Jake Forgay Counseling
Welcome!
Hello! My name is Jake Forgay and I have been a practicing therapist since 2024. I am an LMSW and graduate from the University of Georgia. I specialize in OCD, Anxiety, and Trauma. I also have a range of experience working with grief, sudden life changes, relationship issues, depression, and eating concerns.
I pursued a career as a therapist for two reasons: (1) I find psychology fascinating and (2) I have struggled with crippling social anxiety, stuttering, and OCD, and have come out on the other end of these experiences. My work combines both my lived experiences with my professional training, which is influenced by CBT, ACT, evolutionary psychology, and existential psychotherapy. Specifically, I am trained in Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) and Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing therapy (EMDR).
As a therapist, I personally have had my share of underwhelming and unrewarding therapy experiences, which in my mind has always boiled down to the fact that I felt that the person I was sitting across didn’t on some level make efforts to really be present and understand my experience. From these experiences, I strive to sit with my clients with a deeper sense of compassion, presence, relatedness, and awareness of our common humanity, viewing therapy as a space where we are fellow travelers rather than expert and patient. I really value exploration, playfulness, and curiosity, and I aim to highlight my clients’ own problem-solving abilities rather than positioning myself as the one with all the answers. While advice can be helpful at times, I’ve found that meaningful change tends to emerge when clients feel understood, empowered, supported in discovering what works for them, and willing to take active steps toward facing the things they’ve been avoiding or feeling trapped by.
My main goal is to develop a warm, trusting relationship and help my clients make sense of experiences that feel overwhelmingly shameful, confusing, isolating, paralyzing, or hopeless, and from this sense-making, create room for deeper feelings of self-compassion, forgiveness, humor, meaning, confidence and agency. My hope is that at the end of our work together, you can arrive to yourself and your life with a deeper sense of understanding and presence.
If my background or expertise resonates, please feel free to reach out or book a free consultation HERE
Limitations and Scope of Practice
I am a Licensed Master Social Worker practicing under the direct supervision of Jessica G. Sexton, LPC, LLC (License Number: LPC01661), and I am currently employed under Living Lotus LLC, a private practice founded by Jessica Sexton based in Braselton, Georgia. As an LMSW in pursuit of my LCSW licensure, I attend weekly supervision. This is were I inform my supervisor of cases, gain needed feedback in areas where I feel uncertain or which may be helpful, and discuss whether current cases are within the scope of my practice. As such, I provide therapeutic services within the scope of my professional training and in accordance with the guidelines set forth by the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) and the applicable state licensing boards.
As a Social Worker directed by a Licensed Professional Counselor, I provide counseling, psychotherapy, and clinician assessments both in person and virtually. Counseling and psychotherapy are one on one meetings in which we will discuss and process topics related to your treatment. Together we will create goals of what your personal mental health recovery will look like. Meeting frequency is determined by my clinical recommendation and our joint availability. Not every therapist is an expert on every issue, so best fit is important. Here is a list of my professional limitations. I do not provide psychological testing, forensic interviews, or parental fitness evaluations. I also do not specialize in working primarily with couples/family groups. If you have questions about any of my procedures, we may discuss them whenever they arise. If you believe it to be helpful, I will be happy to help you set up a meeting with another mental health professional for a second opinion or alternate perspective