Our team · Online in California
Lauren Goldstein, LCSW, CST: Sex Therapy and Couples Therapy Online in California
Licensed Clinical Social Worker, CA LCSW #24555 · AASECT Certified Sex Therapist
Lauren Goldstein, LCSW, is an AASECT Certified Sex Therapist at Lisa Chen & Associates Therapy with more than 20 years of experience. She sees individuals and couples online anywhere in California, with evening appointments, for low or mismatched desire, sexual anxiety and avoidance, intimacy after infidelity, and LGBTQ+ and non-monogamous relationships. Sessions are $300 for individuals and $325 for couples, and every new client starts with a free 20-minute consultation.
Who I work with
Successful at work. Struggling to feel close.
I'm Lauren, a licensed clinical social worker and AASECT Certified Sex Therapist with over 20 years of experience. I work especially well with thoughtful, introspective people who are successful in their careers but struggle in their relationships and want deeper understanding and closeness.
Many of my clients have complex inner worlds and have spent years feeling misunderstood, or trying to reconcile different parts of themselves. They want more than quick solutions. They're interested in longer-term work: understanding themselves, accepting themselves, and changing long-standing patterns in their relationships.
Sex therapy
Sex is often where the distance shows first
It's also where it's hardest to talk about. Lauren is AASECT certified, the national standard for sex therapists, and trained in couples and sex therapy at UCLA and the University of Michigan.
- Low desire, changes in libido, and difficulty initiating sex
- Mismatched desire between partners
- Sexual anxiety, avoidance, and performance pressure
- The emotional side of sexual pain and past trauma
- Shame around sex, including healing from purity culture or a religious upbringing
- Sexuality and identity, including coming out later in life
- Sex through menopause, perimenopause, parenthood, and aging
Couples therapy for desire and intimacy
When the problem is sex
Many couples come in stuck in a pursue-withdraw cycle: one partner asks for more, the other pulls back, and both feel rejected. Lauren slows that pattern down so neither of you is cast as the problem.
Mismatched desire
When one of you wants sex more often, and the conversation has turned into pressure or avoidance.
Low-sex and sexless relationships
For couples who love each other and have stopped touching.
Rebuilding trust after infidelity
Including the sexual relationship afterward.
LGBTQ+ couples
With particular experience working with queer women and lesbian couples.
Open and polyamorous relationships
Whether you're exploring non-monogamy, renegotiating it, or repairing after a rupture.
Conflict and emotional distance
Recurring fights and quiet distance that have spilled into the bedroom.
Couples sessions can run longer than 50 minutes when the work calls for it. Lauren is Gottman Method trained and Relational Life Therapy (Level 1) trained. For executives, high-stakes couples or intensives, see Lisa Chen.
How I approach this work
The protective patterns you built made sense when you built them.
Therapy works best when there's room for both honesty and compassion. Rather than rushing toward simple answers, we stay with the complexity long enough to understand what's really happening. Most of what people bring in isn't one clean feeling but a tangle of contradictory ones, and I'll be right beside you as we sort through all of it.
At the center of therapy is the experience of being deeply seen. When you feel accepted, without shame or judgment, something softens, and it becomes possible to treat yourself and your loved ones with the same kindness. If those old patterns are costing you closeness now, we'll work together to loosen their hold.
I've trained in many modalities over the years, but I always come back to my psychodynamic roots to understand where you're coming from. From there I take an integrative approach to help you work through the hard places and live with more connection and vitality. I'm active in sessions, direct with my feedback, and I use humor when it helps.
I work with both individuals and couples, and I enjoy working with people who don't fit neatly into categories. I'm proudly LGBTQ+ affirmative, and every letter of the alphabet is welcome here.
Areas of focus
Sex therapy · Mismatched desire · Low libido · Sexual anxiety and avoidance · Intimacy after infidelity · LGBTQ+ individuals and couples · Queer women and lesbian couples · Non-monogamy and polyamory · Purity culture and sexual shame · Coming out later in life · Menopause, midlife and sex · Relationship anxiety · Pursue-withdraw cycles
Training
- AASECT Certified Sex Therapist
- Couples and sex therapy training, UCLA
- Sex therapy certificate, University of Michigan
- Gottman Method trained
- Relational Life Therapy, Level 1
- Two-year postgraduate certificate in psychoanalytic psychotherapy, Los Angeles
Education and license
- Vassar College
- Graduate study in social work, The University of Texas at Austin
- Licensed Clinical Social Worker, California, LCSW #24555
Fees
Individual therapy $300 per 50 minutes. Couples therapy $325 per session. Online only, for clients living in California. Evening appointments available.
Out of network. We provide a superbill, and many employers' PPO plans reimburse a portion. Fees and FAQs
Not sure where to start? Talk it through with us.
A free 20-minute consultation. Tell us what's going on, and we'll confirm whether Lauren is the right fit or match you with another clinician.