Mario Ponce, LMFT is an experienced, versatile clinician who is bilingual in Spanish. He enthusiastically supports a wide variety of client needs with Nugent Family Counseling Center: kids, parents, individuals, couples, and families. Mario’s favorite part of his work is being a part of making small changes in people’s lives. He is inspired by Maya Angelou’s wisdom: “ People will not remember what you say, but they will remember how you made them feel”
Mario has 6 years experience doing extensive crisis work with mental health urgent care clients at Valley Medical Center, Santa Clara County Behavioral Health Department. While with Children’s Health Alliance Council (CHAC), Mario’s efforts focused on middle school students ages 11-13 and their families referred by Sunnyvale and Mountain View school districts. He supported concerns and needs surrounding ADHD/ADD, autism, trauma, depression, anxiety. He brings years of experience supervising behavior modification therapeutic services for 5 to 21 year olds under the Family & Children Division of Gardner Family Health. Mario also ran psych-education groups of 12-18 year old teens for the Juvenile Probation Department. He supervised teen residential treatment homes and related therapeutic behavioral services.
As a domestic violence facilitator with “A Turning Point”, Mario conducted 16 and 52 week court mandated anger management groups. Palo Alto School District found him as a job developer for their Department of Rehab, supporting and helping students with ADHD/ADD, autism disorder and other special needs to resource and secure employment while finishing school. His customized approaches integrate his expertise in CBT, DBT, ACT, solution-focused and trauma.
In his off time, Mario takes off for walks with his German Shepherd canine buddy named Kooba; they especially enjoy hiking Rancho San Antonio Park or the Half Moon Bay beaches. Mario loves soccer, football, dancing and all genres of music. His favorite foods are Vietnamese and BBQ. He is approachable, funny, open-minded, and genuinely eager to meet you where you’re at to help you make progress in your life and relationships.