Nadias Hallak, LPC

I offer a warm, safe, and caring environment that is solution focused.

Nadiah is a dedicated clinician who firmly believes that amidst the numerous complex stressors in modern society, clients deserve an empathetic, deeply caring professional who can act as a primary source of grounding support while offering highly effective therapeutic treatment. Operating with the core philosophy that empathy is the single most vital element in a therapeutic relationship, Nadiah strives to truly understand her clients’ unique internal worlds and the varied experiences they have endured.

By looking through this deeply compassionate lens, she honors each client’s individual story and complex emotions, helping them achieve profound self-understanding while successfully reaching their most important life goals.

Areas of Clinical Specialty

In her clinical practice at 2nd Story Counseling, Nadiah establishes an empowering, culturally humble environment tailored to adults, professionals, and individuals navigating acute emotional hurdles. Her areas of specialized focus include:

• Trauma & Somatic Recovery: Advanced, specialized care utilizing EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) to safely process past trauma, reduce physiological hypervigilance, and alleviate chronic PTSD symptoms.
• Women’s Counseling & Empowerment: Dedicated advocacy and therapeutic support addressing the unique biological, professional, relational, and systemic lifecycle stressors facing women.
• Mood & Emotional Regulation: Compassionate, structured interventions for managing persistent depression, chronic anxiety states, acute panic, and the development of sustainable, everyday coping strategies.
• Grief, Loss, & Bereavement: Providing a gentle, sacred space to process major life alterations, identity changes, ambiguous loss, and complex relational endings.
• Identity & Relational Support: Resolving deep-seated relationship problems, guiding individuals through substance and behavioral addictions, and offering a safe, celebratory, and affirming environment for LGBTQ+ & queer-identifying adults.
• Advanced Mindfulness Modalities: Integrating evidence-based mindfulness techniques to help clients cultivate present-moment awareness, ground their nervous systems, and quiet cognitive distress.

Nothing makes Nadiah happier than to witness her clients improve their well-being and actively enhance the overall quality of their lives. She is deeply committed to providing radically affirming, safe, and culturally sensitive care to every individual who enters her practice. This clinical commitment is especially vital when supporting individuals navigating queer identities, including non-binary, gender-nonconforming, transgender, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and asexual clients. She believes in helping every client, regardless of identity, to feel comfortable, validated, and fully empowered to reach their personal goals using highly effective, evidence-based interventions.

Nadiah’s integrative therapeutic orientation primarily consists of EMDR therapy, Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT), and deeply Client-Centered Therapy. Having completed advanced, specialized training in cultural psychology and the complexities of acculturation, she possesses a sophisticated framework for understanding and addressing the unique challenges of minority stress, intersecting identity formation, and navigating strained relationships with non-affirming family structures or societal systems. Her expansive clinical background also encompasses treating complex trauma, depression, severe anxiety states, and relationship issues, all approached through a therapeutic lens that honors the client’s most authentic self. Nadiah has extensive experience working with couples and enjoys providing tailored counseling to clients across diverse age groups.

Background, Education & Academic Leadership

In addition to her extensive hands-on clinical experience, Nadiah brings a profound depth of psychological expertise. She has taught undergraduate and graduate college courses in the fields of psychology and human behavior for nearly 15 years. This long-standing tenure as a college professor ensures her therapeutic approach is continuously grounded in the absolute latest peer-reviewed clinical research and psychological modalities. Nadiah holds full clinical licensure in the state of Illinois and is formally trained in Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy.