Counseling & Forensic Psychology in Lufkin, TX

Our main office at 103 Wildlife Lane — counseling, assessments, veterans’ services and court-related evaluations for Lufkin and Angelina County.

Pathways Forensic & Mental Health Services, PLLC provides counseling in Lufkin, TX from its main office at 103 Wildlife Lane. It is the practice’s original location and the base for owner and clinical director Dr. V. Jean Stanley, Ph.D., a Licensed Psychologist, Licensed Professional Counselor-Supervisor and Licensed Sex Offender Treatment Provider-Supervisor with more than twenty years of experience in clinical and forensic psychology across East Texas.

The office serves Lufkin and Angelina County, and it is where the practice’s court-related work for the region is coordinated. Appointments are available in person at Wildlife Lane and virtually for clients anywhere in Texas.

Counseling in Lufkin for individuals, couples and families

The approach at Pathways is cognitive-based and non-judgmental, built on a simple belief: in most cases people can change for the better if they choose to, and even when circumstances are beyond a person’s control, the chosen response to them is not. Counseling in Lufkin covers individuals, married couples, parents and co-parents, children, adolescents and families. The situations our licensed counselors work with every week include stress and anxiety, depression, grief and loss, post-traumatic stress disorder, recovery from sexual or emotional abuse, separation and divorce, blended-family issues, intimacy and commitment problems, child behavioral issues, parenting concerns, anger management, financial stress, and thoughts of suicide or self-harm.

Addiction counseling is part of the Lufkin caseload as well, for substance addictions such as alcohol and drugs and for behavioral addictions such as pornography, sex or gambling. Cognitive-behavioral therapy is used to identify the beliefs and thought patterns behind the behavior and to replace them with better coping and decision-making. Post-bariatric-surgery adjustment counseling is available for patients who have had weight-loss surgery and are finding the changes harder than expected.

Veterans and military families

Angelina County is home to many veterans, and the Charles Wilson VA Outpatient Clinic on North John Redditt Drive brings veterans from across Deep East Texas into town. A few minutes away on Wildlife Lane, the Lufkin office provides veterans’ mental health services: individual and family therapy, trauma-informed CBT and EMDR for PTSD, anxiety, depression, grief and the adjustment to civilian life, with TRICARE and CHAMPVA among the plans accepted. A formal PTSD diagnosis is not required to begin, and spouses and families can be seen on their own or alongside the veteran’s treatment.

Assessments and testing

Not every visit for counseling in Lufkin is therapy. The office offers a range of non-court-related evaluations: ADHD testing (T.O.V.A.) for children, adolescents and adults; intellectual (IQ) testing; vocational interest inventories; functional behavior analysis; public-safety evaluations for suitability to carry a firearm; pre-employment psychological evaluations; and pre-bariatric psychological evaluations, which many bariatric surgeons and insurers require before weight-loss surgery and which Pathways conducts to the guidelines of the American Society of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery. When you call about an assessment, we schedule it for the specific type of evaluation you need, or pass your details to the clinician who will conduct it so they can gather what they need first.

Forensic psychological services in Lufkin

What distinguishes this practice from other counseling in Lufkin is the forensic side. Pathways provides forensic psychological evaluations and treatment for the criminal and family courts, defense and prosecuting attorneys, adult and juvenile probation, state parole and other agencies, State and Federal. Evaluations include competency to stand trial, violence risk assessments, psychosexual risk assessments and evaluations of deviant sexual interest, sentence mitigation evaluations, and assessments relating to anger, parenting and child custody. Dr. Stanley also provides expert testimony in criminal and family law proceedings and trial consultation for criminal and civil cases. Similar services are available for adolescents involved with the juvenile justice system. The office is a short drive from the Angelina County Courthouse and the county’s probation offices, which matters when records, orders and court dates are moving.

Court-mandated counseling in Lufkin is available for people ordered to anger management, substance abuse or sex offender treatment. Sex offender treatment is delivered by a Licensed Sex Offender Treatment Provider, and Dr. Stanley is certified by the Council on Sex Offender Treatment as a Deregistration Evaluation Specialist, one of roughly twenty in Texas, so people approved by CSOT for evaluation toward removal from the Texas sex offender registry can be seen here — see Texas sex offender deregistration evaluations for how that process works. If you have been referred by a court, attorney or probation officer, bring the order or referral letter to the first appointment; it defines what the evaluation has to answer.

About Lufkin

Lufkin is the seat of Angelina County and the commercial center of the Deep East Texas Pineywoods, where US 59 and US 69 meet inside Loop 287. The city is known for the Ellen Trout Zoo, the Texas Forestry Museum and the Museum of East Texas, and for Angelina College, whose counseling and social-work programs have trained several of the clinicians who practice in the area. The Angelina and Davy Crockett National Forests sit on either side of town, and the two regional hospitals, CHI St. Luke’s Health Memorial and Woodland Heights Medical Center, draw patients from a dozen surrounding counties. That regional pull is why the Lufkin office sees clients from Diboll, Huntington, Hudson, Zavalla, Pollok and Wells as readily as from Lufkin itself.

The City of Lufkin and Angelina County websites carry local court, probation and community-resource information; our FAQ answers the questions we hear most from new clients, including which insurance plans we accept.

Address, hours and scheduling

The office is at 103 Wildlife Lane, Lufkin, TX 75904. Hours are Monday through Thursday, 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, and Friday, 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM; evening appointments are available upon request. Call (936) 238-3868 to schedule; the fax line for records is (936) 238-3867. Demand for counseling in Lufkin is high, so the online appointment request is often the fastest route to a first visit.

Once you contact the office you will receive an email with a link to the Pathways Patient Portal, a secure channel for exchanging forms and documents before your appointment. Please complete and return the forms through the portal, or use the online intake forms, which include a Spanish-language client intake and a telehealth consent. In the first sessions you and your therapist clarify the issues, agree on goals and choose the strategies to reach them; a psycho-diagnostic evaluation may be recommended along the way to sharpen the diagnosis and treatment plan.

Two offices, one practice

Pathways also has an office in Nacogdoches, at 1132 NW Stallings Drive, Suite 2, open Monday through Thursday. Both offices use the same phone number, the same forms and the same clinical standards under Dr. Stanley’s direction, so a client who starts counseling in Lufkin can be seen in Nacogdoches, and the reverse, whenever that is more convenient. How your records are kept, how to request a copy, and how to raise a concern about your care are set out on our consumer rights page, written to the notice requirements of the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council.

If you are looking for a therapist or psychologist in Lufkin, TX and are not sure whether you need counseling, an evaluation or both, call the office and describe the situation. That is the question the front desk answers every day, and the answer decides who you see first.

Lufkin office

103 Wildlife Lane
Lufkin, TX 75904

Mon–Thu 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.
Fri 8:00 a.m.–12:00 noon

Helpful links

Ready to take the first step?

Whether you need confidential counseling or a court-related evaluation, our team in Lufkin and Nacogdoches is here to help.

(936) 238-3868