Danielle Greenspan, LMFT, LPCC

10/28/2025

One of the best things about being a therapist is getting to be my nerdy self everyday. Featuring my new “tis but a scratch” Monty Python and the Holy Grail shirt from one of my favorite places, , and sparkle ghost earrings. ⚔️🤺👻

09/26/2025

Be patient with your trans friends and family right now. What they need is to be figuratively (and maybe literally) wrapped in a fuzzy blanket while trying to survive the world we’re living in. They deserve to feel safe and it’s our job to provide that safety.

09/19/2025

The weather cooling down means more Walk and Talk therapy sessions at the Effie Yeaw Nature Center. These are perfect for kids, teens and adults who want to be active during therapy and don’t want to feel like they *should* be talking or making eye contact (although these are never requirements with me). The freezing cold river water getting my shoes and socks wet was great for modeling mindfulness 😜

05/05/2023

Happy May the 4th!
One of my favorite things about being a therapist in private practice is getting to show up everyday as myself. My nerdy, silly, Star Wars obsessed self. I have Star Wars represented in my office and also on my website. I’ve even had clients tell me what caught their eye when looking at my website was a Star Wars themed image (a storm trooper family on my Family Therapy page).

03/23/2023

I started offering “walk and talk” therapy at the beginning of the pandemic as a way to safely see clients in person. Being able to be outside, socially distanced and while wearing masks allowed me to put my clients’ safety and my safety first while still benefiting from meeting in person. I find that it is easier for some people to talk and be vulnerable while waking because there is no expectation to make eye contact (this is never an expectation for me) or keep the conversation flowing.

02/18/2023

Let’s talk about jealousy. Jealousy has been a theme that has come up a lot recently with my clients. What comes to mind when you think about jealousy? Often, people think of jealousy as a negative emotion or one that they have 100% control over. As a result, feelings of guilt and shame also often come with jealousy. Jealousy isn’t different from any other human emotion. It is not good or bad or right or wrong, it just is. When you approach jealousy with radical acceptance and without judgement, the guilt and shame will naturally fall away. There is nothing unhealthy about experiencing jealousy as an emotion. What can become unhealthy is how jealousy is expressed or suppressed. Explore for yourself what jealousy feels like to you and where it is coming from. Be mindful and experience the emotion rather than pushing it away or holding onto it.

11/16/2022

After an intensive 12 month training program with the incomparable , I am officially certified in Kink Informed Treatment by !

08/31/2021

“Focus on forming secure attachments with them by getting to know them– NOT by letting strangers (therapists) force-feed them, undress them and force them on a toilet, expose them to loud noises trying to make them more tolerant, or force them to use spoken words to get their needs met.

Your child’s future health and happiness depend on not being traumatized or developmentally manipulated in their most formative years. Don’t focus on what you think they OUGHT to be. Love on who they are.”

As soon as a parent is aware that their child is autistic, they often ask, “What therapies does my child need?” Terra Vance walks readers through what to prioritize.

04/27/2021

"Trust trans people."

Now that the surgery is over I can share this little tidbit. Dysphoria is like nothing many people have ever experienced. And transness isn’t what you think.

When I began the process of prepping for my surgery and asking advice, a number of well meaning trans women warned me about an inevitable ask from someone in the chain of my doctors: I would be asked to stop my HRT at least two weeks before surgery and maybe up to a month before. (HRT for those who don’t know, is our estrogen and any necessary anti-androgen medicines to block testosterone.)

Why?

There is a hypothetical risk for those taking oral estrogen or problems with clotting during the surgery. So, there is a hypothetical where taking estrogen could end in your death on an operating table. Scary stuff.

Best I can tell there’s no evidence of that actually happening to anyone ever, just a theoretical possibility.

The first time I heard that, I wanted to cry. I was beside myself. My stomach sank. I had full blown. PTSD style attacks and flashbacks. I was terrified and shaken to my core by the idea of stopping HRT, even just for a month.

I made up my mind that I was going to stockpile my HRT. it wasn’t uncommon for me to have a little extra left over because of scheduling of appointments and the like. I just needed enough to last a month. And I was going to lie through my teeth if I needed to.

My dysphoria was so deep, so intense, and so truly nightmarish that I would rather have died on an operating table than live like that again for a month, a week, or even a day.

I made that calculation. I was OK with the math.

Fortunately, nobody asked me to stop my HRT. My estrogen was continued as prescribed in the hospital and I’ve never been better. But I was prepared to DIE. And that cannot be overstated.

So many people, including people close to me, have questioned my motives in transition: was it for sexual gratification? A kink? A passing fancy? A fad? Was I doing it for fashion? Was I just a gay man?

No. I was a woman in pain. And people, even medical professionals, couldn’t find it in themselves to trust me when I said so. They needed to make it make sense for them before they could deem me worthy of their effort or change.

When my surgery was delayed 10 days before my scheduled date in March, it happened again. I was beside myself. I kept trying to center myself and find calm, only to be ripped out of my center and into a storm of suicidal ideation. My surgery was bumped because it wasn’t as important to one of my surgeons. The last month of my surgery preparations I spent clinging to a shred of hope that that surgeon’s critical eye would not fall on, and deem me unworthy, for a 4th time. I began to have trauma reactions anytime that surgeon’s team called me.

And I hope by being honest and real about this, you’ll see that the same forces that afflicted me afflict many and maybe most trans people. We transition to be allowed, for once, to exist. We want to exist. And HRT and surgery are the cost so many of us pay for existing.

These treatments aren’t optional. Theyre not “cosmetic.” They’re essential. They’re life saving. They’re life giving.

Trust trans people.

04/15/2021

This is the best description of depression I have ever read. Go read the book
The Monster Under the Bed: S*x, Depression, and the Conversations We Aren't Having
by JoEllen Notte