OCD & I-CBT Therapy for Professionals in Salt Lake City, Utah
SPECIALIZED THERAPY FOR INTRUSIVE THOUGHTS, OBSESSIVE DOUBT, ANXIETY, AND THE MENTAL EXHAUSTION THAT COMES FROM CONSTANTLY TRYING TO GET THINGS RIGHT
You may be capable, responsible, and outwardly successful while privately spending an enormous amount of energy questioning yourself.
You replay conversations. Recheck decisions. Analyze whether you handled something correctly. Search for reassurance. Try to determine what an intrusive thought means. Tell yourself that if you could just think about the problem a little longer, you would finally feel certain.
But certainty rarely lasts.
At Laurel M Therapy, I work with adults from Salt Lake City who are struggling with OCD, intrusive thoughts, anxiety, perfectionism, hyper-responsibility, people-pleasing, and difficulty trusting their own judgment.
I offer specialized OCD treatment, including Inference-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (I-CBT), from my nearby office in Murray, Utah. Online therapy is also available for adults throughout Utah.
When Your Mind Will Not Let the Question Go
OCD does not always look like obvious rituals.
For many adults, the most exhausting compulsions happen entirely inside the mind.
You may find yourself repeatedly asking:
- What if I made the wrong decision?
- What if I overlooked something important?
- What if I accidentally hurt someone?
- What if this thought says something terrible about who I am?
- What if I cannot trust my memory?
- What if I am being selfish, irresponsible, dishonest, or careless?
- What if there is something I should confess?
- How can I know for sure?
You may understand logically that the question cannot be answered with complete certainty and still feel compelled to keep trying.
A Different Way of Understanding OCD: I-CBT
Laurel Mallonee, LCSW, incorporates Inference-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (I-CBT) into OCD treatment when appropriate.
I-CBT focuses on how obsessional doubt develops in the first place.
OCD often begins with an imagined possibility:
Maybe I missed something.
Maybe I secretly meant that.
Maybe this feeling proves something.
Maybe I cannot trust what I remember.
The possibility may begin as only a thought, but the mind can gradually build a convincing story around it.
You may start giving the imagined possibility more weight than the information available to you in the present moment.
I-CBT helps you examine that reasoning process.
Rather than endlessly debating the content of every intrusive thought, you can begin learning to notice how the doubt was constructed, why it feels believable, and when your mind has moved away from present-moment information into an imagined scenario.
Over time, obsessional doubt may become easier to recognize before it pulls you into hours of checking, reviewing, reassurance-seeking, or rumination.
When Being Responsible Turns Into Feeling Responsible for Everything
Salt Lake City is full of people working in roles where being attentive, competent, ethical, and dependable matters.
Those qualities can be genuine strengths.
But anxiety and OCD can take healthy responsibility and stretch it far beyond what any one person can reasonably control.
You may find yourself:
- Rechecking work long after it is complete
- Feeling personally responsible for preventing every possible mistake
- Replaying interactions to make sure you did not offend someone
- Taking on work because saying no feels irresponsible
- Feeling guilty when another person is disappointed
- Worrying that one imperfect decision could have serious consequences
- Carrying work mentally long after the workday ends
- Feeling unable to relax because there is always something else you “should” be doing
Healthcare professionals, educators, caregivers, managers, and other high-responsibility adults can be particularly vulnerable to this pattern.
The same vigilance that helps you perform well professionally can become exhausting when your mind never allows you to clock out.
Therapy can help you separate healthy responsibility from anxiety-driven responsibility.
Therapy for Salt Lake City Healthcare Professionals
Healthcare work often requires rapid decisions, careful documentation, strong attention to risk, and responsibility for other people’s well-being.
For someone already vulnerable to anxiety or OCD, those demands can sometimes follow you home.
You may finish a shift and continue mentally reviewing:
Did I chart that correctly?
Did I miss something?
Should I have handled that differently?
What if I made a mistake that nobody has noticed yet?
You may also find it difficult to say no to additional responsibilities because being unavailable feels selfish or professionally irresponsible.
Therapy can help you explore where appropriate professional responsibility ends and anxiety-driven hyper-responsibility begins.
Therapy for Salt Lake City Teachers and Educators
Educators are asked to hold an extraordinary amount at once.
Students’ academic needs. Behavior. Parents. Administration. Coworkers. Deadlines. Documentation. Classroom dynamics. The emotional weight of worrying about children who are struggling.
If you are already prone to perfectionism, people-pleasing, or anxiety, it can become difficult to know when you have done enough.
You may leave school physically while continuing to carry it mentally.
Therapy can help you work through chronic responsibility, anxiety, difficult boundaries, perfectionism, and the belief that taking care of yourself means letting someone else down.
A Collaborative, Trauma-Informed Approach
My approach is compassionate, engaged, and individualized.
Depending on what you are experiencing, therapy may draw from:
- Inference-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (I-CBT)
- OCD-focused treatment
- Anxiety treatment
- Trauma-informed therapy
- Internal Family Systems-informed work
- Emotional processing
- Boundary and relationship work
- Practical tools for everyday life
You are not expected to arrive with a perfectly organized explanation of what is wrong.
Part of therapy is figuring that out together.
We can look at the patterns underneath the distress, identify what keeps pulling you back into the same cycles, and work toward changes that feel meaningful in your daily life.
In-Person Therapy Near Salt Lake City
Laurel M Therapy’s physical office is located in nearby Murray, Utah, at:
925 E Executive Park Drive, Ste B
Murray, UT 84117
The Murray office provides an in-person option for adults traveling from Salt Lake City and surrounding communities.
Laurel M Therapy does not maintain a separate Salt Lake City office.
Online therapy is also available for adults located anywhere in Utah.
Private-Pay Specialty Therapy
Laurel M Therapy offers individualized treatment for adults seeking support with OCD, intrusive thoughts, anxiety, perfectionism, people-pleasing, boundaries, and trauma-related concerns.
If you plan to use out-of-network insurance benefits, superbills may be available upon request so you can independently pursue possible reimbursement from your insurance provider.
Questions about rates, insurance, payment, and scheduling can be discussed during your free consultation.
Is OCD or Anxiety Taking Up More of Your Life Than You Want?
You do not have to become completely certain before you move forward.
You do not have to solve every intrusive thought.
You do not have to carry every responsibility simply because your mind tells you that you should.
If you are looking for OCD therapy, I-CBT, intrusive thoughts therapy, or anxiety therapy for adults in Salt Lake City, Laurel M Therapy offers in-person appointments from a nearby Murray office as well as online therapy throughout Utah.
Laurel Mallonee, LCSW
Laurel M Therapy
Office: 925 E Executive Park Drive, Ste B, Murray, UT 84117
Phone/Text: (385) 743-8732
Email: LaurelMLCSW@gmail.com
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Laurel M Therapy have an office in Salt Lake City?
No. Laurel M Therapy’s physical office is located nearby in Murray, Utah. Adults from Salt Lake City can attend in-person appointments at the Murray office or participate in online therapy if they are physically located in Utah at the time of their session.
Do you provide OCD therapy for adults from Salt Lake City?
Yes. Laurel works with adults experiencing OCD, intrusive thoughts, reassurance-seeking, mental compulsions, rumination, checking, avoidance, obsessive doubt, and related concerns.
Do you accept insurance?
Laurel M Therapy is primarily a private-pay office. Out-of-network benefits may be available to you and superbills are available upon request. Read more about Laurel’s rates on the Fees & FAQ Page.
What is I-CBT?
Inference-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is an OCD treatment approach that focuses on how obsessional doubt develops. I-CBT helps clients examine when imagined possibilities begin to feel more convincing than present-moment information and how that reasoning process can contribute to obsessive doubt and compulsive behaviors.
Can you help with intrusive thoughts?
Yes. Therapy can help you understand intrusive thoughts, reduce the shame that can surround them, and recognize patterns such as rumination, reassurance-seeking, checking, avoidance, and attempts to prove what a thought does or does not mean.
Do you work with relationship OCD?
Laurel works with adults whose obsessive doubt may involve relationships, feelings, decisions, reassurance, guilt, or fears about what their thoughts mean. During a consultation, you can discuss your particular concerns and determine whether Laurel’s approach seems appropriate for you.
Do you work with healthcare professionals?
Yes. Laurel works with healthcare professionals experiencing anxiety, OCD, perfectionism, hyper-responsibility, burnout, intrusive thoughts, and boundary difficulties.
Do you work with teachers and educators?
Yes. Laurel works with educators experiencing anxiety, perfectionism, burnout, people-pleasing, boundary difficulties, OCD, and related concerns.
Can I meet with Laurel online instead of driving to Murray?
Yes. Online therapy is available to adults who are physically located in Utah at the time of their appointment.
How do I get started?
You can schedule a free 15-minute consultation to ask questions, briefly discuss what you are looking for, and see whether working together feels like a good fit.