Mary Alice Reilly, LCSW-C

Individual Therapist
Silver Spring, MD & Telehealth in MD & DC

Mary Alice uses warmth, humor, and empathy to create a space where clients feel safe enough to be real and supported enough to grow. Her approach balances compassion with practical tools, helping clients explore what’s not working and build new strategies for living with more clarity, connection, and resilience. Mary Alice is especially passionate about working with adults who experience anxiety, OCD, perfectionism, and low self-worth, particularly when these challenges are linked to complex trauma, neurodivergence, or identity-based stress. Whether you’re feeling overwhelmed, burned out, stuck in painful patterns, or just unsure where to start, Mary Alice offers therapy that’s proactive, affirming, and tailored to your pace.

Mary Alice’s Clinical Focus
Mary Alice helps clients understand and shift the mental and emotional patterns that keep them stuck—especially when rooted in generalized anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), complex trauma, or autistic or ADHD neurotypes. She specializes in treating:

• Generalized and social anxiety, particularly where perfectionism, self-doubt, or masking are present
• OCD and related symptoms using Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) and Inference-based Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (I-CBT)
• Trauma and complex trauma, including attachment wounds and developmental trauma
• Identity- and values-based distress linked to sexuality, neurodivergence, chronic illness, or marginalization
• Rumination, overthinking, and perfectionism rooted in fear, shame, or chronic stress
• Burnout, self-criticism, shame, and emotional dysregulation that interfere with relationships or daily life

She is deeply committed to providing LGBTQIA+ affirming, kink-aware, and sex-positive care. She welcomes clients who are exploring gender identity, sexuality, or alternative relationship structures like ethical non-monogamy and polyamory—and offers a culturally responsive space where all parts of your identity are seen and supported.

Mary Alice’s Approach
Mary Alice’s therapeutic style is proactive, relational, and strengths-based. She draws from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Exposure Response Prevention (ERP), and I-CBT. This integrative approach allows her to help clients reduce distress, enhance resilience, and develop effective tools for navigating difficult emotions, rigidity, stagnancy, and unwanted patterns. She brings a deep awareness of how race, gender, sexuality, class, body size, ability, and sociocultural background shape each client’s lived experience—and the therapy space itself. Her work is collaborative and empowering, helping clients move from self-blame to self-compassion, and from survival to alignment.

You might benefit from therapy with Mary Alice if you are:

• Seeking an LGBTQIA+ affirming, sex-positive, and kink-aware therapist who honors the whole of who you are
• Living with OCD, social anxiety, or generalized anxiety and seeking evidence-based tools to manage symptoms
• Neurodivergent and navigating stress, burnout, or identity-based overwhelm
• Working through trauma or complex trauma that still affects your emotions, relationships, or sense of self
• Struggling with self-worth, perfectionism, or shame that affects your relationships and daily life
• Dealing with chronic illness, a new diagnosis, or trying to stay regulated while living with a health condition

Education & Credentials
Mary Alice earned her Master’s degree in Clinical Behavioral Health Social Work from the University of Maryland, Baltimore. Her experience includes working with children and adults of diverse backgrounds across the DC metro area. She provides individual therapy for adults both virtually and in-person at our Silver Spring, MD office.

Mary Alice is licensed in Maryland and Washington, DC.