About Tiffany Savener PhD, LPC-Associate
Trauma-Informed Therapy for Individuals and Couples
LPC-Associate #93330 | Supervised by Mark Cagle, MA, LPC-S (#71799)
In-person therapy in Northwest Austin (MoPac & Far West) and Round Rock, TX | Online therapy across Texas
Healing from Trauma, Betrayal, and Relationship Wounds
Healing from trauma, betrayal, or the slow erosion of a relationship that was supposed to feel safe takes courage, and a space where that courage is met with someone who can sit with complexity, make sense of a tangled history, and help you find your way through.
Relationships shape us. They can wound us. And they can heal us.
The relationships we experience throughout our lives influence how we see ourselves, what we expect from others, and how safe we feel in the world. When those relationships are marked by betrayal, neglect, emotional immaturity, chronic conflict, or disconnection, they can leave wounds that follow us for years, showing up as anxiety, self-doubt, people-pleasing, difficulty trusting, or an aching sense that something is always slightly off.
I work with people navigating high levels of responsibility, achievement, and relational complexity, often alongside internal stress that isn't visible from the outside. My work is grounded, trauma-informed, and relational: a space where people can slow down enough to notice patterns that have been running automatically in the background of their lives, and begin to understand themselves with more clarity and compassion.
At a Glance
View my professional training and clinical development →
Education
PhD in Clinical Psychology, Texas Tech University
BA in English, University of Texas at Austin
Specialties
Relational Trauma, Betrayal Trauma & Attachment Wounds
(including infidelity, emotional affairs, complex PTSD, and family-of-origin trauma)
Narcissistic Abuse Recovery & Relational Trauma
(including emotional abuse, coercive control, chronic invalidation, boundary violations, and recovery from toxic relationship dynamics)
Trauma-Informed Couples Therapy & Relationship Repair
(including affair recovery, emotional disconnection, and intimacy/sexual relationship concerns)
Family Systems & Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
(including emotionally immature parenting dynamics and long-term relational impact)
Sexual Health, Intimacy & Relationship Patterns
(including desire differences, pornography-related concerns, and sexual disconnection in relationships)
Anxiety & Depression
Approaches
My clinical approach is informed by specialized training with many of the leading voices in couples therapy, attachment science, trauma treatment, narcissistic abuse recovery, family systems, and sexual health, including John and Julie Gottman, Sue Johnson, Kathleen Chard, Janina Fisher, Lindsay Gibson, Ramani Durvasula, Tammy Nelson, and Terry Real.
Gottman Method Couples Therapy
Informed by specialized training with John Gottman, PhD, and Julie Gottman, PhD, this research-based approach helps couples improve communication, navigate conflict, rebuild trust, repair injuries, and strengthen their relationship.
Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT)
Based on attachment science and informed by training with Sue Johnson, EdD, founder of Emotionally Focused Therapy, this approach helps partners understand emotional patterns, create greater emotional safety, and deepen emotional connection.
Trauma Recovery & Complex Trauma Treatment
Integrates EMDR, Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), and advanced trauma training with Kathleen Chard, PhD, developer of Cognitive Processing Therapy, and Janina Fisher, PhD, a leading expert in complex trauma. This work helps clients process traumatic experiences, heal attachment wounds, regulate overwhelming emotions, and develop greater self-compassion.
Narcissistic Abuse Recovery & Relational Trauma
Informed by specialized training with Ramani Durvasula, PhD, a leading authority on narcissistic abuse and toxic relationships. This work helps clients recover from emotional abuse, coercive control, chronic invalidation, manipulation, betrayal, and other forms of relational trauma while rebuilding self-trust, confidence, and healthy boundaries.
Attachment-Based Clinical Framework
My work is grounded in attachment science, including training with Sue Johnson, EdD, and Lindsay Gibson, PhD. This framework helps clients understand how early relationships shape emotional safety, trust, connection, boundaries, and self-worth throughout adulthood.
Family Systems & Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
Informed by family systems theory and specialized training with Lindsay Gibson, PhD, author of Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents. This approach helps clients understand family-of-origin dynamics, navigate difficult family relationships, strengthen boundaries, and break longstanding relational patterns.
Sexual Health, Intimacy & Couples Sexuality
Integrates sex therapy training with Tammy Nelson, PhD, a leader in integrative sex and couples therapy, along with PACT-informed interventions for sexual intimacy. This work helps couples navigate desire differences, sexual communication, intimacy concerns, pornography-related relationship challenges, and rebuilding connection after relational injuries.
Relational Accountability & High-Conflict Relationship Dynamics
Informed by training with Terry Real, LICSW, this approach helps individuals and couples address defensiveness, conflict escalation, emotional avoidance, and unhealthy relational patterns while fostering greater accountability, authenticity, and connection.
How I Came to This Work
After graduating from UT Austin, I spent several years teaching high school, work I loved, but that kept pointing me toward something deeper. I was drawn to the emotional lives of the people in front of me: what shaped them, what hurt them, what helped them grow. That pull led me to pursue a PhD in Clinical Psychology at Texas Tech University.
My clinical training spanned the full spectrum of care. I worked in inpatient psychiatric units within correctional facilities serving adolescents and adults, in a state hospital with children, adolescents, and adults with complex, high-acuity needs, and in outpatient clinics with equally complex presentations. I worked with individuals across the lifespan and across a wide range of racial, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds, including rural communities and urban settings, and people living in both significant economic hardship and relative stability.
Those years taught me something that remains central to my work today: people find powerful ways of surviving experiences that were overwhelming and did what they had to do to get through them. Often, the same strategies that once created safety can later make intimacy, connection, and emotional closeness more difficult in the present. The past doesn’t disappear; it continues to live with us in patterns we may not fully recognize. In therapy, we begin to understand and honor those survival responses, and through telling our story in a safe and supported way, space can open for new ways of relating that feel healthier and more connected.
After completing my doctorate, I stepped back from formal practice to focus on raising my family. Those years weren’t a pause. They deepened my understanding of the relational systems my clients actually live inside: the weight of caregiving, the complexity of shifting family roles, the ways connection sustains us and the ways it can wound us. I returned to clinical work when my children were older, bringing both additional training and a deeper clinical understanding shaped by that earlier season of life.
Why I Specialize in Relationship Wounds
Most of my specialties share a common thread.
Betrayal trauma lives in intimate relationships. Family estrangement grows from unresolved relational injuries. Emotionally immature or narcissistic family systems shape how we see ourselves for decades. Couples come to therapy when trust, connection, or emotional safety has been disrupted. Even anxiety, depression, and trauma often affect our relationship with ourselves most deeply.
Underneath all of these concerns, the same questions tend to surface:
How did I learn to relate to myself? How did I learn to relate to others? And how can those relationships become healthier?
Helping clients answer those questions is at the heart of everything I do.
A Little More About Me
I’m an Austin native, a mom of three, and have been married for over 30 years.
In the therapy room, I pay close attention to both what is being said and what has been difficult to put into words. My focus is on helping people make sense of their experience in a way that feels steady, nonjudgmental, and emotionally safe, while also supporting meaningful change over time.
I believe therapy works best when it is collaborative, and when people feel they don’t have to perform, defend themselves, or convince someone their experience is real.
Clients often describe therapy as a place where they begin to see themselves more clearly and feel more grounded in their own internal experience.
What I Believe About Therapy
I believe most people make complete sense once their story is fully understood.
Rather than asking what’s wrong with you, I ask what happened to you? And just as importantly, what strengths helped you survive?
The patterns that bring people to therapy, anxiety, perfectionism, people-pleasing, emotional shutdown, difficulty trusting, rarely come from nowhere. They developed because they once served a purpose: keeping you safe, keeping the peace, keeping relationships intact. Therapy isn't about judging those responses. It's about understanding them, and making room for something new.
I believe healing happens through greater self-awareness, meaningful connection, emotional safety, and the courage to engage honestly with ourselves and the people we love.
Schedule a Consultation
Whether you’re carrying the weight of old wounds, navigating a relationship in crisis, or feeling stuck in patterns you can’t seem to change, therapy can help you understand yourself more fully and move toward something different.
Schedule a free consultation by clicking the link below to choose a time that works for you. If you don’t see an available time or still have questions, you’re welcome to email me at tsavener@seekthesun.net. We’ll talk about what you’re navigating and whether we might be a good fit.