Today we’d like to introduce you to Johanna Koenig.
Hi Johanna, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I’ve been in the therapy field for 12 years, but my path to founding The Oak + Willow Trauma Therapy Center really started with a growing sense, over years of clinical work, that I wanted to specialize more deeply in trauma rather than practice generally. I earned my MSW from the University of Maryland School of Social Work and spent the next several years building my clinical foundation, first in internships supporting clients through crisis and case management, then nearly eight years as a therapist in a private practice setting, working with adolescents and adults across a wide range of presenting concerns. I have had the pleasure of being an adjunct professor for 6 years at Bellevue University’s Clinical Mental Health graduate program.
Along the way, I became a Certified Clinical Trauma Professional and trained in Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART), an approach that lets clients process painful memories without having to relive or verbally recount every detail. Watching how much relief and movement clients experienced with ART, often in a fraction of the time traditional talk therapy takes, changed how I thought about what trauma treatment could look like. I also started teaching as adjunct faculty in a graduate Clinical Mental Health Counseling program, which deepened my own thinking about what truly effective, trauma-informed care requires.
In January 2026, I took the leap to open The Oak + Willow Trauma Therapy Center, a private practice licensed across DC, Maryland, and Virginia, built specifically around trauma-informed care and ART, which is offered both as focused 90-minute sessions and multi-day trauma intensives for clients who want to do deeper work in a more condensed format. Today, my work includes clients from all walks of life, including a specialization in supporting military families and Special Operations Forces clients navigating combat-related trauma. Getting to combine everything I’ve learned over 11 years into a practice built exactly the way I believe trauma care should be done has honestly been one of the most meaningful chapters of my career so far.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It hasn’t been a completely smooth road, and I don’t think it should be. I think the struggle is part of what makes the work meaningful. Starting The Oak + Willow Trauma Therapy Center on my own was daunting in a very real way. I left the consistency of a stable paycheck to build something from scratch, all while raising a small child, so there wasn’t a lot of room for uncertainty even though starting a business is inherently uncertain. There were plenty of moments early on where I second-guessed myself and dealt with real imposter syndrome, wondering if I actually had what it took to run a practice, not just be a good therapist within someone else’s. But I kept coming back to the fact that this work is genuinely my passion, and I hoped that if I kept showing up and doing it well, that passion would come through to the people I was trying to reach. Looking back, I think it did, but it took a lot of trust in myself during a season where that trust didn’t always come easily.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
At The Oak + Willow Trauma Therapy Center, I specialize in trauma-informed psychotherapy for adults, with a particular focus on Accelerated Resolution Therapy, or ART, a treatment that helps clients process painful or traumatic memories without having to relive or verbally recount every detail. I offer it both as a standard 90-minute session and as a multi-day trauma intensive for clients who want to do deeper, more concentrated work in a condensed timeframe. Alongside that, I provide individual psychotherapy for a wide range of concerns, and I’ve developed a specialization in working with survivors of sexual abuse and childhood trauma, as well as military families and Special Operations Forces clients navigating combat-related trauma, an area that’s become personally meaningful to me as well as professionally.
I’m known for meeting clients where they actually are, rather than asking them to fit into a rigid therapeutic mold. Trauma work can be intimidating to start, and I try to make the process feel safe, paced, and human, never like something being done to a client rather than with them. What I’m most proud of is building a practice from the ground up that reflects exactly how I believe trauma care should be delivered, flexible in format, deeply specialized, and centered on the client’s pace and dignity, rather than shaped around insurance requirements or a one-size-fits-all model.
I think what sets me apart is the combination of deep specialization and real flexibility. ART itself is still a relatively under-the-radar modality, even though the outcomes can be remarkable, and I’ve built my practice specifically to offer it in the format that best fits each client, whether that’s ongoing weekly sessions or an intensive that compresses months of work into a few focused days. I also bring 11 years of broader clinical experience and a role as adjunct faculty training future therapists, so clients are working with someone who has both deep specialization and a wide clinical foundation behind it.
What’s next?
Looking ahead, I’m focused on growth, both in the practice’s reach and in what it can offer the community. One of the biggest changes on the horizon is bringing on additional therapists, which will let me expand access to trauma-informed care and ART across DC, Maryland, and Virginia beyond what I can offer on my own. I want The Oak + Willow Trauma Therapy Center to grow into a small group practice that still holds onto the same values it was built on: specialized, client-centered, trauma-informed care, just able to reach more people who need it.
I’m also looking forward to deepening the practice’s specialty offerings, including exploring group intensives and workshops for specific populations, so clients can access support in formats beyond individual sessions. And I want to keep growing the practice’s presence in the community, whether that’s through content and education around trauma and ART, or through partnerships that help connect people, especially military families and others who’ve had a hard time finding a provider who really understands their experience, to the care they need. Ultimately, my hope is that Oak + Willow becomes a place people think of first when they’re looking for trauma-informed care in this region, not just because of what we offer, but because of how it feels to be a client here.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.oakwillowtherapy,com
- Other: info@oakwillowtherapy.com
