Kristin Alvey is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with over 30 years of experience in the mental health field, specializing in work with children, adolescents, and families. For the first two decades of her career, she provided therapeutic care to children ages 5–14 within a residential treatment setting. This program utilized a developmental, relational, and attachment-based model to address a wide range of concerns, including complex childhood and attachment trauma, bipolar disorder, ADHD, and other emotional and behavioral challenges.

Ms. Alvey has extensive experience supporting adopted children and their families, with a deep understanding of the unique attachment, identity, and relational dynamics that adoption can involve. Her work is grounded in creating safety, connection, and trust—essential elements for healing and healthy development.

In addition to her direct clinical work, Ms. Alvey has served as a clinical supervisor within a school-based treatment program. In this role, she provided guidance and support to therapists and collaborated closely with educators and school systems to implement developmentally appropriate, trauma-informed, and emotionally supportive interventions. Her efforts helped create learning environments where children with behavioral and emotional challenges could experience increased success. She has also facilitated parent education trainings, staff development workshops, and therapeutic group processing for both children and families.

Ms. Alvey is a Certified Circle of Security Parenting Educator, a model she uses to support and mentor caregivers in understanding their children’s emotional and developmental needs. Through this approach, she helps parents respond more effectively to the underlying needs beneath challenging behaviors, strengthening the parent-child relationship and promoting secure attachment across all developmental stages.

Ms. Alvey is certified in Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), an evidence-based therapeutic approach designed to help individuals process and resolve the effects of acute and chronic trauma. Ms. Alvey integrates EMDR into her work with both children and adults in a developmentally appropriate and compassionate manner. She has successfully helped children overcome phobias, reduce nightmares, and address anxiety and other fear-based symptoms.

Ms. Alvey’s approach is highly collaborative and emphasizes the vital role of caregivers in a child’s healing process. She believes that parents and primary caregivers are powerful agents of change and works closely with them to support their child’s growth and resilience. Her work reflects a holistic perspective, taking into account each child and family’s unique strengths, as well as the broader influences of community, culture, spirituality, and socioeconomic context.