Vanessa Martz , LPC

Vanessa Martz is an experienced counselor who brings a motherly presence to her therapeutic work, a quality her clients often note. Her professional life has spanned science, military service, and higher education, and those diverse roles inform a practical and steady approach to care.

She is a veteran, the widowed spouse of a veteran, and the mother of a disabled veteran, and she grew up as the daughter of a World War II veteran who struggled with PTSD. These family and military connections, along with personal experiences of violence and loss, contribute to a deep empathy for people navigating trauma and grief. She is a mother by birth and adoption to five children and has fostered 26 children over a 33-year period, experiences that shape her understanding of parenting, blended families, and adoption and foster care challenges.

A Christian who is also a licensed pastor, she offers pastoral services alongside counseling. Her practice emphasizes grief work, relationship and family issues, trauma and abuse recovery, and coping with life changes. Clinically she blends approaches rather than relying on a single method, making substantial use of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and grief resolution techniques while expanding interventions to meet each person’s needs. She aims not to force change but to help clients feel at peace with their choices and to rediscover the possibility of joy in life. Vanessa Martz, LPC (Licensed Professional Counselor), brings lived experience and clinical versatility to her work.