phone: 218-461-1693
fax: 218-302-1768
rachel@northbrookmn.com
Rachel Ashford LICSW

I'm a licensed clinical social worker with over 15 years of experience working with adults, teens, and families. I bring the same thing to every client: genuine curiosity about who you are, and a direct, no-nonsense approach to helping you get unstuck.
I specialize in working with people who have experienced trauma, and much of my career has been spent with people who are high-functioning on the outside and exhausted on the inside — holding a lot together and ready to deal with what's underneath. I also love working with neurodivergent people learning to work with their brains rather than against them, and with middle and high schoolers navigating more than most adults realize.
My primary approach is Brainspotting, a body-based method for processing trauma and other stuck patterns. I'm also trained in EMDR and in inference-based CBT (I-CBT) for OCD, and I offer consultation to other mental health professionals.
Therapy with me is collaborative and, honestly, often pretty funny. I don't have a poker face, and while we absolutely go to the hard places, there's a lot of laughter along the way. I work best with people who want to get to the bottom of things, not just manage symptoms, and I'll be honest with you about what I'm seeing.
Outside the office, I'm usually outside — biking, gardening, or on the sidelines at a hockey rink or speech competition — or at home with my two middle schoolers, a bulldog named Greta, and David, the biggest, sweetest cat you've ever met.
If any of this sounds like a fit, I'd love to hear from you.