Gail Poust

About Gail

My approach

My foundation is Narrative Therapy, examining the inherited stories about bodies, parenthood, and grief that make these struggles heavier, so you can reclaim your own. I add practical tools from CBT, DBT, ACT, and ERP. Sessions are warm but purposeful, with goals we track and skills to practice between visits.

About me

I did not choose this specialty from a textbook. I have lived through pregnancy loss, infertility, new parenthood, perimenopause, and chronic illness myself. That means you will not spend a single session proving your pain is real. Practicing since 2014, with advanced training in maternal mental health, PMDD, menopause, grief, and OCD.

More background

In what ways have your personal experiences influenced your work with your clients?

Profoundly: this specialty found me before I chose it. I've experienced pregnancy loss, an infertility journey, the disorienting transition to parenthood, perimenopause, and a chronic health condition in my own life. During my hardest chapter, I wrestled with the question many of my clients bring to me: what would make life meaningful if the future I'd counted on didn't arrive? Finding my way through that question is what led me to this profession. In practical terms, my experience shapes our work in two ways. First, you'll never need to convince me that what you're going through is real. I've felt the dismissiveness of "it's just hormones" from the patient's chair, and my office is the opposite of that. Second, the tools I teach aren't theoretical to me; I've used them in my own life, which means I know the difference between what sounds good in a book and what actually helps at 2 a.m. Your story will differ from mine, every story does, and I'll never assume otherwise. But you'll be talking with someone who has stood somewhere near where you're standing.

What is your style/approach to therapy?

Warm, collaborative, and purposeful. My foundation is Narrative Therapy: we look at the stories you've inherited about what your body should do, what a parent should feel, how strong you're supposed to be, and work on reclaiming authorship of the ones that will define you going forward. Around that foundation, I bring practical, research-backed tools from CBT, DBT, ACT, and ERP, plus Gottman Method and Gordon Effectiveness Training for relationship strain, selected for your situation rather than applied one-size-fits-all. Expect structure alongside the warmth: we'll set concrete goals early, measure progress against them, and I'll regularly give you skills to practice between sessions. An hour a week matters most for what it changes in the rest of your life. My care is culturally sensitive, trauma-informed, and LGBTQIA+ affirming, and I welcome clients of all genders, identities, and family structures.

Are there any recurring themes or issues you’ve noticed as you treat people in your area of specialization, and how has this insight guided your approach?

Yes, my clients arrive with wildly different stories, but the same five threads run through nearly all of them. Life transitions: something has changed (a diagnosis, a birth, a loss, a new decade) and life on the other side doesn't resemble life before. Identity changes: new roles, chosen or not, that don't yet fit the person you've always been. Body challenges: a body that feels unfamiliar, unreliable, or like it has broken an unspoken agreement with you. Feeling overwhelmed or out of control: the coping strategies that always worked simply don't work for this. And grief, sometimes for a tangible loss, like a pregnancy, and just as often for intangible ones: a dream, a capability, a future you'd already furnished in your mind. Noticing these threads has shaped my approach in a specific way: I treat the whole pattern, not just the presenting problem. A client may come in for postpartum anxiety, but we'll also tend to the identity shift and the grief for her former life hiding underneath it, because in my experience, that's what makes recovery hold. It's also why I work from a narrative foundation: every one of these threads is, at heart, a story mid-revision, and therapy is where you get to influence how the next chapter reads.

Work history

I've been a practicing marriage and family therapist since 2014, licensed in California (LMFT #128899), with a Master of Science in Marriage, Family and Child Counseling from San Francisco State University. Over the past decade, my practice has become increasingly focused on reproductive mental health: I work with adults facing pregnancy and postpartum challenges (including postpartum depression, anxiety, rage, and OCD) as well as infertility, pregnancy loss, PMDD, perimenopause, and chronic pain and illness. I also treat OCD with Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), the most effective treatment we have for it. I've pursued advanced training deliberately matched to this focus: a Maternal Mental Health Professional Certificate, specialized training in treating PMDD and premenstrual disorders, menopause-informed education, trauma treatment training, and advanced grief therapy training. Today I see clients exclusively online, throughout California.

Meet Gail

A short hello from Gail

Specialties

Types of therapy

Who Gail works with

Ages

Adults

Communities

LGBTQ+, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Non-Binary, BIPOC, Black / African American, Latino / Hispanic, Asian American, Indigenous / Native American, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, People with Disabilities, Body Positive, Single Parents

Languages

English

Education and training

Master of Science in Counseling in Marriage, Family and Child Counseling, San Francisco State University, 2017

Certifications

Maternal Mental Health Professional Certificate Training, 2022, 16 hours

Reproductive Grief Certificate Training, 2026, 12.5 hours

Treat Pre-Menstrual Dysphoric Disorder, Premenstrual Syndrome & Emotional-Dysregulation with DBT & CBT, 2026, 4.5 hours

An Integrative Approach to Menopause, 2026, 1.5 hours

2-­Day Intensive Trauma Treatment Workshop, 2022, 12 hours