my bio
I am a licensed professional clinical counselor and clinical supervisor with 20+ years dedicated to culturally responsive and equitable mental health care. I completed a masters degree in Counseling Psychology from Lesley College, Cambridge, MA and post graduate studies in intellectual assessment at Cambridge College.
My foundation is in human development, crisis intervention, clinical assessment, trauma recovery, diversity, and multidisciplinary team leadership. Early in my career, working alongside a network of dedicated professionals in urban and rural communities facing complex trauma and health disparities, I supported children healing from trauma, immigrant and Indigenous communities, first responders, and 9/11 survivors. I developed and evaluated mental health programs to meet community needs, advocated for equitable access to care, and both served and led equity councils. Alongside direct service, I’ve supervised interns and newly licensed therapists, taught social and life skills to youth, and trained professional staff on trauma responsiveness and human behavior and development. That work in residential treatment, public and tribal schools, and private practice was foundational to the work I do today
My virtual practice, WellByShellLLC, serves Colorado and New Mexico. My areas of care include health and performance, relationship with self and others, trauma recovery, diversity, behavior change, anxious thinking, and life transitions. I work with young and midlife adults, including people in high-demand fields — health care, first response, performance, pro and non-pro athletes — and people experiencing burnout. My whole-person approach draws on DBT, CBT, ACT, nutrition, movement, and sleep, influenced by neuroscience and the gut brain axis. If you’re a Colorado or New Mexico resident with insurance or public health insurance and would like to work with me, you can find me here.
My current project is a broader advocacy and education platform:
Reimagine Mental Health: Any Day for Everyone, Whole Body, Know Your Self.
It’s built on the same equity-driven foundation as my clinical work with an international reach, focusing on normalizing mental health as part of preventative care. Its 3 pillars are simple:
- Mental health as any day health for everyone, not just in crisis.
- Mental health is whole-body health requiring approaches that include movement, nutrition, and sleep.
- Know your self: your body, your values, how you learn, your strengths, your weaknesses, what you’ll carry on and what you’ll leave behind.
Licensure:
National Board of Certified Counselors NBCC 1696346 – US
Counseling and Therapy Practice Board lic # CTB-2022-0068 – New Mexico
State Board of Licensed Professional Counselor Examiners # LPC 0022137 – Colorado
I am a member of the National Association of Mental Illness & the World Federation for Mental Health.
Licenses can be verified through the Colorado DORA licensee lookup and the New Mexico Regulation and Licensing Department lookup.
Areas of Current Study:
Complex trauma: National Institute of Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine
Nutrition and Mental Health: Mass General Hospital, Harvard Medical
Gut Brain Axis: Center for Nutritional Psychology
Facing History & Facing Ourselves: anti-racism education
Shell (shelley) A. Welch, MA, LPCC, LPC
