Maya Belitski, Psy.D.

Licensed Clinical Psychologist PSY 30848

My name is Dr. Maya Belitski and I am a licensed clinical psychologist practicing in San Francisco.  In my clinical practice, I offer a variety of services including psychotherapy to adolescents, adults, couples, and families as well as clinical consultation. I strive to create a safe, nurturing, and culturally-sensitive environment for my clients to explore and tell their unique narratives. My clinical approach integrates contemporary psychodynamic, cognitive-behavioral, and mind-body or somatic modalities within a holistic framework of mental health and wellness.  I strongly believe that psychotherapy works best when we can collaborate in exploring the distinct constellation of conflicts or points of distress that lead you to treatment.

I bring over a decade of clinical experience working with individuals who experience challenges ranging from anxiety or depression, to loneliness or isolation, creative blocks, chronic stress or trauma, relationship dissatisfaction, life transitions or adjustment problems, and identity development and integration. I honor the goals you bring into psychotherapy and aim to help you gain deeper insight into the visible and invisible strengths that might be leveraged by each patient in making these goals feasible. I offer brief as well as long psychotherapy and carefully tailor each treatment to the individual needs and concerns unique to your situation to support you in alleviating unnecessary suffering. This flexibility allows you to make use of psychotherapy at a pace most comfortable for you as you develop greater self-awareness about your struggles and begin to implement better coping strategies to take control of troubling or maladaptive thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, allowing you to experience more resilience, agency, and meaning in life.

I specialize in working with individuals diagnosed with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), High-Functioning Autism (HFA), Highly Sensitive Persons (HSP), and Learning Differences and Disabilities, such as Dyslexia, as well as sensory processing challenges and sensitivities.  I have a passion for destigmatizing mental illness and specialize in treating clients with challenges across the spectrum of neurodiversity.  I enjoy working with neurodiverse populations in the Silicon Valley and Bay Area tech sector, helping clients to identify and nurture their distinct talents and more productively leverage their underutilized skills and capacities.  In addition, I offer consultation services to corporations seeking to improve diversity inclusion and disability accommodations to enhance the engagement and productivity of neurodivergent employees in the workplace.

Education and Training:

I received my Doctorate in Clinical Psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies in 2017, and a Bachelors of Arts in Psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2005.  I bring over a decade of clinical expertise to my clinical practice, from my research background in social cognitive neuroscience (investigating the shared neural correlates underlying social pain and rejection sensitivity) to my graduate training in expressive arts and somatic or mindfulness-based psychotherapies, integrating these areas of specialization with my passion for contemporary relational psychodynamic techniques.

My clinical experience includes a background in substance abuse counseling, art therapy, and interpersonal psychodynamic therapy, serving a diverse group of clients, ranging from children to adults. I also completed three years of intensive study in contemporary relational psychoanalysis and offered long-term psychodynamic therapy at Psychological Services Center (PSC) at CIIS as well as throughout my Predoctoral Internship at the Access Institute in San Francisco, where I provided psychodynamic psychotherapy to adolescents, adults, and families, as well as play therapy to children in a local elementary school and clinical consultations to parents and teachers.

I honed my understanding of neurodevelopmental psychopathology through my dissertation research, which examined how adverse developmental experience—such as insecure attachment styles, or lifelong misattunements between neurodivergent individuals and neurotypical social contexts—may result in chronic stress, maladjustment, and developmental trauma, which can significantly exacerbate the expression of impairing symptoms among individuals temperamentally predisposed to ADHD. I bring a social justice perspective to my work in order to help clients better understand their idiosyncratic sensory, emotional, and cognitive profiles, empowering them to self-advocate for their needs and implement more suitable accommodations in life and work so they can reach their full potential.

Areas of Clinical Specialization:

  • Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
  • High Functioning Autism (HFA)
  • Learning Disabilities
  • Academic or Workplace Accommodations
  • Highly Sensitive Persons (HSPs)
  • Anxiety & Depression
  • Addiction, Substance Use Disorders & Compulsive Behaviors
  • Insomnia & Sleep Disorders
  • LGBTQ Community
  • Mixed Race Identity Development
  • Life Transitions & Stage of Life Issues
  • Relationship Difficulties, Codependency & Intimacy
  • Stress, Trauma & Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Grief, Loss & Mourning
  • Creative Blocks

How to Contact Me:

If you are interested in working together, please get in touch with me by phone at (415) 275-0344 or email at Dr.MayaBelitski@neurodiversityspectrum.com to schedule your initial phone consultation and first appointment.