Petrovnia McIntosh, LCSW

Petrovnia McIntosh is a licensed clinical social worker (LCSW) based in Wisconsin who works primarily with adults coping with long-term effects of childhood trauma. With a clinical focus on understanding patterns that emerge from early experiences, she approaches therapy through a psychodynamic lens while integrating evidence-based methods such as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), motivational interviewing, trauma-focused approaches, attachment-based work, and client-centered care. She frames behaviors as adaptations that once served an important purpose, and she helps clients explore the needs those behaviors met so they can experiment with new strategies and evaluate what helps them move forward.

Her practice emphasizes a nonjudgmental stance that honors how survival strategies developed in difficult environments. Sessions are collaborative and aim to identify recurring thoughts and interaction patterns, trace their origins, and co-create practical plans for change. Petrovnia works with people facing stress, anxiety, depression, addictions, relationship and parenting challenges, low self-esteem, compassion fatigue, and trauma and abuse, and she also supports those navigating attachment and abandonment issues, dissociation, domestic violence, substance concerns, and personality-related struggles.

She brings particular experience supporting people with intersecting identities, including people of color, members of the LGBTQ community - including individuals considering gender-affirming care - and people living with HIV. Her additional areas of focus include alternative sexual cultures such as BDSM and kink, polyamory and non-monogamous relationships, communication difficulties, family of origin impacts, guilt and shame, and work with hearing impaired clients. Petrovnia provides services in English and American Sign Language and draws on a range of therapeutic models to tailor care to each person's history and goals.