About Alison
Thoughtful therapy for people who are ready to go deeper.
I am Alison “Allie” Hochman, LMFT, a licensed marriage and family therapist specializing in complex and relational trauma, betrayal, intimacy, and relationship repair.
Many of the people who find their way to me are highly capable, thoughtful, and deeply self aware.
They may be successful in their careers, responsible for other people, accustomed to functioning under pressure, or even work in helping professions themselves. From the outside, their lives may appear relatively intact. Internally, they may be carrying trauma, betrayal, relationship pain, intimacy struggles, or patterns they understand intellectually but have not yet been able to change.
Often, they have already done meaningful therapy.
They are not necessarily looking for someone to teach them basic coping skills or help them identify a pattern they have already spent years understanding.
They are looking for a therapist who can meet them at the depth they are already capable of reaching.
That is where much of my work begins.
How I Work
My style is warm, direct, relational, and actively engaged.
I am not a therapist who expects you to sit across from me and figure everything out alone.
I will ask questions. I will notice patterns. I will offer observations. I will slow us down when something important is happening. I may gently challenge you when I believe doing so serves the work.
At the same time, I do not believe my role is to become the authority on your inner world.
One of the principles that guides my work is simple:
The people I serve deserve a therapist whose certainty never outweighs their curiosity.
I want to understand how your experiences make sense within the context of your life.
That includes what happened to you, what you learned about yourself and other people because of it, how your nervous system adapted, how you learned to protect yourself, and what happens inside you when connection begins to feel uncertain or unsafe.
Protective patterns usually developed for a reason.
Therapy is not about shaming them out of existence.
It is about understanding what they have been trying to accomplish and helping your system discover when something different is now possible.
When Insight Is Not Enough
Some of the clients I work with can explain their patterns exceptionally well.
They know where the pattern came from.
They know what their attachment style is.
They know why they become activated.
They know what they should do differently.
And then the same thing happens again.
This does not mean therapy has failed.
Insight is important, but insight and change are not always the same process.
Our emotional, relational, and physiological responses can continue long after we intellectually understand them.
My work therefore goes beyond simply asking, “Why do I do this?”
We may also explore:
What happens inside you in the moments before the pattern begins?
What does your body anticipate?
What part of you believes this response is necessary?
What are you protecting?
What becomes difficult to feel, ask for, tolerate, or receive?
What would need to become possible for your system to respond differently?
This is where relational, experiential, trauma focused, and nervous system informed therapy can create opportunities that insight alone sometimes cannot.
Complex Trauma, Betrayal, and Relationships
I am particularly drawn to work that does not fit neatly into one diagnostic category.
Complex trauma often lives in relationships.
So does betrayal.
So do shame, intimacy difficulties, attachment injuries, compulsive behavior, emotional avoidance, and the protective strategies people develop when closeness has also been a source of pain.
I work with individuals and couples navigating concerns such as:
• Complex and relational trauma
• Betrayal trauma
• Infidelity and sexual betrayal
• Compulsive sexual behavior and its relational impact
• Intimacy avoidance and sexual disconnection
• Attachment injuries
• Repeating relationship patterns
• Dissociation and protective parts
• Shame
• Relationship rupture and repair
• Neurodivergence within relationships
• Identity and belonging
• Experiences in which someone understands what happened but still does not feel free from it
I am especially interested in the places where trauma, attachment, sexuality, intimacy, and relationships intersect.
Those intersections are often complicated.
I am comfortable with complicated.
Intensive Therapy
A significant part of my practice is increasingly focused on intensive psychotherapy.
Traditional weekly therapy can be incredibly valuable, and for many people it is exactly the right structure.
There are also times when fifty minutes feels like an artificial container for work that needs more space.
You may spend much of a session arriving, regulating, finding the thread, and finally reaching something meaningful just as it is time to begin closing.
An intensive offers another option.
Instead of dividing the work into small weekly pieces, we create a larger protected period of time around a clearly identified treatment goal.
Depending on your needs, that may include assessment, preparation, EMDR, relational work, somatic work, parts work, focused trauma processing, integration, or coordination with other members of your treatment team.
The goal is not to force healing to happen quickly.
More time does not mean more pressure.
In complex trauma work, having more time can actually allow us to move more thoughtfully.
There is room to prepare carefully, follow what emerges, pause when needed, regulate, integrate, and close intentionally.
For clients with demanding schedules, significant professional responsibilities, or a desire to dedicate focused time to therapy, this format can also offer a different kind of flexibility than adding another weekly appointment indefinitely.
You Do Not Have to Leave Your Therapist
Some of my favorite intensive work is adjunctive.
You may already have an excellent therapist who knows you deeply and with whom you want to continue working.
You do not necessarily need to end that relationship in order to complete focused trauma work with me.
When clinically appropriate, I can collaborate with your primary therapist around a defined treatment target, provide specialized intensive work, and support integration back into your ongoing therapy.
This is also why I welcome referrals directly from therapists and other providers.
I want to be a resource for clinicians who recognize that their client needs a particular type of trauma, betrayal, intimacy, or intensive work that falls outside the structure or specialty of their ongoing treatment.
Couples Work
I work with couples navigating significant relational pain, particularly betrayal, attachment injury, intimacy concerns, sexual disconnection, entrenched cycles, and questions about whether meaningful repair is possible.
I do not enter couples therapy assuming that preserving the relationship at all costs is the goal.
Sometimes the work leads toward repair.
Sometimes it leads toward clarity.
Sometimes the first priority is helping both people understand what is happening well enough to determine what kind of work is actually needed.
In some situations, couples therapy is appropriate immediately.
In others, individual stabilization, trauma treatment, safety assessment, work around compulsive behavior, or additional support may need to happen first.
Part of good couples treatment is being willing to determine the difference.
My goal is not to rush a couple toward reconciliation or separation.
It is to create enough clarity, emotional capacity, accountability, and relational safety for more informed choices to become possible.
An Integrative Approach
I do not begin with a modality and then try to fit you into it.
I begin with you.
My work draws from approaches including EMDR, attachment focused therapy, somatic approaches, parts informed therapy, relational psychotherapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy principles, Gottman informed couples work, cognitive and behavioral approaches, and regulation based interventions.
I also provide preparation and integration work related to ketamine assisted psychotherapy when clinically appropriate.
Different people need different things at different stages of treatment.
Sometimes we need to understand.
Sometimes we need to experience.
Sometimes we need to process.
Sometimes we need to practice something entirely new within a relationship.
And sometimes the most sophisticated clinical decision is to slow down.
Pacing Matters
I care deeply about pacing in trauma therapy.
Going deeper does not mean pushing harder.
I do not believe good trauma treatment is measured by how quickly we can access the most painful material.
For some people, meaningful work requires substantial preparation, stabilization, trust, internal resources, and nervous system capacity before deeper processing becomes useful.
An intensive does not change that.
In fact, one of the advantages of having more time is that therapy does not need to feel rushed by the clock.
We can pay attention to what is happening, work within your capacity, and allow the pace of treatment to reflect what your system is actually ready for.
Who I Tend to Work Especially Well With
I often connect well with clients who value depth, nuance, direct communication, and collaboration.
You may be a particularly good fit for my work if you:
• Have done therapy before and want to move beyond insight alone
• Are psychologically minded and genuinely curious about yourself
• Function at a high level while carrying significant pain privately
• Hold a great deal of responsibility in your professional or personal life
• Are a clinician, professional, business owner, leader, caregiver, or person who is often the one others depend on
• Want a therapist who will actively engage with you rather than simply reflect what you have said
• Need someone who can tolerate complexity without reducing your experience to a simple explanation
• Want compassion without avoiding accountability
• Appreciate directness without judgment
• Want treatment built around your needs rather than a standard protocol
• Are willing to dedicate meaningful time, attention, and resources to the therapeutic process
• Want focused work around something that has remained unresolved despite substantial previous effort
You do not need to be in crisis to deserve deeper support.
Sometimes the most meaningful time to do intensive work is when enough stability finally exists to give something important the attention it has needed.
What Matters to Me
I care deeply about integrity in this profession.
Expertise matters.
Training matters.
Evidence matters.
So do humility, curiosity, relationship, and the willingness to recognize when something does not fit neatly inside a theory.
I do not want you to become more dependent on therapy.
I want therapy to help you develop greater access to yourself, your choices, your relationships, and the life you want to build.
I believe good therapy can hold seemingly opposing things at the same time.
Compassion and accountability.
Acceptance and change.
Autonomy and connection.
Strength and vulnerability.
Grief and possibility.
Understanding what protected you and recognizing when that protection has become costly.
The work is rarely about becoming an entirely different person.
Often, it is about becoming more able to remain with yourself.
Training and Professional Background
I am a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist providing psychotherapy to clients located in California and Oregon.
My professional development has focused extensively on trauma, attachment, couples work, betrayal, sexuality, intimacy, nervous system regulation, and experiential approaches to psychotherapy.
My training and clinical work draw from areas including:
• EMDR
• Complex and relational trauma
• Somatic approaches to trauma treatment
• Parts informed therapy
• Attachment focused psychotherapy
• Emotionally Focused Therapy principles
• Gottman Method couples work
• Betrayal trauma
• Compulsive sexual behavior and its relational impact
• Intimacy and sexual avoidance
• LGBTQIA+ affirming care
• ADHD and neurodivergence
• Ketamine assisted psychotherapy preparation and integration
• Exposure and Response Prevention
• DBT informed interventions
• CBT informed interventions
I believe specialization requires continued learning, consultation, and a willingness to remain teachable.
My clinical work continues to evolve as I pursue advanced training in the areas where trauma, sexuality, intimacy, betrayal, and relationships intersect.
California LMFT #154392
Oregon LMFT #T3484
A Little More Human
Outside of therapy, I am drawn to trees, water, animals, and places that make it easier to remember that human beings are part of something larger than whatever is consuming our attention in a particular moment.
Nature has shaped the way I think about healing.
Living systems respond to their environments.
They adapt.
They protect.
They conserve energy when conditions are unsafe.
And when enough safety, nourishment, space, and possibility become available, they often begin moving toward growth without needing to be forced.
I think people are often more like that than we realize.
Healing is not about becoming someone entirely new.
Sometimes it is about understanding the conditions that shaped you, respecting the intelligence of the ways you learned to survive, and creating enough safety and possibility for new ways of living and relating to emerge.
Healing is in your nature.
Interested in Working Together?
If you are looking for specialized support around complex trauma, betrayal, intimacy, relationship repair, or a specific area where previous therapy has reached an impasse, you are welcome to reach out.
I offer individual and couples psychotherapy, focused therapy intensives, and adjunctive intensive work for clients who already have an ongoing therapist.
You do not need to determine the perfect treatment format before contacting me.
We can begin by understanding what you are looking for and determining whether my approach is the right fit for the work you want to do.