Kimberly Brammer

Kim has a wide background as a Licensed Professional Counselor in DC and is a Board Certified Art Therapist (ATR-BC), with experience treating trauma in women, self-injury, substance abuse recovery, and mood disorders including anxiety and depression.

With couples, Kim provides clear, empathetic structure to sessions and has a very active presence to help partners change destructive patterns, have productive conversations and resolve conflict. Kim holds her M.A. from George Washington University in Art Therapy, with a focus on Trauma, and has worked in numerous behavioral health settings. She is trained in Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) for couples.

Working with Kim will bring you into deeper and more compassionate understanding of key parts of yourself. As a couples therapist, she actively helps create a productive environment in the sessions, and offers clear steps to create better relationship skills.

PERSONAL BIOGRAPHY AND INTRODUCTION

Couples/Families/Parents

• Improve communication – create safety to talk about vulnerable subjects with respect and care.
• Transform relationship conflict into connection – deal constructively with negativity and gain healthier, more balanced expectations for your relationship.
• Infidelity – find out what created the opportunity for an affair, whether you can really work it out and stay together, and discover ways to repair your relationship.
• Sex therapy and other ways of negotiating (non)monogamy in your relationship – identify solutions to sexual issues in your relationship and/or determine whether monogamy is right for you and your partner
• Pre-marital and pre-parental counseling – discuss some common issues that arise for couples as they are preparing for marriage or expanding their family
• Intentional Parenting – become a parent your child respects and listens to without coercion or punishment.
• Lower the volume and raise respect – find alternatives to yelling at your teenagers and increasing connection.

Individuals

• Improving your success in relationships – gain confidence with being yourself and relating to others.
• Women’s mental health – resolving gender-based stress, depression, and difficulty in the workplace.
• Identity development – identifying where you are in your racial/ethnic identity development. and/or gender or sexual identity development and how it may be impacting your life.
• Managing moods (depression, anxiety, chronic stress) – take control of your life and free yourself from fear and worry.
• Grief counseling – find forgiveness and stability as you grow from tragedy or loss.
• Healing from trauma and adversity – restore a healthy balance and rhythm, and find new meaning in your life.
• Substance abuse – receive personal support in your recovery to identify and heal the pain that keeps triggering your drinking, smoking, or other drug use.

Fees and Payment

Payment is expected prior to the first session by submitting a form of payment here.

Fees for appointments vary among our counselors. Ms Brammer’s fees are $200 for a 50 minute session and $225 for 50 minute couples sessions.

Appointment Hours

Ms Brammer has daytime appointments available remotely (or after pandemic) in the Dupont Circle office. Schedule may change in the future.

INSURANCE: Neither Keith Miller Counseling, LLC or Kimberly Brammer accept insurance or participate in insurance networks. However, because we are licensed mental health providers, it is likely that your insurance may provide “out of network” coverage in the form of reimbursement for mental health services. Coverage and reimbursement rates varies widely across policies, so it will be your responsibility to find out what your expected reimbursement rate may be from your insurance company. You are responsible for paying in full for services rendered at the time of service, and upon request, I will provide you with a monthly invoice to submit to your insurance company if you plan to pursue reimbursement. As you are making your decision about pursuing insurance reimbursement, please consider the following:

CONFIDENTIALITY: All insurance companies require some level of information about the reason you are seeking mental health services in order to process your claim. In addition, managed care plans often require detailed information regarding the problem(s) for which you are seeking help, its history, symptoms, family and work life, and sometimes more. This information is then entered into a large information processing system and current regulations may not be strong enough to completely protect your confidentiality.

CONTROL OF TREATMENT: Managed care companies may use the information provided to them to decide if treatment is “medically necessary,” what kind of therapy is or is not approved, and later, if it should continue. Many insurance company employees who make these decisions have limited training, and oftentimes have never met or even talked to you.

PSYCHIATRIC DIAGNOSIS: Health insurance exists to pay for the treatment of a diagnosable illness. Therefore, to access insurance benefits for mental health services, a psychiatric diagnosis code must be given before most insurance companies will pay or reimburse for services. Oftentimes, insurance companies require a certain level of severity of diagnosis that they deem necessary for treatment and to some this may feel overly severe or pathologizing. I will use my best clinical judgment, in consultation with you, to determine your diagnosis. For couples, I will use the procedure code: 908.47 for “conjoint therapy” because insurance companies typically do not reimburse for “marriage” or “couples” therapy.