Shanua Smith

Shanua Smith is a licensed counselor who helps people manage stress, anxiety, anger, depression, and trauma. She draws on 19 years of practice in South Dakota and focuses on practical steps people can take right now. Shanua aims to create a calm, nonjudgmental space so clients can name what’s hard and try small changes that add up over time.

Her sessions are client-centered and personalized to each person’s needs. She uses cognitive behavioral ideas to spot unhelpful thinking and try new behaviors. For those processing painful memories, she may incorporate trauma-focused tools and EMDR techniques when appropriate.

Shanua pays attention to relationships and communication patterns. She helps people address intimacy-related concerns, attachment and abandonment wounds, and family stress. She also supports those coping with grief, caregiving strain, addictions, and the emotional effects of health challenges like cancer.

Practical skills and steady pacing are common in her work. She offers coaching-style support for career or life-change goals and approaches difficult topics like guilt, shame, and forgiveness with care. Sessions include talking, skill practice, and planning next steps that fit day-to-day life.

Shanua holds the LPC-MH credential, which stands for Licensed Professional Counselor - Mental Health. She works with people to build resilience and clearer ways of coping. To begin, clients complete a short questionnaire and schedule sessions based on the therapist’s availability.

How these approaches guide online work

Client-Centered Therapy focuses on listening and responding to each person's experience without judgment. It helps people feel heard and supports them in finding their own answers to problems like relationship strain or low self-esteem.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, looks at how thoughts and behaviors interact. It uses short exercises and real-life practice to reduce anxiety, anger outbursts, or depressive patterns by changing unhelpful thinking and testing new actions.

EMDR is a trauma-focused method that works with distressing memories. It can be used when people want to reduce the intensity of painful memories and move toward daily functioning with less reactivity.

Picking the right approach is part of therapy. Shanua works collaboratively to match methods to a person's goals, preferences, and current needs. She adjusts pace and techniques as the work unfolds so the plan fits the individual rather than forcing a single method.

The practical benefits of online therapy include fitting sessions into a busy schedule and keeping momentum between appointments. Because the biography does not list specific session formats, confirm available formats before booking. Online work can make it easier to check in during a lunch break, avoid travel time, or choose shorter check-ins when life is hectic.