AutumnSpring Counseling

This is historic news for mental health counseling in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania! The Counseling Compact allows for clients who move away from the State College/Penn State community to continue with their trusted therapist. For students, faculty, staff, professionals, and retirees of the large institutions in our area, they can choose to progress through the the big transitions in their lives without losing nearly all of their support resources at once. AutumnSpring Counseling's clients will benefit tremendously from the Counseling Compact once it is fully active across all member states.

: The dream of many licensed professional counselors to practice across state lines continues on as Pennsylvania becomes the 39th state to sign the Counseling Compact into law!

More info: https://bit.ly/4pfk81f

🍂🌱 AutumnSpring Counseling is now a federally registered trademark — USPTO Certificate No. 8,301,301, issued today, June 16.

As the practice heads into its 5th year this September, it's a good moment to pause and appreciate how much has been built — one session, one client, one transition at a time.

Grateful for the support. And ready for what's next.

Welcome to AutumnSpring Counseling!

If you’re here, you may be carrying a lot—grief after loss, stress or burnout at work or school, big questions about your career, or tension and distance in an important relationship. You might feel stuck between who you’ve been and who you want to become—individually, or as a couple.

I’m Josh Kirby, a Licensed Professional Counselor based in State College, PA, and owner of the practice. AutumnSpring Counseling focuses on three core areas:
– ACT‑informed individual therapy
– Contemporary grief counseling
– Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFCT) for partners who want to repair and deepen their relationship.

For individuals
For individual work, I draw primarily on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), a modern CBT‑based approach for people facing grief, anxiety, depression, burnout, and major life decisions. Together, we work to:
– Understand your thoughts, emotions, and physical reactions
– Clarify the values that actually matter to you
– Build skills and strategies for taking meaningful steps forward, even when life feels uncertain or painful

Many individual clients come in struggling with:
– Grief from many kinds of loss (not only death)
– Work or school stress, burnout, or toxic workplaces
– Bad bosses or coworkers, job loss, or end‑of‑career transition
– Career or major indecision and life direction questions

For couples
For couples, I offer Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFCT), an evidence‑based, attachment‑oriented approach that helps partners:
– Recognize the negative cycles they get pulled into
– Share emotions and needs in safer, clearer ways
– Rebuild trust, emotional responsiveness, and a more secure bond

EFCT can be helpful if you and your partner feel disconnected, find yourselves in the same arguments over and over, are recovering from a major stressor or betrayal, or simply want a stronger, more resilient relationship.

For grief and loss
Grief work at AutumnSpring Counseling is not about “getting over” loss or forcing yourself through stages. I use contemporary grief counseling approaches that view grief as an ongoing, personal process of meaning‑making and connection. We slow down enough to honor your story, the relationship with what (or who) was lost, and the ways grief is showing up in your life now—while still moving toward a life that holds both your pain and your values.

Who I work with
I see individual clients from high school age through retirement, and I work with adult couples across professions, identities, and life stages—students, educators, healthcare workers, executives, entrepreneurs, and people in career transition.

How to get started
1. Visit autumnspring.co to learn more about individual counseling, couples counseling (EFCT), and grief services.
2. Read the service pages and FAQs to see if my approach fits what you’re facing.
3. Use the contact form or the phone/email listed there to request an appointment or brief consult.

AutumnSpring Counseling is a private‑pay practice and does not accept insurance. I see clients from my office in State College, PA, and online for people located in Pennsylvania and other states where I am approved to provide telehealth—details are on the website.

If you’re looking for a thoughtful, structured space to talk through your grief, stress, or relationship, I’d be honored to support you.

This NPR story, in partnership with ProPublica, is one of the most important pieces of healthcare journalism in 2024. Please listen to it (7 minutes) instead of reading it. It is well-researched and clear in its explanation. And it is a near-perfect representation of why AutumnSpring Counseling is a private-pay practice that does not have any connection to health insurance whatsoever.

It is critical for current and future consumers of mental health services, which likely could be everyone, to understand what insurance companies do to mental health providers that degrades the quality of the services that clients receive. The are two challenges for private-pay health providers: (1) patients/clients are paying hefty premiums for what they believe should be a comfortable blanket covering the services necessary to return them to health and wellness; and (2) the big money in the health insurance industry makes it seem as though the best care is the care that your health insurance company tells you they will cover.

With a more educated consumer—particularly potential clients who recognize that their health insurance may not guarantee that they receive the care they need—private pay practitioners will be able to positively impact their clients and the mental health industry as a whole.

Finding a therapist who takes your insurance can be nearly impossible. Here's why Getting mental health care covered by insurance can be really tough. Reporters spoke to hundreds of therapists who left their insurance networks to find out why.

AutumnSpring Counseling’s Josh Kirby co-taught our signature Prepared to Care program with the Jana Marie Foundation again this year.

Happy 2024 to everyone working toward incremental improvement in themselves and their lives! The New Year hype can be equally motivating and deflating. Counterintuitively, we face more disappointment when we quest for happiness than when we construct our contentment. Happiness is fleeting, and contentment is firm. Are you investing yourself in what you need most?

Interested in working together in 2024? Inquire about new client appointments at www.AutumnSpring.co.

AutumnSpring Counseling • Mental Health and Career Counseling in State College Supporting the mental health of students, professionals, and entrepreneurs, and their families as they work through the challenges, decisions, and transitions of work and schooling.

Josh Kirby of AutumnSpring Counseling was Scott Rochman's guest on his new Navigating Your 20s podcast. This episode is 12 minutes focused on career development, burnout response, and pursuing exotic experiences for 20-something’s based on my professional and personal insights. Take a listen to the episode, and Scott’s series, from your favorite podcast platform (Apple, Spotify, Audible, Amazon, etc) which you can access from the link below.

Navigating Your Career ft. Josh Kirby by Navigating Your 20s For this episode, I am joined by Josh Kirby, a Certified Career Counselor and Mental Health Coach. For more information on Josh and his practice, check out https://autumnspring.co/