Motherhood comes with a lot of advice. For a long time, it hasn’t come with enough
support, especially for the mother herself.
Women’s Health Innovations of Arizona (WHI) was founded by clinicians who kept
seeing the same gap: new mothers whose mental health went unaddressed while all the
attention went to the baby. WHI built something Arizona didn’t have: accessible,
specialized care for Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders (PMADs), including
postpartum depression, postpartum anxiety, and postpartum OCD. One in five women
experiences a perinatal mood or anxiety disorder, and most never get diagnosed or
treated. WHI was built to close that gap, one family at a time.
As families kept returning through new stages of life, WHI grew with them. Today, WHI
Kids provides mental health therapy for children from birth through age 17, using play
therapy, art therapy, and sand tray techniques so kids who aren’t ready to talk can still
be understood and supported. School-age children get help with grief, trauma, anxiety,
ADHD, and academic stress; teens get support navigating identity and independence;
and parents get coaching alongside their child’s care.
ADHD support has become one of WHI’s fastest-growing programs. About 1 in 9
children nationally are diagnosed with ADHD, and roughly 60% carry symptoms into
adulthood, yet most families are never given tools that actually fit how their child’s brain
works. WHI’s ADHD coaching, available for kids, teens, and adults, is one-on-one and
skills-based, building the organization, follow-through, and emotional regulation that
therapy or medication alone don’t always cover.
Couples counseling, men’s therapy, grief support, trauma care, and menopause and
perimenopause support round out a whole-family model of care, all delivered by
licensed therapists and support coaches across WHI’s Gilbert and Tempe locations.
Sessions are available in person at either office or virtually, and WHI accepts most
major insurance plans, including AHCCCS Medicaid, with funds available for qualifying
families so cost isn’t a barrier to getting help.
The innovation here isn’t a device or an app. It’s a model of care built around a simple
idea: every member of the family deserves the same attention the baby gets. If you or
someone you love is navigating pregnancy, postpartum, childhood struggles, or ADHD,
help is close to home.
Learn more or schedule a consultation at whiarizona.org.
Michelle Lacy, LPC, PMH-C, is the Executive Director of Women’s Health Innovations of Arizona (WHI), a Gilbert- and Tempe-based nonprofit dedicated to closing gaps in
maternal, child, and family mental health care. Under her leadership, WHI has grown
from a small group of clinicians into one of Arizona’s leading providers of perinatal
mental health, children’s therapy, and ADHD coaching.
