Clinicians

Laura J. Halford, SUDP, LMHC

Director/Founder
Licensed Mental Health Counselor
Licensed Substance Use Disorder Professional
Certified EMDR Therapist

Laura is the founder and director of Eastside Center for Healing, established in 2004. Her work is rooted in the belief that wellness must be preserved in environments that demand high productivity, especially within entrepreneurial, executive, and high-tech family systems. She brings a nuanced understanding of what it means to maintain functionality without losing connection to self or others.

A Navy Reserve veteran from a military family, Laura understands firsthand the impact of multiple deployments and long-term service on individual and relational health. Since 2010, she has focused on supporting first responders and their families, as well as veterans and commercial pilots. Her clinic contracts with the Bellevue Police Department and provides behavioral health services across several departments in the Greater Seattle area.

Her clinical orientation is integrative. Drawing from family systems, EMDR, addiction recovery models, mindfulness, and long-standing meditation practice, Laura approaches therapy with pragmatism, directness, and respect for each client’s pace and readiness for change. She is attuned to the complexities of trauma recovery in people whose roles require them to remain calm under pressure and often prioritize others’ needs above their own.

These days, Laura's clinical focus encompasses couples therapy, Somatically based EMDR therapy for trauma, teaching meditation and substance use assessments for individuals navigating the court system, offering clear, trauma-informed evaluations for those facing family court-legal, professional, or licensing consequences.

She works with executives, first responders, entrepreneurs, clinicians, and high-profile professionals—people whose outer responsibilities often obscure inner distress. Her approach is collaborative, humorous when needed, and deeply curious. Clients describe her as clear-eyed, skilled, and able to name what matters without forcing the process.

As a clinical supervisor for over two decades, Laura meets WAC requirements in Washington State and supports emerging therapists in finding their clinical voice. Her supervision focuses on supervising clinical supervisors and her style encourages personal reflection, skill refinement, and sustainability in practice. Therapist wellness is a central focus, she holds space for the reality of compassion fatigue, vicarious trauma, and the need for boundaries in caregiving work.

Laura comes from three generations of helping professionals. She was mentored early on by her grandfather, a psychiatrist who emphasized meditation, nutrition, and group process as foundations for healing. Her father, now retired, served in community mental health and schools as a social worker, while her mother worked as a recovery coach and in management in treatment programs.

Her clinical work is guided by deep respect for resilience, the long arc of healing, and the importance of staying grounded and compassionate in helping systems.