Charles Bugh
Direct, practical counseling with a recovery focus
- Credentials
- LMHC
- Experience
- 29 years
- Licensed in
- Indiana
- Languages
- English
- Format
- Online sessions
About Charles
Charles Bugh began his professional path as a licensed mental health counselor with nearly three decades of experience. He is an LMHC (Licensed Mental Health Counselor) based in Indiana. He has worked with people facing addiction and many other mental health concerns over a long career.
He brings practical skills from years in emergency medicine and first responder settings to his clinical work. He uses cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, as a primary approach.
Background and approach
CBT helps people spot unhelpful thoughts and try different behaviors to improve mood and function. He also draws on mindfulness techniques and motivational interviewing when those tools fit a person’s goals. Sessions tend to be straightforward and goal-oriented.
The therapist focuses on clear steps people can try between meetings. He adapts tools to everyday life and talks through coping strategies that can be used at home or work. His background includes substantial experience with addiction and recovery models, and he is comfortable addressing trauma, grief, stress, and mood challenges.
He also has experience with topics such as intimacy and sexuality, including BDSM and kink, and with fatherhood and men’s issues. People seeking practical coaching or therapy around life transitions, career stress, or relationship and parenting concerns may find his style direct and action-focused. The first meetings typically identify priorities and map small, achievable next steps.
Practical approaches for online care
Charles often uses cognitive behavioral therapy, a method that helps people identify unhelpful thoughts and try small behavior changes to reduce symptoms like anxiety or low mood. CBT is useful for stress, panic, mood issues, and problems with coping.He also uses motivational interviewing to help people find internal motivation for change. This conversational style supports goals like reducing substance use or starting healthier routines by focusing on personal reasons for change.
Choosing the right approach is a collaborative process. The therapist will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what has or has not worked before. Together they decide which techniques to try and adjust the plan over time.
Online sessions offer flexibility for busy schedules and for people who live far from a counselor. Video and phone sessions let the same conversations happen in real time, while live chat and text messaging provide shorter check-ins and written tools people can reference later. These options make it easier to practice new skills between meetings and keep therapy consistent with day-to-day life.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
CBT looks at the link between what you think, how you feel, and what you do. You work on noticing unhelpful patterns and practising steadier responses. It suits online sessions well, because much of the work happens between appointments and can be talked through from anywhere.
Mindfulness Therapy
Attention training: noticing thoughts and physical feelings as they arrive without being carried off by them. Much of it is practice you do yourself, so guidance over video or audio works much as it would in person.
Motivational Interviewing
A way of working through mixed feelings about change without being pushed. The therapist helps you weigh things up and find your own reasons, which often makes a difficult decision feel less stuck.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Stress, Anxiety
- Addictions
- Relationship issues
Also works with
- BDSM, kink, and alternative sex culture
- Bipolar disorder
- Career difficulties
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Depression
- Divorce and separation
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Family conflicts
- Fatherhood issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Phobias
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 29 years
- Licensed
- Indiana
- Languages
- English
Next step
Talk to Charles
- Takes a few minutes
- Nothing to set up just to look
- Stop at any point