Marilyn Traynor

Marilyn Traynor is a licensed clinical social worker with forty years of practice in Illinois. She focuses on helping adults who are dealing with depression, anxiety, grief, anger, and big life changes. Her work often supports people facing caregiver stress, chronic health challenges, and the emotional shifts that come with midlife and later years.

Marilyn uses clear, direct conversation to help people name hard feelings and find manageable next steps. Sessions aim to build coping skills and strengthen day-to-day functioning. She pays attention to relationship patterns, communication problems, and the ways past losses or attachment wounds affect current life.

Her approach blends practical tools with an emphasis on emotional understanding. That includes behavior-focused strategies to change unhelpful patterns and therapy that looks at how early attachments shape expectations now. Together these help people make concrete changes while also attending to deeper hurt.

People come to Marilyn for a range of struggles such as workplace stress, addiction concerns, family conflict, intimacy issues, and career transitions. She also supports people coping with chronic pain, caregiving demands, and issues around aging.

Sessions are collaborative and paced to fit what each person needs. The goal is steady progress that fits daily life, whether the focus is reducing intense reactions like anger or building stronger communication and self-care routines.

Therapeutic approaches and online care that fit your life

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ACT, helps people notice difficult thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them. It focuses on actions that matter to you and can be useful for anxiety, depression, and stress about life changes. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, looks at the links between thoughts, feelings, and behavior and teaches specific strategies to change patterns that cause distress. CBT is often used for anxiety, depression, and managing strong reactions like anger.

Finding the right approach is a collaborative process. Marilyn will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what feels most useful. Together you decide which methods to try and adjust the plan as progress is made.

If you are considering online therapy, confirm current session options before booking since formats are not listed here. Online work can make it easier to fit therapy into a busy schedule, shorten commute time, allow quick check-ins between in-person meetings, and let someone use a quieter part of their day for a session. The therapist will also consider how to adapt ACT or CBT techniques to the online setting so sessions stay focused and practical.