Sex Therapy in Santa Monica
Honest, grounded conversations about sex, intimacy, and desire.
Weekly 50, 75, or 90-minute sessions · Secure video sessions · Serving Santa Monica residents and clients across California
Honest, grounded sex therapy for Santa Monica residents.
Santa Monica is full of people living the life they were told to want and wondering why it feels so thin. The couple with the jobs at the Colorado Avenue tech offices, the place a few blocks from the sand, the kids in the good schools, and a quiet sense that they've become roommates who co-manage a calendar. Silicon Beach runs long hours behind the beach town, and a lot of parents here are quietly burning out while pushing a stroller down Ocean Avenue on a perfect afternoon. When the setting is this idyllic, the gap between how the life looks and how the marriage feels gets harder to name, not easier. The people who come to me in Santa Monica usually aren't falling apart. They're successful, exhausted, and lonely in a place that keeps insisting they have nothing to complain about.
Santa Monica packs an enormous amount of pressure into 8.3 square miles. It's a Westside company town for tech and entertainment, Snap headquartered here, Hulu and the streaming and studio orbit close by, wellness and creative firms filling the rest, and something like a third of the city's jobs sitting in that tech-and-creative band. The neighborhoods each hold a different version of the same life: Ocean Park and Sunset Park with their bungalows and young families, the wealth north of Montana, the more mixed and working Pico neighborhood, the condos and renters through Mid-City and the Wilshire-Montana blocks. Because most households here rent, often at a genuinely painful number, the affluence you see on the street sits on top of real financial strain. The relational texture is specific to that. A lot of Santa Monica couples are two high earners on long clocks who chose to raise kids in a city built for cars and cameras, and the days run long even when the office is a mile away. The result is often a partnership that performs well and connects rarely, two people who are excellent at logistics and out of practice at each other. There's a cultural weight too, the local gospel of sun, fitness, and optimism that leaves almost no room to say out loud that things feel hard. Add the traffic, Bundy and the 10 and parking off Wilshire, and even getting to help becomes its own reason not to. The work I do meets the Santa Monica that lives behind the postcard.
About Sex Therapy
Sex therapy for individuals and couples navigating desire, intimacy, sexual identity, and the topics that are often hardest to talk about. My approach is non-judgmental, sex-positive, and inclusive of all relationship structures, identities, and orientations. We talk about what's actually going on, and we work toward what you actually want.
In a city that treats optimization as a lifestyle, the pressure to have a perfect sex life can make the real one hard to talk about, and plenty of Santa Monica couples are quietly disconnected under all that wellness. Sex therapy online opens a judgment-free, sex-positive hour to say plainly what feels off and talk about desire, on secure video from home.
What to expect
- An initial intake session to understand your goals and history
- Weekly sessions of your chosen length: 50, 75, or 90 minutes
- Open, honest conversation in a non-judgmental space
- Inclusive of all identities, orientations, and relationship structures (kink, poly, mono, LGBTQ, trans, all welcome)
- A pace that follows your comfort. There's no rush
Common reasons people come in
- —Differences in desire between partners
- —Sexual disconnection or loss of intimacy
- —Pain, dysfunction, or physical concerns affecting sex
- —Sexual identity, orientation, or coming-out work
- —Kink, ENM, and non-traditional relationship structures
- —Recovering from sexual trauma or shame
- —The Silicon Beach burnout underneath the postcard, two high earners on long tech and creative clocks, raising kids in a car-built city, performing a life that looks perfect and feeling strangely disconnected inside it
Weekly 50, 75, or 90-minute sessions
- All sessions held online via secure HIPAA-compliant video
- Cancellation policy: 24 hours
- Currently accepting new Santa Monica clients
Why online sessions are a good fit for Santa Monica
Santa Monica is only 8.3 square miles, and it lives even smaller than that. With around 91,000 residents, running into a coworker at the Wednesday farmers market or a neighbor in the waiting room of a Montana Avenue practice is a real possibility, and for a lot of people that alone is reason to want therapy that isn't happening three blocks away. Online sessions give you that privacy, plus something a Silicon Beach schedule rarely allows: an hour that doesn't cost you the middle of the afternoon. Tech and creative work makes up roughly a third of the jobs here, and the days run long even when the office is close. Add that most Santa Monica households rent, often at a serious cost, and the strain under the postcard gets easier to name. Whether you're in Ocean Park, Sunset Park, the Pico neighborhood, or north of Montana, therapy happens over secure video, from wherever you actually are. I'm licensed throughout California and work entirely online.
- No travel time across Ocean Park, Sunset Park, North of Montana
- Sessions fit into work-from-home schedules
- Privacy and discretion, with sessions from your own home
- Available evenings and select weekend hours
A relational, depth-oriented therapist serving California.
I'm Fanshen Thompson, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) based in California. I work with couples, individuals, and partnerships navigating intimacy, identity, and the slower work of becoming.
I am a certified Gottman trained couples therapist and draw from Emotionally Focused Therapy, Internal Family Systems, attachment theory, and somatic practices. But more than any single modality, I bring myself: a real human who has done, and continues to do, this work.
My practice is online and serves clients across California. The work is honest, grounded, and paced to what you can actually carry.
Frequently asked questions
How do online sessions work?
We meet over a secure, HIPAA-compliant video platform. You'll receive a link before each session and join from a private space at home. No app downloads or special equipment beyond a device with a camera and a stable internet connection.
Do I need a special app or platform?
No. The video platform runs in your browser. I'll send a link a few minutes before our session. You click, and we begin.
Is this covered by insurance?
I'm an out-of-network provider. I can provide a superbill you can submit to your insurance for potential out-of-network reimbursement. I'd encourage you to call your insurance and ask about your out-of-network mental health benefits.
How long does it take to see results?
Most people begin to feel something shift within the first several weeks. A little more clarity, a little less alone in it. Real, lasting change is a longer arc, often months of consistent weekly work. I'll be honest with you about what I see along the way.
What is your cancellation policy?
My cancellation policy is 24 hours. Sessions cancelled with less than 24 hours' notice are charged in full.
Can you see clients in Santa Monica?
Your corner of Santa Monica has no effect on the work, since it happens online under a statewide California license. Two partners who both keep Silicon Beach hours can log in from home the same evening, secure video end to end, with no crawl down Bundy or the 10 and no circling for parking off Wilshire. I meet couples and individuals across Ocean Park, Sunset Park, north of Montana, the Pico neighborhood, Mid-City, and the Wilshire-Montana blocks. In a town where the drive often ends therapy, online is frequently the difference between a weekly hour and a calendar that slips.
Ready to start? Let's talk.
Book a free 20-minute consultation. We'll talk about what's going on and whether working together feels right. No pressure, no commitment.