Coaching with Katherine Michelle Burns, ACC

Providing clarity, compassion, and guidance for identity expansions.

Are you questioning who you are? I work with clients from many different backgrounds and experiences to help navigate identity disruptions from a variety of life events and life transitions. This includes a change in career, empty nesters, divorce, new parents and infertility.

I specialize in working with clients who have had a DNA surprises which includes; late discovery adoptees, people with a NPE & MPE and  donor- conceived people.

I am an Associate Certified Coach (ACC) through the International Coaching Federation and participated in the NPE Trauma Recovery Coach program through IAOTRC.

Many of my clients are undergoing changes in their identity and I help them:

  1. Identify tools and resources that may help them find information about their truth.
  2. Process a wide array of complex emotions.
  3. Navigate changing family dynamics—this includes processing who to tell, how to tell them and when.
  4. Accept the truth for what it is. This does not mean accept mistreatment it means accepting what cannot be changed.
  5. Integrate new information into their identity without compromising integrity or authenticity.  I help clients broaden their identities to include new information into an evolving sense of self.

Clients have found that collaborating with me has provided them with someone on their team.  I am someone they can open up to about the complexities of their situation without worrying about hurting families feelings or betraying trust. I help clients feel seen and heard as they work through disorienting times in their lives.

My goal is to help clients evolve their identity with integrity and agency. I do not promise a pretty package with a neat bow, this work is often messy. I can promise compassionate, non judgmental guidance to help you navigate your discovery.

I offer personalized, compassionate guidance to help my clients navigate meaningful identity transformations.

—Katherine Michelle Burns, LCSW, ACC

Client Testimonials

I was feeling unfulfilled in my job, my living situation, my relationships and in myself. Katherine met me with empathy and compassion and took the time to get to know me and understand my situation.

Katherine worked with me in anticipation of a big move I was planning across the country to live closer to family. With her support, I was able to pull myself out of survival mode during a year I was in limbo.

I was feeling stuck, and stagnant, but Katherine gave me the tools I needed to make it a pivotal year for learning and growth. Katherine, thank you for helping me understand myself a little better!

I had the privilege to work with Katherine after discovering my paternity was a lie. She helped me write letters to my paternal family and navigate the betrayal trauma I suffered… I’m happy to say that contact was a success!

Katherine taught me how to recognize patterns and be curious, practice self-compassion, voice my needs with kindness, have higher expectations for how others treat me, and stay grounded in my worth.

Thanks to Katherine I feel confident that I’m going to be able to sustain more balance through the peaks and valleys of my life, and I’m already practicing in this new chapter.

Having Katherine as my therapist was such a wonderful experience… From the very beginning, she brought a sense of calm, realism, and understanding that helped me begin to recenter myself and rebuild a sense of order.