About Daniel Ahearn, LMFT

Training and Credentials

I'm one of the only certified Integrative Attachment Therapy (IAT) clinicians in the United States and have trained directly with Dan Brown and David Elliott since 2018 in the Ideal Parent Figure Protocol and its clinical applications.

I hold licenses as a Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) and Certified Alcohol and Drug Abuse Counselor (CADAC). For over a decade, I've specialized in attachment-focused work with adolescents, men, and families—first in residential treatment and now in private practice and as Director of Culture at Ascend Healthcare.

Clinical Philosophy

Most people I work with aren't broken—they're adapted. The strategies that protected you as a child (withdrawal, performance, self-reliance, vigilance) made sense then. They may even work professionally. But they cost you in intimate relationships.

Attachment repair isn't about understanding why you do what you do. It's about changing the procedural memory—the automatic nervous system response—that runs your relationships.

Using IAT and the Ideal Parent Figure Protocol, I help clients internalize what secure attachment feels like. Not conceptually. Somatically. Your body learns: "I'm safe. I'm valued. I belong. I can trust connection."

This changes everything.

Specialized Training

  • Integrative Attachment Therapy (IAT) Certification

  • Ideal Parent Figure Protocol with Dan Brown and David Elliott

  • Trauma-focused modalities

  • Adolescent development and family systems

  • Contemplative approaches to therapy

Professional Role

As Director of Culture at Ascend Healthcare, I train clinicians in attachment-focused treatment, design therapeutic milieu, and ensure that our organizational culture reflects the secure attachment we're helping families create.

Personal Context

I'm a father. I know what it's like to see my own patterns show up in parenting and have to do the work to change them. This isn't theoretical for me: It's personal and ongoing.

I integrate contemplative practice into my life and clinical work. Mindfulness, somatic awareness, and Buddhist psychology inform how I hold space for clients. But the core of my work is attachment repair—grounded in neuroscience, trauma theory, and developmental psychology.

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