Mary Blair, LPC

Mary Blair is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) based in South Dakota with 18 years of experience as a psychotherapist, consultant, and as a hospice and hospital chaplain. She has worked with people facing a wide range of concerns, including grief and loss, life transitions, anxiety, depression, trauma history, and challenges related to parenting and intimate relationships. Her practice emphasizes a holistic perspective that honors mind, body, and spirit as each person defines those terms.

Her therapeutic work weaves together several trained approaches, including Internal Family Systems (IFS), psychodynamic techniques, and somatic methods that attend to the body alongside emotional processing. She describes her style as client-centered, inviting clients to take an active role in guiding the focus of sessions while the therapist offers structure, insight, and tools as needed. This integrative stance supports people coping with stress, relationship difficulties, identity and self-esteem concerns, caregiving and end-of-life matters, and the long-term effects of trauma.

Mary values collaboration and supports each person in exploring their strengths and values as part of healing and change. She aims to create a respectful, empathetic space where people can address practical problems and deeper patterns, learn coping strategies, and pursue meaningful growth at a pace that fits their needs.

Therapeutic Approaches and Online Care

Mary Blair draws on client-centered, psychodynamic, and somatic approaches to guide online therapy in ways that suit each person’s needs. Client-centered therapy focuses on listening, empathy, and helping the individual take the lead in sessions - it is useful for building self-awareness, confidence, and clearer decision-making. Psychodynamic therapy explores patterns that arise from past experiences and relationships to help uncover underlying causes of current difficulties such as relationship problems, depression, or recurring anxiety. Somatic therapy attends to the body and physical sensations as part of emotional processing, offering tools for people who experience stress, trauma responses, or overwhelm that show up somatically.

Choosing the right approach is part of the therapeutic process. Mary works collaboratively with each person to identify which methods fit their goals, preferences, and circumstances, and she adapts the plan over time as needs change. This collaborative stance helps clients feel involved in shaping their care.

Online therapy with Mary is offered via video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging, providing flexibility for work, family, and health schedules. These options make it easier to attend sessions from home or other convenient locations, maintain continuity of care during life transitions, and access consistent support when in-person visits are difficult.