Alison Picard
MA, LMFT #132492 | she/her
Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist, Clinical Supervisor
I became a therapist because I believe that the right relationship — one built on honesty, curiosity, and genuine care — can change things that nothing else has. That conviction shapes how I work, and how I show up with every person I see.
About Me
I grew up shaped by questions about identity, belonging, and what it means to be known by another person. Those questions eventually led me to psychoanalysis — a field that takes seriously what lives beneath the surface of our awareness, and what happens between two people when they're paying close attention.
I'm a cisgender queer woman, white and able-bodied, and I was trained in a predominantly psychoanalytic tradition. I bring these identities — and my awareness of the privileges and blind spots they carry — into the room with me. I think it matters that we can talk about who we are in relation to each other, including differences of race, gender, class, and power, because those dynamics are present whether or not we name them.
Outside the consulting room, I'm drawn to literature, film, and conversation that sits with difficulty rather than resolving it too quickly. I find myself most at home in the in-between — in ambiguity, in the long thought, in the question that doesn't have a clean answer yet.
I work in South Pasadena and see clients via telehealth throughout California. I also teach and supervise, which keeps me learning. I find that staying curious about my own work makes me a better clinician — and a more honest one.
Who I Work With
I work with adults, couples, and varied relationship constellations. Many of the people I see are navigating significant transitions — in identity, relationship, career, or life stage. Others are addressing longer-standing patterns: anxiety, depression, a persistent sense of disconnection, or relational dynamics that repeat across different contexts.
Identity, coming out, queer relationships, family dynamics, and the particular experience of moving through a world that wasn't built with you in mind.
Clinicians deserve their own space too. I work with therapists and trainees navigating the particular pressures of this profession — including what shows up in the room with clients.
Parenthood, relationship changes, loss, new identities, and exploring consensual nonmonogamy. Transitions are opportunities for a true confrontation with our selves.
The stretch between early adulthood and settling into a self — identity formation, relationships, vocation, and the anxiety that tends to accompany all of it.
The intersection of identity and work — creative block, visibility anxiety, the complexity of building a life around something that means so much.
All relationship constellations welcome. I work with couples and partners navigating conflict, communication, desire, and the challenge of sustaining closeness over time.
My approach
My work is relational and psychoanalytic. That means I'm interested not just in what you bring to sessions, but in what happens between us — in the room, in real time. The therapeutic relationship itself becomes a place where old patterns can surface and, slowly, begin to shift. I don't approach therapy as a problem-solving exercise. Symptoms, I think, are trying to tell us something about what we need and haven't been able to ask for. My job is to help us listen.
What that might look like in therapy:
Close listening
To what you say, what you avoid, what surfaces in the space between words — including in dreams, which I find remarkably useful.
The therapeutic relationship
How we relate to each other often mirrors earlier patterns. Rather than setting that aside, we use it — carefully, and with your consent.
Depth over speed
This work is unhurried. Understanding something deeply — and feeling it shift — takes time. I'm not trying to fix symptoms quickly; I'm trying to understand what they're communicating.
Education, training & affiliations
Training
Current roles & memberships
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2-year certificate in Adult Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy — Psychoanalytic Center of California, Los Angeles
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2-year certificate in Adult Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy — New Center for Psychoanalysis, Los Angeles
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The Maple Center, Los Angeles
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M.A. Antioch University Los Angeles — Clinical Psychology, LGBTQ+ Affirmative Specialization
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B.A. McGill University, Montréal
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Co-Chair, Committee for Diversities and Socio-cultural Inequities — New Center for Psychoanalysis
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Faculty, Adult Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Program — course: Sexuality and Gender — New Center for Psychoanalysis
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Member, California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (CAMFT)
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Member, APA Division 39 — Society for Psychoanalysis and Psychoanalytic Psychology
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Member, American Psychoanalytic Association