Judith Liu

A practice built on connection and purpose

Judith is the owner, Clinical Director, and a practicing clinician at Steady Compass Counseling Services, which she founded in 2021 on a commitment to compassionate, individualized care. With over 20 years of experience, she works with individuals, families, and communities navigating complex life challenges, with a deep focus on the human–animal bond, grief, and pet loss.

Judith also serves as a Clinical Supervisor, providing mentorship to graduate-level interns and provisionally licensed clinicians as they develop into ethical, confident practitioners. Her background spans corporate and nonprofit leadership in financial education and housing, which informs her financial social work practice. She has provided immigration evaluation services for many years and has extensive experience working with military families, female active-duty service members, and combat veterans. Judith is currently working toward her Certification in Veterinary Social Work.

An adoptive parent herself, Judith brings personal understanding to the complexities of adoption, identity, and family-building. This lived experience grounds her work with adoptive families, children, and individuals exploring questions of belonging, attachment, and identity.

You are the expert in your own life

Judith’s clinical work centers on helping people move through anxiety, grief, burnout, life transitions, and relational challenges with greater clarity and self-trust. She works with adults, children, teens, caregivers, military families, and individuals in high-stress or caregiving roles.

A meaningful part of her practice includes grief and loss counseling, particularly pet loss. She understands how profound the human–animal bond can be, and how isolating this type of grief can feel when it is not fully recognized or supported.

Judith believes you are the expert in your own life. Her role is to walk alongside you, offering guidance, insight, and steady support, while creating a safe, nonjudgmental space to explore challenges and strengths. Her own lived experiences with adversity shape her empathy and reinforce her belief in our capacity to heal, grow, and move forward, even during uncertain or painful chapters.

Why Judith works with animals

The Gentle Paw

Animals as co-facilitators of healing

Therapy animals bring a calming, grounding presence that can help reduce stress, ease anxiety, and foster emotional connection. Their nonjudgmental companionship can make it easier to open up, especially when words are hard to find. Whether you’re navigating trauma, life changes, or just need a safe space to heal, therapy animals can be powerful partners in the process.

In Judith’s practice, animals are co-facilitators, never the focus, always the support. Clients are welcome to choose whether or not they’d like to work with a therapy animal. Depending on comfort and preference, they may request to work specifically with Judith’s therapy dog, Ruby, or her therapy cat, Grogu. Your emotional safety and sense of control are central to the work.

Learn more at thegentlepaw.com →

A grounded, integrative approach

Judith draws from a range of established modalities to tailor each engagement to the individual in front of her. Her style is collaborative, practical, and grounded, well suited to therapy clients, supervisees, and those seeking specialized evaluations or coaching.

Supporting the next generation of clinicians

A little about Judith

Animals have always been central to Judith’s life and values. She is deeply involved in animal welfare and therapy-animal work, with years of experience volunteering in rescue, fostering, transport, crisis support, and community education.

She currently serves as an active Board Member of All The King’s Horses Equine Rescue, a Connecticut-based 501(c)(3) dedicated to the rescue, rehabilitation, and placement of equines facing neglect, abuse, or threat of slaughter. Her work with the organization reflects a longstanding commitment to advocacy for vulnerable animals and the people whose lives they touch.

At home, Judith shares life with her family: her son and their two Boston Terriers, Ruby and Kai Xin, along with their Sphynx cat, Grogu. Together they are a daily reminder of the comfort, connection, and resilience that family and animals bring, and they continue to inspire both her personal life and professional work.