailoring her approach to each client's unique needs. Michelle brings a humanistic and relational foundation to her practice, one that honors the whole person and creates space for clients to explore healing on every level — mental, physical, and spiritual.