Branch Counseling, Rebekah Sorkin MA LCSW

08/28/2025

The gift of secure attachment is what we offer our little ones when we welcome them into a world grounded in love and connection, a foundation first nurtured in the bond between partners.

As an attachment-focused psychotherapist, a mom, and a Gottman-Certified Bringing Baby Home Educator, I have the joy of supporting new and expecting parents who want to feel more connected, less stressed, and more grounded in their partnership as they navigate this tender and transformative season.

For many, this means creating a new kind of family story, one built on safety, connection, and belonging. A story that may look and feel different than what they experienced growing up.

The Bringing Baby Home program is grounded in decades of research and offers couples practical, proven tools to strengthen their bond, ease conflict, and grow together as they navigate the shifts and challenges of parenthood. At its heart, it’s about finding safety in each other, deepening your connection, and traveling through this beautiful and exhausting parenting journey side by side.

Whether you’re preparing to welcome your little one, navigating the toddler years, or adjusting to new stages of parenting, I’d love to walk alongside you.

08/22/2025

One of the most sacred roles we play as parents and caregivers
is becoming our child’s first inner voice.

When a child is told that they are inherently “sinful” and untrustworthy,
that their mistakes deserve punishment and pain,
that love must be earned through obedience and self-abandonment,

that tender little one grows up with an inner world defined by fear rather than safety.

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In adulthood, these early teachings echo as an inner critic.
They erode self-trust
and make it hard to feel worthy of love.

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James Dobson built an entire empire on these distortions of love and manipulations of fear and control.

What attachment science and trauma research recognize as relational betrayal and abuse,
Dobson, and the millions of homes and churches that embraced his teachings, called “discipline.”

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The result? Generations of children grew up in homes where:
• Safety was tied to obedience
• Physical violence was normalized
• Emotional expression was punished
• Love was made conditional
• Core attachment needs for trust, comfort, and belonging were shamed as “sinful” and deserving of punishment

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If you’re feeling something about Dobson’s death,
anger, grief, sadness, rage, or even numbness,
it’s valid. Every bit of it.

Dobson, and so many like him, taught us that emotions were dangerous.
That was a lie.

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Feeling is not weakness.
Feeling is resistance.

Every tear, every tremor of anger, every pang of grief, every spark of rage
is a reclamation of your humanity,
your attachment needs,
and your right to love and be loved without fear.

Feel on.

08/13/2025

It’s easy to parent the way we were parented.
To love the way we were loved.
To respond the way we were responded to.

What’s not easy is untangling ourselves from the sticky threads of shame, fear, and control that shaped the rules we were raised with, the script we were given, and choosing to create

something new.
Something gentler.
Something safer.
Something rooted in connection and love instead of fear and control.

It takes courage.
It takes repetition.

But it’s so worth it.

You’re allowed to write a story where safety, love, and connection are the norm.

For you, and for them.

08/12/2025

Growth isn’t just about what we add.
It’s also about what we let go.

Therapy is a space where learning and unlearning happen side by side.
✨Learning gives us new ways to connect, to set boundaries, to trust.
✨ Unlearning loosens the patterns that once kept us safe, but now hold us back.

Both are part of growth.
Both can change us and our relationships for the better.

Branch Counseling LLC - in person in Denver, and virtually across Colorado and Utah

08/05/2025

✨ Exciting news! ✨
Branch Counseling is growing beyond Colorado and is now offering therapy and coaching services in both Colorado and Utah!

Branch Counseling exists to support folks navigating:
• Religious trauma + deconstruction
• Connected parenting + parenting after religion
• Attachment and relationship dynamics
• Trauma recovery + EMDR

I’m so grateful for the ways this work continues to grow in both reach and depth. And can't wait to open the door a little wider and welcome new clients into this tender and transformative work.

If you're curious about working together, check out the link in my bio for more info or to schedule a free call.

I'd love to connect.

07/11/2025

Fearful-Avoidant (sometimes called Disorganized) attachment develops in the context of early relational trauma when the people meant to offer safety were also unpredictable sources of fear, harm or abuse.

You may have grown up longing for closeness and fearing it at the same time, reaching out while pulling back, trying to stay connected and protected in the very same moment. A painful, disorienting and destabilizing dance that kept your nervous system on edge when safety and danger were hard to tell apart.

And while those patterns can make trust feel complicated, they also hold quiet strengths: intuitive truth-seeking, deep empathy, emotional courage, and the ability to sit with complexity and contradiction.

As protective patterns begin to soften in the presence of steady, caring relationships, it becomes easier to sense the difference between what’s familiar vs. what’s truly safe. With gentleness, you can begin to explore new kinds of connection that offer love without confusion, closeness without harm, and a safety that invites you to stay not out of survival, but by choice.

07/08/2025

Avoidant attachment often forms in relationships where emotional closeness felt unpredictable, intrusive, or out of reach. You may have learned to rely on yourself, to stay a step back, and to manage your feelings quietly.

Over time, distance became a way to protect what was tender. And while that space can sometimes make connection feel harder to trust, it also holds real strengths: steadiness, self-awareness, discernment, and the ability to stay calm in moments of intensity.

In the context of safe and dependable relationships, these strengths can begin to stretch, making room for more flexibility, more curiosity, and more trust. As you lean into more secure patterns, you may find yourself reaching out a little more, staying present a little longer, and experiencing connection as a healing invitation, rather than an overwhelming demand.

07/03/2025

Anxious attachment develops in relationships where closeness was inconsistent or hard to trust. You may have learned to stay especially alert, reaching out quickly, trying to fix things, and holding on when connection felt shaky or even hurtful. And even though those patterns can feel exhausting, they also hold quiet strengths, like emotional courage, attunement, persistence, and a deep capacity for care.

When you start to meet those instincts with compassion, they can become tools for healing.
You can still care deeply and have boundaries.
You can still want closeness and practice trust.

You can move toward more secure patterns in your relationships and still keep the parts of you that feel deeply and love wholeheartedly.

07/01/2025

We hear a lot about what we “need” in order to heal from attachment wounds.
The truth is, the list is short, though not small:
Safety, Attunement, and Repair.

We know we can’t offer or expect those things perfectly every time. We miss cues. We’re tired. We hit the edge of our emotional capacity. That’s just being human. So we enter relationships with the understanding that repair is essential.

What we need isn’t perfection. It’s connection.
And for our brain and nervous system to truly recalibrate, we need that dance of safety, attunement, and repair to happen again and again.

Maybe that starts in one of your relationships with a friend, a partner, a family member. Or maybe it begins in therapy, where your therapist and the work you do together create a space for that dance to unfold, week after week.

And over time, what you get to experience in that space starts to show up elsewhere.
The safety you begin to feel in therapy becomes a felt sense you can carry with you.
The patterns you learn become more familiar and start to take root in your everyday life.
And you get to feel how transformative it is when the work you do in one safe relationship makes space for growth in all the others.

Branch Counseling is here to support you on that journey.

06/11/2025

Hey there! I'm Rebekah.
I work with individuals and couples who are carrying hard things.

Trauma, attachment wounds, relationship struggles, complex identities, and the impacts of high-control religion are some of the things I hold and navigate with my clients.

At the center of my work is a belief in post-traumatic growth ~ the quiet, powerful process of returning to Self and safety in the aftermath of harm. Growth that's relational, embodied, and self-led.

It's work I care about deeply and a responsibility I hold with intention and gratitude.

If you're longing for change, or just looking for a place to be seen and supported, you're welcomed, wanted and celebrated here.

05/15/2025

Relational wounds require relational repair.
That’s why the fit between you and your therapist matters.

A secure therapeutic relationship can begin to gently rewire old patterns of distrust, shame, and fear, offering something new:
→ I’m not too much.
→ I’m not alone.
→ I’m worth showing up for.

Neuroscience and attachment research confirm that consistent attunement from a therapist engages the parasympathetic nervous system, downregulating chronic stress and helps the brain to develop new patterns for managing triggers, emotions, building trust, and feeling safe in relationships.

Prioritizing fit gives you permission to trust your gut. To say, this feels right for me, or this doesn’t.
That listening inward? That’s healing, too.

And if something feels off? Choosing to walk away from a therapist who isn’t the right fit isn’t failure ~ it’s part of reclaiming your right to choose who earns the honor of holding your story. That’s not a detour from the work.
It is the work.

Sometimes the connection clicks right away. Other times, it takes time to build.

But even early on, it’s worth gently noticing:
→ Do I feel safe enough to be honest?
Not without activation, but with enough grounding to begin building trust.
→ Do I feel seen and understood?
Are they present, attuned, and genuinely curious about me?
→ Is there room for messy nuance?
Can I bring uncertainty and ambivalence without being rushed to “fix” anything?
→ How do I feel after?
Do I leave feeling steadier or more scrambled?

Therapeutic outcomes are shaped by relationship. The right fit can make all the difference.

05/06/2025