Joy Close, LCSW

Joy Close is a licensed clinical social worker (LCSW) with 28 years of experience helping adults facing stress, anxiety, depression, grief, and traumatic experiences. She focuses on practical skills that make daily life easier. She aims to create a warm, accepting space where people feel heard and respected.

Joy uses a collaborative style. Sessions are tailored to each person’s needs and goals. She helps people build coping tools, understand themselves better, and work toward clearer next steps.

Her work often addresses relationship and family concerns, parenting strain, intimacy issues, and communication problems. She also supports people managing chronic illness, caregiver stress, cancer, aging and geriatric issues, and end-of-life concerns. Issues such as addiction, bipolar mood concerns, ADHD, and sleep disruption are also part of her practice.

Joy draws on a mix of approaches including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, client-centered work, mindfulness practices, psychodynamic ideas, and solution-focused strategies. Those methods are used to help with grief, post-traumatic stress, multicultural concerns, and life transitions.

She brings many years of experience and a commitment to social justice. Joy identifies as anti-racist, anti-sexist, LGBTQIA+ affirming, and sex-positive. She practices in North Carolina and conducts sessions in English.

Therapeutic approaches and how they work online

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) helps people notice difficult thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them, then choose actions that match their values; it can be useful for anxiety, depression, and life transitions. Mindfulness Therapy focuses on present-moment awareness and simple practices to reduce reactivity and improve sleep and emotional regulation. Client-Centered Therapy emphasizes a nonjudgmental, empathic relationship where the person’s own goals lead the work and solutions emerge from their experience.

Finding the right approach is part of the work together. The therapist will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what feels most helpful. This is a collaborative process aimed at shaping sessions to fit the client’s needs over time.

Session formats are not listed here, so confirm current options before booking. Online therapy can make it easier to fit sessions into a busy life, shorten commute time, and allow check-ins during breaks or between other responsibilities. It also makes it possible to continue therapeutic work when managing caregiving duties, chronic illness, or mobility limits. Licensed professionals can adapt exercises and homework to suit an online setting so progress continues outside the session.