Ingrid Clayton, PhD, is a clinical psychologist, writer, and trauma specialist in private practice in Los Angeles. She is the author of Believing Me: Healing from Narcissistic Abuse and Complex Trauma and Recovering Spirituality: Achieving Emotional Sobriety in Your Spiritual Practice, as well as the book Fawning, which explores the often misunderstood trauma response of people pleasing. Across her work, Ingrid combines clinical insight with her own lived experience of complex trauma, bringing a deeply human and relational perspective to conversations about healing, identity, and reclaiming one’s voice.

With a master’s degree in transpersonal psychology and a PhD in clinical psychology, Ingrid’s approach integrates psychological depth, nervous system awareness, and trauma informed care. Her work focuses on helping individuals understand the survival patterns that shaped them, particularly those rooted in relational trauma, emotional abuse, and the often overlooked “fawn” response. Through therapy, writing, and teaching, she helps people recognize how strategies like people pleasing, self abandonment, or spiritual bypassing can develop as adaptive responses to early environments.

Ingrid is known for bridging the gap between clinical psychology and lived experience, creating work that is both intellectually grounded and deeply accessible. Her memoir Believing Me explores her own journey of recognizing and healing childhood trauma through the lens of a psychologist, offering readers a powerful reflection on memory, truth, and recovery. She is also a regular contributor to Psychology Today, where her writing on topics such as self gaslighting, trauma bonding, and emotional sobriety has reached a wide audience.

Through her writing, speaking, and clinical practice, Ingrid’s work invites people to better understand the nervous system patterns that shape their lives, and to reconnect with authenticity, agency, and a deeper sense of self.