- Practical tools
- Recovery focus
- Mindfulness skills
About Sharmen
Sharmen Rutherford is a Licensed Professional Counselor with 16 years of experience. She offers a warm, steady presence for people feeling overwhelmed by stress, anxiety, addiction, trauma, eating concerns, or major life changes. Her tone is practical and encouraging, aimed at helping people take small, manageable steps forward.
Sharmen emphasizes clear tools and steady support. She uses approaches such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Client-Centered Therapy, and mindfulness to help people handle strong emotions and change unhelpful patterns. Sessions focus on learning skills, noticing patterns, and trying new behaviors between meetings.
Her background includes work with substance use and co-occurring challenges alongside mood and trauma-related concerns. She also addresses issues like codependency, body image, attachment difficulties, grief, and work-related stress. Over her career she has helped people navigate recovery, manage mood swings, and rebuild routines after loss or disruption.
Sharmen holds LPC-MHSP and LPC credentials and practices in Alabama. She frames therapy as a collaborative process that moves at a person’s pace. People who choose her often get straightforward guidance, skills practice, and support for day-to-day coping.
To begin, people complete a short matching questionnaire and schedule based on availability. Sessions use a subscription model that can be canceled at any time, and practical next steps are set together in the first meetings.
How these approaches guide online work
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy helps people clarify what matters to them and take small actions that match their values. It is useful for anxiety, depression, and patterns like avoidance. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy focuses on noticing thoughts and behaviors, testing them, and building different habits to reduce symptoms such as anxiety, low mood, or unhelpful coping around food or substances.Finding the right approach is part of the work. The therapist will collaborate with each person to pick methods that fit their goals, needs, and preferences. That may mean trying a short skills-focused plan or combining methods to address both emotion regulation and behavior change.
Confirm the therapist's current session options before booking so you know how meetings are scheduled. Online work can make therapy easier to fit into busy days, allow shorter check-ins when needed, and reduce travel time. It can also make it simpler to practice mindfulness and behavioral experiments between sessions so people can apply new skills in everyday settings.
Areas of expertise
Primary focus
Also works with
Additional focus areas
Therapeutic approaches
Experience
16+ years
Credentials
Alabama, Tennessee
Languages
English
Frequently asked questions
What concerns does Sharmen commonly address?
She works with stress, anxiety, addictions, trauma and abuse, eating and food-related issues, depression, grief, self-esteem, and related concerns like codependency and body image.
What is her therapeutic approach like?
She uses approaches such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Client-Centered Therapy, and mindfulness to teach skills and support behavior change in everyday life.
How much experience does she have?
Sharmen has 16 years of clinical experience working with addictions, co-occurring disorders, mood concerns, trauma, and eating-related issues.
What credentials and location are listed for her?
She holds LPC-MHSP and LPC credentials and practices in Alabama.
Which languages are sessions offered in?
Sessions are offered in English.
Can people outside the country work with her?
She is not accepting international clients at this time.
How are fees and payment handled?
Cost varies with location and therapist availability; sessions use a subscription that can be canceled at any time.
What are the first steps to begin therapy?
Select the Start Therapy button, complete a short matching questionnaire, and schedule according to therapist availability.
Profile details come from information the therapist supplied to BetterHelp. Credential and registration rules differ between the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia.