Our Team

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Sarah Schaffer smiles with arms gently crossed, she is a mixed Jewish and Southeast Asian person with light brown skin and dark curly hair in her thirties
  • Therapist

Sarah Schaffer

She/Her

Licensed Social Worker

Staff Psychotherapist

sschaffer@liveoakchicago.com

708.303.8338

English

Supervised By:

Values & Philosophy

As a therapist I show up as myself—with warmth, a lot of humor, the experiences I’ve lived, and the experiences that I have been trusted to know. Many forces in our culture encourage us to heal in isolation, so I start with curiosity about what helps my clients feel safe to show up fully as themselves.

With my somatic, or body-based, lens, I encourage clients to speak their stories while sensing for what their bodies have to say, too. Data from our thoughts, feelings, and sensations—a tingling in the feet, the impulse to make a fist, tension melting in the chest—help us understand and appreciate our instincts for protection and connection, even when they no longer serve us.

I collaborate with my clients to create a trusted container to experiment in: What breath grounds me when I’m spun up? What posture energizes me when I’m down and stuck?

My hope is that building trust and agency together offers good practice to build affirming community way beyond our sessions. Not only do we heal in relationship; organizing together is our only chance to root out the oppression, exploitation, and marginalization we are tired of healing from.
Our identities may or may not overlap, but as a queer, non-monogamous, and multiracial person, I hope my experiences of self discovery, navigating between cultures, and feeling seen and not seen help me hold the complexities of my clients with care.

Education & Training

Licensure

LSW 150.112082
Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation, 2023

Degrees

MSW
University of Illinois at Chicago, 2023

BA
Oberlin College, 2010

Certifications

Sensorimotor Psychotherapy for Trauma - Level 1
Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute , 2023

Sensorimotor Psychotherapy for Developmental and Relational Injury - Level 2
Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute, expected 2025

Areas of Focus & Specialization

  • Depression, anxiety, & stress
  • Life transitions
  • Trauma & attachment
  • Identity exploration and development
  • Multiracial experience
  • LGBQ & TGNC experience
  • Non-monogamy and relationship diversity
  • Disability, chronic illness, & neurodivergence

I Work With

  • Adult individuals
  • Relationships (triads, polycules, metamours, constellations, couples)
  • Families (chosen & family of origin)
  • Children
  • Adolescents

Modalities

  • Mindfulness & body-based
  • Sensorimotor Psychotherapy
  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
  • Relational-cultural therapy
  • Feminist & anti-oppression
  • Dialectical Behavior Therapy
  • Internal Family Systems