Creativity Transforms Therapy

"I’ve now had pleasure of Elaina been a friend and work colleague now for 4 years and she brings a well of therapeutic knowledge and easeful presence that helps facilitate opportunities of gentle holding and growth for her clients!"

"I have recommended Elaina to several people who are looking for therapy. She is incredibly openminded and nonjudgmental, listens deeply and truly, and brings genuine warmth and caring to every interaction. Elaina is expertly trained and has a depth of experience that shows in her work, and she brings humanity and creativity to everything she does."

"As a therapist of nearly 15 years myself, I highly and wholeheartedly recommend working with Elaina at Creative Transforms Therapy. Eliana is a brilliant counselor and art therapist, and is deeply compassionate, wise, and creative. I would send anyone to her and trust that they will receive excellent, above-and-beyond care. I trust her completely! 5 stars, no hesitations."

"Elaina is a therapist who not only cares deeply about her patients, but is also invested in doing her best to assist them in their healing. She continually updates her expertise by learning more about treatment modalities, on top of her extensive academic background. Elaina has earned my trust as a colleague because she repeatedly provides thought-out, ethically-sound consultation. And when she doesn't know something, Elaina always has a resource to refer me to. My practice as a therapist is better because Elaina is in my professional network."

"Ms. Elaina Whittenhall is a truly caring mental healthcare provider, but she is not a competent one, and I recommend avoiding her services at all costs. I worked with Elaina for over four years, during which time she provided some helpful paradigms for trauma recovery, but she abruptly terminated our relationship via phone without warning, context, or the courtesy of an exit session, and I had to go out of my way to ask for my discharge notes, as I was initially only provided referrals for providers to take over for her. For 2.5 of the 4 years I worked with Elaina, she engaged in therapeutic conversations via text message, which is not the professional standard and enabled a lack of appropriate client/patient boundaries. I never asked her to provide therapy via text message, and I was consistently respectful on the rare occasion she would implement boundaries related to communication. She never took notes during our sessions, and she let them bleed over, causing her to have to rush to the next patient, so our sessions were often not documented until hours afterward (if at all, as I never saw her provide any outside of my discharge notes, which were incomplete, inaccurate, and omitted critical details that another provider would need to know). Additionally, Elaina did not advocate for more structure in our sessions, did not have progress checks with me, and never discussed an official diagnosis with me. When I asked for my discharge paperwork, she provided an official diagnosis that was inaccurate and would have been detrimental to my future care had I not gone out of my way to seek supplementary support prior to the termination of our relationship. That support from external sources led to an Autism diagnosis, which finally put all of my struggles into perspective and led to me leading the happiest, most stable life full of self love I could have imagined. While Elaina advocated for me to hold space for myself and encouraged self love, she knew I was neurodivergent for three of the four years we worked together. I was diagnosed with ADHD in 2020, of which Elaina was aware and collaborated with my psychiatrist accordingly, yet she omitted that critical detail from my discharge notes. Somehow Elaina felt confident providing me with a harmful and inaccurate diagnosis that shared symptoms with Autism, even though I did not fit all of the key criteria for the diagnosis she provided, nor did she ever disclose that diagnosis to me so that I could work on it directly (which I'm glad I didn't or I would have continued to suffer). My personal opinion is that Elaina's personal past of self harm, extremely limited professional experience, and lack of appropriate boundaries colored her better judgment, and she projected that experience on me. In Elaina's care, I initially felt safe, seen, and supported, but the way she led our sessions, communicated with me via text, and neglected to consider my neurodivergence in her discharge notes, led to me wandering in perpetual suffering for at least a year longer than I would have without her. The unprofessional and inaccurate way she terminated our relationship showed me that I had outgrown her ability to provide effective support long before I stopped seeking her services. I initially tried to be understanding when communicating with her about her behavior. Ultimately, her decision to reduce her caseload was the best thing that ever happened to me, because I was finally free from behavioral patterns and an incomplete understanding of self that she enabled with her incompetence and lack of sufficient experience to understand me. I highly advise you think twice before seeking Elaina's care as a therapist, and if you are one of her patients, I recommend you ask for your documentation to ensure it aligns with your understanding of your time together, because mine could not have been more misaligned. I don't think I'll ever forgive her for the harm she caused or the way she chose to conduct herself, but ultimately I'm grateful that I never have to suffer under her services again."