Maria Clara Salazar-Pretto, LCSW

Maria Clara Salazar-Pretto is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with twenty years of experience. She speaks English and Spanish and helps people who are feeling stressed, anxious, low, or overwhelmed by life changes. She uses straightforward methods to help people feel steadier and more able to cope.

She often blends cognitive behavioral techniques with a client-centered, goal-focused style. Sessions look at unhelpful thinking and everyday patterns, and then try small practical steps to change them. She also draws on dialectical behavior strategies and mindfulness to teach emotion regulation and grounding skills.

Maria Clara has worked in hospitals, health centers, and private agencies. Her training includes a Master of Social Work from California State University, Fresno, and an undergraduate major in clinical psychology. Those roles gave her experience with many presenting concerns across the lifespan.

In the room she uses active listening, validation, and reflection. Conversations aim to be nonjudgmental and aimed at concrete next steps. She describes her style as hands-on and focused on building coping skills that fit daily life.

She helps people facing relationship strain, parenting challenges, grief, trauma and abuse, anger, career stress, compassion fatigue, ADHD, and related concerns. She also supports people dealing with adoption issues, caregiving stress, blended family questions, chronic illness, and other complex life problems.

To begin, Maria Clara encourages a simple first step: share what feels most urgent, and together set realistic goals. Her work centers on helping people find practical ways to feel more grounded and capable.

How therapy approaches work online

Maria Clara commonly uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Client-Centered Therapy in online work. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy focuses on identifying unhelpful thoughts and behaviors and testing small changes to improve mood and functioning; it is often useful for anxiety, depression, and stress. Client-Centered Therapy emphasizes seeing each person as an individual, using empathetic listening and reflection to help clarify goals and values, which fits well when people need support making life decisions or coping with change.

Finding the right approach is part of the work. She will collaborate with each person to pick methods that match their goals and preferences, and adjust plans as needed. Treatment is presented as a shared process where goals are revisited and practical steps are agreed on together.

Online sessions are offered by video call, phone, live chat, or text-based messaging to make therapy more flexible. Video allows face-to-face conversation and guided skill practice, phone can be easier when a video setup is not possible, live chat provides brief check-ins, and messaging supports ongoing reflection between sessions. These options help fit therapy into a busy life and reduce travel time while keeping focus on progress.