I’m Jay Woods, LCSW, a psychotherapist in private practice offering psychodynamic therapy in McLean, Virginia and via telehealth throughout Virginia.

My style is attentive, thoughtful, and direct. I listen closely, ask questions that deepen our work, and share observations that can help you feel more recognized in your own experience. Therapy with me is not about performing wellness or arriving with a polished explanation of what hurts. It is a place to speak more freely, to notice what keeps repeating, and to make room for parts of yourself that may have been hard to know or easier to keep at a distance.

As a queer therapist, I know the importance of being met in a way that affirms your full self. I work with adults from many walks of life, including people who have not always felt seen or understood. Many are navigating identity questions, living with old wounds, managing anxiety that will not quiet, or carrying the sense that they never fit in their families, relationships, or the roles they were handed. Some are exploring gender or sexuality. Some experience the world in ways that have never had a good name. Whatever brings you here, this is a space where you do not have to translate yourself into something more palatable in order to be understood.

My approach is psychodynamic and relational. I am interested in the deeper emotional patterns that shape a person’s life, including the ways earlier relationships continue to live in the present. Together we can think about the forms of protection you have developed, the conflicts that keep returning, and what begins to shift when those patterns can be named and understood in a steady therapeutic relationship.

In our sessions, we focus on what matters most to you: your feelings, your relationships, and the meanings you make of your life. Change unfolds in its own time. The work can feel quiet, searching, or difficult, but it can also bring relief, clarity, and a fuller sense of self. My role is to provide a steady setting where you can bring more of yourself into the conversation.

Before becoming a therapist, I practiced law. I still bring that same attention to complexity, pattern, and close reading to clinical work, along with a belief that real understanding is worth the time it takes.