Rachel Kaufman, LCSW
My work is rooted in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), as well as relational and somatic approaches, which means we pay attention not just to what’s happening in your thoughts, but in your body, your patterns, and your day-to-day life.
Together, we create space to understand what’s going on beneath the surface, rather than pushing past it—and begin to build a more trusting relationship with yourself over time.
I believe that change happens in the small, everyday moments: how you care for yourself, how you respond to stress, and how you show up in your relationships.
If you’d like to learn more about my approach and how I came to this work, you can read more below.
I earned my Bachelor of Social Work from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and my Master of Social Work from the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Over the past three years, I’ve worked in nonprofit settings, group practices, and higher levels of care, supporting children, adolescents, and young adults through a wide range of challenges. My experience includes working with anxiety, depression, neurodivergence, personality and attachment patterns, family conflict, trauma, eating disorders and body image concerns, and substance use. I understand that these experiences often overlap and don’t exist in isolation, and I take a holistic, individualized approach to care.
My Path to This Work
I came to this work through a complicated relationship with food and my own body, and the slow, humbling process of learning to trust myself. Traditional approaches alone weren’t enough to help me reconnect with a body that often felt like it didn’t belong to me. Over time, through lots of trial and error, my healing became something more layered, experiential, and personal:
Attuned Movement
Learning to move my body by listening inward. Choosing movement that felt supportive and good, rather than what I was told would lead to results.
Kitchen as Sanctuary
Reframing the kitchen from a place of control to a space of creativity and care.
Parts Work
Gently getting to know my inner world and the different parts of myself, with curiosity instead of judgment.
Teaching Others
Working with young people in the kitchen, helping them discover their ability to create nourishment, connect with their bodies, and practice self-care.
Mindful Nourishment
Learning to feed myself in ways that truly met my needs—not just physically, but emotionally.
Cultivating Peace
Building a life that feels safe, secure, and sustainable—rather than overwhelming or disconnected.
My Approach
It’s important to me to get to know you as a whole person. Not just what you’re struggling with, but the systems, relationships, and experiences that have shaped you and continue to shape you.
Creating a sense of safety is always my first priority. It’s important that you feel like you can show up as you are, even on the days when it feels hardest to be seen.
I also care deeply about fit. Early on, I’ll invite you to pay attention to how it feels to work together, because the relationship we build plays a big role in how helpful therapy can be. If it doesn’t feel like the right match, I will support you in finding someone who might be. I know people pleasers may be wary of this, but I welcome it. It took me a handful of sessions with therapists who I didn’t click with before I found the right fit.
From there, we’ll begin to gently explore your story, starting wherever feels right to you. For some people, that includes looking at the past. For others, the focus stays in the present.
I’ll always meet you where you are — sometimes literally. In addition to telehealth, I offer walk-and-talk therapy for clients in the northwest suburbs who find movement and the outdoors helpful to the therapeutic process.
My work is eclectic and tailored to you. I draw from ACT (values-based work), mindfulness and grounding tools, and somatic practices to help you feel more present and connected. I also use parts work to help you understand and relate to different parts of your internal world.
For those who prefer experiential approaches, I offer culinary-based sessions and integrate body-based and creative methods informed by expressive arts therapy training. This is especially helpful for people working with eating disorders and body-image concerns, where reconnecting with the body can be an important part of healing.
This is your space. My approach is guided by what you bring and what you need, with the goal of helping you feel more grounded, aligned, and connected to yourself.
Specialties
Eating Disorders & Disordered Eating
Body Image & Chronic Dieting
Anxiety & Perfectionism
Relationship Issues & People-Pleasing
Self-Esteem & Identity Struggles
Life Transitions in Teens & Young Adulthood
Trauma & Attachment Wounds
Emotional Dysregulation & Self-Trust
Codependency & Boundary Work
Areas of Focus
I support teens and young adults who are navigating challenges such as:
Feeling out of control around food or their body image
Struggling with self-worth, perfectionism, or people-pleasing
Losing themselves in relationships or compromising their needs
Experiencing anxiety, overwhelm, or strong emotional reactivity
Having trouble trusting their judgment or setting healthy boundaries
Feeling disconnected from their values, identity, or life direction
Appearing “high functioning” to others while quietly struggling inside
Approaches
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT)
Mindfulness-Based Therapy
Parts Work/IFS
Relational Therapy
Experiential Therapy
Walk & Talk Therapy
Culinary-Based Therapy
