Dr. Kristin Mangum is a licensed psychologist with 15 years of clinical experience treating individuals, couples, and families in inpatient and outpatient clinical settings. She earned her doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Missouri St.Louis and then completed specialized post-doctoral training in the treatment of eating disorders at the Center for Eating Disorders (CED) at Sheppard Enoch Pratt hospital in Maryland. She has served as staff psychologist in outpatient practices, provided telehealth therapy services for an online medical group, and functioned as Director of Psychology at an outpatient eating disorder treatment center. She has extensive training and experience in the treatment of eating disorders and body image issues, as well as anxiety, depression, self-esteem, stress management, and problems in interpersonal functioning. Dr. Mangum approaches therapy with compassion and optimism. She strongly believes that everyone has the ability to change, and that change occurs through a balance of compassionate acceptance and action. Her therapeutic style tends to be fairly dynamic and action-oriented. She
aims to teach her clients a different way to approach and solve their problems so that over time they can become their own therapist. She does this in a context that respects each person as an individual and recognizes that each person comes to the counseling experience with their own unique strengths and weaknesses, as well as a historical context where the problems may have emerged. She recognizes that it may be necessary to make peace with the past; however, her primary goal is to help each individual live the life they want NOW. Her treatment philosophy is “individuals are stuck- not broken,” and she believes counseling is about helping individuals become “unstuck” — from unhelpful ways of thinking, unhelpful patterns of behavior, and unhelpful ways of approaching problems. She does this through an integration of therapeutic approaches — Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), mindfulness, and interpersonal based approaches. Ultimately, the approach chosen depends upon the individual and their unique treatment needs.