Starting a Private Practice: Interview with Angel Thomson, LMFTA

Ever feel the unshakable pull towards helping others, or the deep-seated drive to ensure no one feels alone? Our guest, Angel, a licensed marriage and family therapist associate, knows all about it. With a special focus on women and non-binary individuals, Angel's therapy work is a beacon in the face of anxiety, relationship struggles, and loss. Listen in as Angel details their mission of building a supportive community for associates in private practice, a testament to their relentless determination and magnanimous nature.

Navigating the mental health industry is no walk in the park. Buckle up as we tackle the harsh realities of the oppressive cycle that starts in graduate school and continues well into pre-licensure. Through the lens of our personal experiences, we examine the sacrifices and privileges associated with this profession. Weaving through tales of commitment and resilience, we uncover the financial struggles, the limited opportunities, and the impacts on the ability to help clients effectively.

But hold on, there's more. Embark on a journey with us as we touch upon the challenges faced in private practice, the art of setting boundaries, and the essentiality of self-care to avoid burning out. Experience the power of storytelling as we dive into the shifting narrative in the therapy world towards prioritizing self-care and advocating for better working conditions. As our conversation crescendos, we'll explore the power dynamics in therapy, the role of vulnerability, and the joy of witnessing client growth and progress. So, tune in to this enriching episode that promises to unravel the complexities of therapy as a form of medicine, both for therapists and clients alike.

You can find out more about Angel and her work on her website: https://www.ojalaalliance.com/

Instagram @mentalbreakitdown
Email: mentalbreakitdown@gmail.com
Logo Artwork: artofandoy.com

Connect with us of you have questions, want to be on the podcast, or have topics you want discussed!

Transcript

Sam: 0:00

Welcome to Mental Break it Down, a podcast for therapists and the therapy curious where we dig into all things mental health and mental health adjacent. We're so happy you're here, let's jump in. Welcome to Mental Break it Down. I'm Sonia, I'm Sam and welcome Jo.

Sonia: 0:14

And Jo, thank you. It's so exciting to have you here. I'm happy to be here. Thanks for having me. Yeah, so we're going to get into who you are, what you do, why you got into this, all of that good stuff today.

Sam: 0:29

Yeah, you want to do a quick and dirty bio on yourself, sure.

Angel: 0:33

Yeah, I am a licensed marriage and family therapist associate in Washington. I have a private practice based out of Renton, but I do online counseling throughout the state. Yeah, what else? I'm a creative person. I write poetry, I love music, I play a little bit of this and that.

Sam: 0:55

Yeah, Instruments A little bit. What do you play? I play piano.

Sonia: 1:02

Oh my gosh, how elegant. Well, not when I play, are you?

Sam: 1:05

imagining like a lot of the little, and you're over here like smashing, like what's happening. Yeah, I'm not classically trained, it doesn't.

Angel: 1:17

It's not a lot of, like you know, classical pieces.

Sonia: 1:20

I just always wanted to be like you know, but I don't, I don't know. I think I have short fingers Like long fingers, piano fingers yeah, I don't know if I have piano fingers or the coordination I love it.

Sam: 1:32

But I'm curious you're a licensed marriage and family therapist associate. What made you get into this field?

Angel: 1:38

I feel like this question is always hard for me to answer because it's not just one thing and so short answer would be I feel like I was sort of led to it and then long answer I think about. I have this picture of me, and probably like maybe two or something, when I'm sitting on my great grandpa's porch. He's in the background and his German shepherd, gina, is like laying in front of me and I'm putting a blanket over her, like a crocheted blanket that my grandma had made, and I'm like putting it on her while she's like laying out sleeping and I didn't want her to be cold on the floor. And so always having this sort of like natural caring sense within me and finding myself doing like mentorship things with teens and having my own sort of experiences of loss in my life my friend when I was 15 died by suicide and so that, just you know, changed everything for me and I felt this sense of aloneness.

Angel: 2:52

And then there's a lot of different factors. I was playing into that, but I carried this like sense of. I just never wanted anyone to ever feel that sense of aloneness Right and so kind of held that within me and wandered and wandered and got my undergrad in psychology and then went on to do my master's. But it was never this thing of like I'm going to be a therapist. It was always like I have this sense of like what feels really important to me and like this thing that I want to be able to contribute to others and like what is that going to look like for me? So yeah, just sort of followed that sense, followed what I felt like was leading and here.

Sonia: 3:42

I am here. You are so glad you're here, and can you talk to us a little bit about your niche and what specific work that you do?

Angel: 3:52

Yeah, so I work primarily with women and non-binary folks around a couple of different things. Usually, with my clients, there is some sense of loss, so that kind of feels like a thread that runs through the clients that come to me.

Angel: 4:09

So grief, work, anxiety is kind of catch, all right Usually they come to me because there's this overwhelming sense of anxiety, relationship distress, a lot of clients where there's like really like past relationship struggles, divorce, identity work. A lot of my Latina clients, especially living in Washington, there's a kind of hard, especially my students that are here, and so yeah, kind of all those different things.

Sam: 4:42

I want to talk about. I want to talk about. We did meet through Facebook which, love it or hate it, it can be really helpful in building community and you had started a group for associates in private practice on Facebook. I did Tell us why you started that group.

Sonia: 4:59

Yes, that is a huge undertaking because it's growing every week. I feel like you have a new post every day welcoming new members.

Angel: 5:09

Or at least it feels like it Every couple of days. Yeah, can't always get in there, but yeah it's pretty cool.

Sonia: 5:16

Why did you take that on?

Angel: 5:19

Yeah, so I think I started that last fall, maybe October, november last year, and I think we have like over 200 members now, which is so cool. I was really struggling with my private practice and I felt frustrated as an associate. When you're working towards your hours for full licensure, your options are really limited in where you can work and how you can work. So I started my private practice and knew that that's what I wanted to do, but was really struggling to market myself to bring in new clients, to attract the kind of clients that I really felt purpose to work with. I was just really frustrated. I was financially really struggling. I think I had maybe four or five clients at the time.

Angel: 6:19

I'm a single person, I'm responsible for everything in my life, and so I was personally really struggling with trying to support myself to do this work that I feel like I'm purpose to do.

Angel: 6:31

And so, yeah, just my own feelings of that and feeling really angry that it's so hard for us to do this, helping work and feeling powerless in some ways of like how do I help change something that I'm being actively influenced by, sort of oppressed by, and I just felt like the only thing that I could do was not be alone in it, right and for others to not be alone in it. And so, yeah, I just was like I have learned a lot and I know that I have a lot of resources to offer other associates. I know that I'm not the only one that feels this way and I know that other people are afraid to be vocal about it. There's a lot of shaming that comes from associates that like right it's. I don't know why. I say it like kind of sorry, you're struggling, but like that's just what it is sort of thing right and so-.

Angel: 7:33

We all have to go through it, enjoy, right, the whole pay-or-do sort of thing, and I yeah. So I just thought the only thing that I could do is really create a space of support for myself and for others, and so yeah, that's what I did.

Sonia: 7:50

Yeah, I thank you for starting that, because I think Sam and I joined and we got on the resource list and it was. It's such a great space for us, for other associates, and I feel like when people think of therapists, we talk to people all day long right, we're with people all day long, and yet it can be very isolating. It can be a very. It can feel lonely. It's siloed. It's siloed. It can be and especially for those of us that do it virtual, like Sam and I, have a group practice together so we see each other most days and we have other therapists in the office and we can create community like that. But for therapists like yourself who are working virtually, it absolutely can get really lonely really fast. And building community and we've talked about this is so important in this line of work.

Sam: 8:47

And the group that you started. From my perspective, I was, of course, part of the big groups in the area for therapists, but there was nothing in particular for associates, and so stumbling upon the associate group especially because it's for associates in private practice right, it's the thing that we're kind of actively pushed away from doing, even though we can it's very much like no, they talk about community mental health. That's what you do after school, but there's this whole other option. So, going into the space that you created, I felt so. I was so relieved to come into it because I can ask the quote unquote, you know stupid newbie questions, but I wasn't treated that way, it's.

Sam: 9:29

Oh yeah, I went through the same experience. Here's what I did. It was a wealth and an outpouring of resources and support, and even when we wanted to take it like into the real world and invite people to the office, it was this excitement about anybody wanting to do anything with each other. It was so. It made me feel better because we're making this choice to go into private practice and it's a hard one, it's scary, it's all of those things, but it was made easier by that community support.

Sam: 10:00

So we greatly appreciate you starting this I know it's only the first anniversary coming up of it and there's 200 members and I'm sure many of those people are feeling the same way. What an impact.

Angel: 10:13

Thank you, I'm so glad that's been your experience.

Sam: 10:16

And also well organized. You have a resource, you have a referral list, you have resource lists, you have everything pinned and it just speaks to the positive effect that community support can have. I'm so glad.

Sonia: 10:28

I think it helps us do our work better. Dare, I say that, sure, do it. Okay, fine, I feel like having a community of other people that understand what I go through day to day, what Sam and I go through day to day. It helps take some of the pressure off. And you don't feel like, am I like losing my mind on my own over here by myself, or are other people feeling this too? Or can we share in the joy and the successes of being an associate in private practice?

Sam: 11:05

I mean to speak to the limitations. Right, we're doing the same work that more quote unquote season clinicians are doing, but there are so many limitations in like the type of certifications we can get and the work that we can do, and so I'm curious if you could talk more about. What you mentioned also is like the oppression, so that's going to look different for every state.

Angel: 11:25

So associates in California have it even harder than we do in Washington. Yeah, so, when it comes to licensure, right, you're an intern, you get your experience right and you graduate, you get your degree and whatever that is, your master's and whatever. And then right, you still have to finish your hours and during that time you're we're provisionally licensed or whatever, so we can practice. And while you're provisionally licensed, there's things like insurance will not contract with you, eaps, for the most part, will not contract with you, and so, as an associate, on your own and private practice, for the most part, you are sort of forced into having to be cash pay and so there's more into it.

Angel: 12:21

Then it becomes this thing of do I have the resources to be able to build up my practice, to have marketing, to invest in SEO, to invest in all of these things that are going to get me out there so that people can see me, so they can find me and decide if they want to pay out of pocket for me there's a lot of great that goes into that or if I don't have any of those resources, I have to work for someone else.

Angel: 12:52

So, working for someone else as an associate, you're going to get paid pretty poorly, and so being able to live for me as a single person on a poor wage is not possible. I cannot live working for community mental health or even another group practice. You will get paid less than half of what you should be getting paid and what you can be getting paid when you're running your own practice, and so for me it feels like when I talk about oppression in this sense, there aren't a lot of clinicians with freedom, like licensed clinicians that have the freedom and have the access that want to make it easier for newer clinicians in the field. It's almost like, in some ways, group practices are structured to make money off of lower level licensed clinicians, and that keeps lower level licensed clinicians earning low wages. It's that cycle.

Angel: 14:09

It just keeps going and it's the same thing of where it really starts is education, where we intern and we work for nothing, for free.

Sonia: 14:15

We work for free, we work for hours. Yeah, you pay to not get paid really because you have to pay tuition to get the hours for your internship.

Sam: 14:24

And there are few and far between stipend intern positions.

Angel: 14:27

But, they're pretty rare.

Sam: 14:29

They're very rare, at least in this area, from what I saw. And I mean there are group practices that run differently and I've seen some group practices. They're actively supporting people and learning how to be in private practice, but like the paid internship positions, those are extremely rare.

Sonia: 14:43

And so you're saying it starts there. Where this cycle starts is in internship in grad school. I think so, yeah.

Angel: 14:53

I mean, how much different would it have been if we were all? So I had two internships and I did get a stipend for the first one. It was, I don't know, maybe like $300 a month or something, but it was something.

Angel: 15:08

But like, how much different right Would it? What kind of a setup would that have been for us if we were getting paid to work as an intern right? That would have been a game changer for me. I was full-time grad school on my own, also working full time to part time on the side and doing my internship. Wow Right, like that's nuts.

Sonia: 15:34

That is nuts.

Angel: 15:36

You don't have to do that. You know Right. And so had I been getting paid where I was working with these clients, I wouldn't have had to work at this other job that I was doing, which would also give me more space to really learn and reflect and dive into that work that I was like learning and doing with these clients. But that's not the case.

Sam: 16:02

How different would the experience have been if it wasn't like a survival situation? Yeah, Because you can't focus on anything and I also worked full-time and did internship almost full-time and school full-time. I also had support of my spouse, which I was very lucky. I mean, that's not even mentioning area of like privilege. You have to be an even just to start this process and be able to pay for school and to be able to still continue to live while doing this work, Because every step of the way it feels like it feels like a challenge to prove how much you want to do this work by self-sacrificing, if that makes any sense.

Sonia: 16:39

It does make sense. I think just this profession, in its nature, is a very giving right. We are referred to as helpers and when the helping profession, when the giving profession, and there is a sense of martyrdom right. We talked about it and yet, at the end of the day, we are still human beings that have to live and pay our bills. We have support, we have student loans, we have all the other things that everybody else has, and a well clinician is a helpful clinician. Yeah.

Sam: 17:16

Like when we are healthy and have time and money in space, we're able to give more to clients and be more helpful.

Sonia: 17:25

But I think, angel, as you said, it's this oppressive cycle and I think even in our community that is a flagged word. We're not supposed to use that, but it does feel like that sometimes that it is so hard for us to get from A to B, right From grad school to internship, from internship to pre-licensure, every step of the way. It is a difficult road and I think it's pretty rare that it's a easy journey. I'm curious what made you go into private practice versus joining community mental health or group practice? What did it for you?

Angel: 18:12

Yeah. So after grad school, I took a year off to come back to life and then I joined a group practice and I was working for them for a year and it was in let's see, I think, 2020. Yeah, I think, yeah. So fall of 2020. So we were, everything was shut down, we were all doing virtual, and so I was working for my bedroom seeing these clients, so I didn't know. Nobody was doing an office work at that time. So I literally had only gone to the office once to like get my picture taken for the website, and so I initially went into the group practice wanting community. That's what I wanted, right, that's what we all want.

Angel: 19:03

Yeah, other groups and so I thought, well, one I think there was a sense to, because we're told this a lot as associates of like private practice is gonna be too hard, I'm not gonna be able to do it. So I had this sense of like I don't think that I can handle that on my own and I also want community, so let's, I think a group kind of fits right, that's the best option. And so, yeah, got hired. I started was seeing all these clients from my bedroom and started to where, as time goes on, that you reflect on like do I like this, Do I like this work? I am not making very much money. I think I was making. I was making $35, a client hour $35, a client hour.

Sam: 19:55

Okay.

Angel: 19:57

Yeah, with the expectation that I would see 20 clients a week in order to have health insurance through them. $30 an hour with a master's degree is like nothing right, especially for like this work that we do. And so I didn't really know that at the time, which is fine, and so I really wasn't enjoying the work that I was doing. I wasn't really enjoying the things that I was working with, the populations that I was working with. I wasn't getting paid enough. I had to live with roommates at the time and really felt taken advantage of because I knew how much clients were paying to see me and that rate increased probably three times while I was there in that year and I saw I think I got like one raise like five bucks.

Angel: 20:56

I think I made like $40 an hour at some point. But I just felt like I'm not. I don't have the sense of community right that I'm wanting. Nobody shows up to these consoles that we're supposed to have. I'm not making enough to live. I don't really enjoy this work and I kind of was feeling like I don't know if I want to do this right, like it's hard when you're in that space to feel like what is actually causing my distress, right now.

Sam: 21:22

Is it?

Angel: 21:22

just that I don't want to be a therapist, or is it like all of these things are compounding to make me feel like this is just not where I'm supposed to be? And so, yeah, I was like this is not the place for me for all of these reasons, and really wrestled with that, though, of like, okay, is this not the place? And also I don't want to do this, I don't want to be a therapist. So I wrestled. I wrestled in supervision, I wrestled in my own personal therapy. Of like, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing, right?

Sonia: 21:53

I thought that I wanted this.

Sam: 21:55

Which is distressing in itself, because I've done all this work for what?

Angel: 21:58

Yeah, all this sacrifice, yeah, yeah, and so just kept sort of wrestling with it, letting right my supervisor and my therapist right helped me navigate that and figure that out and pull things apart, and then just decided it's, I think it really is this place. So decided I was going to leave and then I had two options right, do I want to give the group practice another try Somewhere else 2021? Now things are a little bit more open, people are doing more in person or do I want to start my own? And all of my people were like start your own, except for maybe like one or two, but majority of people were like start your own. Who?

Sonia: 22:44

are your people that supported that. Who's like? Were they other?

Angel: 22:46

tips. Were they friends? Who are they? My supervisor, she had done the same. Nice, she was like why are you like, you know why? Why are you not? You know, explore that with me. My own therapist was like same thing, not like this do-whip, but this like why, opening it up for me, right, helping me, like, see that as a viable option. My friends were the same, like my non-therapist friends, right, they just know me also, and I not the best employee don't work well for others, so they know that right. And so my friends, my I think even my brothers, were pretty supportive. My most of my family was too, but some of them had some reasonable concerns, but for the most part, everybody was like we know you, if that's what you want, we think you can do it, which was really cool. So, anyway, those are my options, right, and in the same weekend it was actually the hot one of the hottest weekends that I think it was June it was like 103.

Sonia: 23:53

I remember that. Oh my God, it was so hot. I had to stay at my friend's house. I had AC at the time. Yes, Let me in your house.

Angel: 24:00

So that same weekend I had found an office through Facebook that was available for sub lease and I also had an interview with another group practice. It was the same weekend and I had to do both and figure out what I was going to do, and while it was a million degrees Melting into it, I was looking at two options when you were already doing it, one that you could do.

Angel: 24:20

Right, and I'm really like I really just hope my cats are okay right now. Oh yeah, so I had, like my roommate like throwing water it was. That whole weekend was a nightmare, and so I just, yeah, kind of allowed myself to explore those options. Right, what would it look like? Right, what did I feel like standing in this space, my own space, right, and the more that I sort of leaned in to either, of course, I made a pro con list that I still have, oh, therapists love pros con lists we love.

Sam: 24:50

Evaluate the ROI.

Angel: 24:54

And really felt like private. My own private practice is what I wanted. What told you that?

Sam: 25:04

What feeling did you get standing in that space?

Angel: 25:07

I was really excited, right, yeah, so it was really. It was so exciting to stand in a space that was going to be mine. But then I also there was some fear there. Right, there was a fear of like, fuck, what if I can't do this? I didn't go into this naive of like I'm gonna be, this is gonna be easy, I'm gonna get all the clients in a week. I knew that it was gonna be hard. But then there was also the fear of like, what if I join this group and it's the same thing what if I?

Angel: 25:44

When you're working for someone else, for the most part, right, you don't pick your clients, you don't really get much control over your marketing, you give up a lot of freedom to have the stability of a full caseload, to have the financial stability. And so I felt like I really wanted stability desperately. But I also was like I don't think I'm willing to give up my freedom, right, I don't think that I'm willing to give up my control over what work I'm doing and over the lives that I'm sitting with, you know. And so it was like, really, I don't wanna struggle, you know, I don't wanna just like I could, really my practice could just tank right. But it's also like I really don't wanna hate this work. I really don't wanna be. You know, five years down the line and I'm no longer a therapist. You just burnt out.

Angel: 26:43

Yeah, you know and so there was a lot of fear about different parts of it and I just ultimately felt like I wasn't willing to give up my freedom to create really and to choose and to be. I didn't want anyone telling me what I couldn't can wear to the office. I didn't want anyone telling me what color hair I couldn't have. I didn't want anyone telling me when I couldn't, couldn't work or how to work, or you know I just I felt like I had a better sense of like what kind of clinician I wanted to be and I was going to lose, I was going to be stifled.

Sonia: 27:28

Working for someone else.

Sonia: 27:30

It's pretty powerful. Yeah, I echo so much of what you said. I think Sam and I have felt a lot of those same things Like this is really, really exciting and scary at the same time. But I don't know about you, angel, but the excitement outweighed the scary and part of the scary is needing that stability. I know there's a paycheck, I know there's health insurance, possibly a 401K right, and yet the excitement of what it could be and the independence and making it yours outweighs the scary and stability which we are programmed to go that way right as a society. Just do it, do it well, don't make the flow Right. And one thing that I do want to touch up on that you said is making $35 an hour which to a lot of people that's an insane amount of money.

Sonia: 28:29

That's a great hourly rate, Sure. However, can you talk a little bit about why in our work that is not great?

Angel: 28:41

sometimes, yeah, yeah. So being a therapist is not like many other jobs. I actually don't really know anything else that is like it, and so I just think about this. There's this amazing post that someone posted on Facebook about just describing to someone's partner that couldn't understand the work that we do, and just explaining what you're doing, right, when you're a therapist, you're sitting, you're full attention, right with people, all day long, right, and the work, the kind of work that we do is inherently very draining. It takes a lot of skill, right, I'm talking to you, I'm tracking you, I'm following you, I'm connecting what you're saying to the history of your life. I'm right, going deeper into things. There's so many things that I'm doing at the same time. That is very.

Sam: 29:41

We love it, we enjoy it, but it's also very draining.

Angel: 29:43

It's not just sitting and listening. Yeah Right, I'm not just nodding at you. And so we do very deep, complex, mentally and emotionally taxing work.

Angel: 29:57

And so right, we don't. We, I mean, I would never work 40 hours a week as a therapist. I would not be a good therapist or friend or human. It would not be good for me. I don't have that much capacity to sit with 40 people and give them my complete attention personally and clinically I can't do it, Not possible for me, and so that means I don't work. I don't see 40 clients a week. So, yeah, we work less hours because of that. And there's also other parts too, like when you're a business owner, there's, you know, easily 10 plus hours of things you've got to do, depending on like what else you're running?

Angel: 30:46

Yeah, right, and so it's just a different kind of job. It's not the same as traditional 40 week, 32 hour week jobs. Right, you just can't compare them. I don't know if I answered your question.

Sonia: 31:01

No, I think you did, I did. It's also that we are trained to do this. We have skills to do this we went to school for this. It's not like, oh, I just decided to do this one day. We put years time, energy, blood, sweat, tears into this right and, yeah, it is hard to describe what we do. And a doctor could see eight, 10 clients a day, patients a day, but you're not spending hour undivided attention, like it's totally different.

Angel: 31:35

Yeah, my doctor doesn't know shit about me. Yeah 15 minutes done. Next patient Like Estonia even thinking about sitting with. Maybe you see five clients a day sitting with someone in their distress, in their pain, in their sadness, in their suffering for five hours just that it's not you absorb it.

Sam: 32:01

You absorb it, you take it. There's a lot of give and take. It's a lot of energy from the clinician.

Angel: 32:07

Yeah, I mean right, I have to tolerate my, I have to regulate my own emotions and keep yourself out of it. Right? Well, I'm with them. Right, we're there together. I don't take what's not mine, but even just sitting with someone that's really struggling in itself is a lot.

Sonia: 32:28

It is, it is. I have to then refresh, reach hard, whatever you want to call it for. Then the next client yeah, and you have to be fully present for them, because that is what they need and that is what they deserve. That is why they're coming to you and it is a lot of work and rewarding work, but it is a lot of work.

Sam: 32:51

And we haven't even touched on completing notes, treatment plans, training, other admin stuff, case management, like researching things for clients, all of those little nitty gritty parts. That private practice we don't get paid by the hour for that. But even in group practice sometimes you might be lucky to get admin pay, which is usually what Minimum wage, maybe for that time, if you get that and that you're doing this when you're also trying to figure out like, okay, do I take these four minutes to go to the bathroom get my note done, or just stand here and stare at a wall to reset for a minute? And it just that on top of, and it keeps going throughout the day. There's only so much that you can take before you're just walking out of your office as a shell of a human and trying to be a person to your family, to your friends, to yourself. Yeah, and that's why I could not. I know that I can't take more than five clients a day, because I've done it and it took everything from me.

Sonia: 33:55

I have a funny story about the four minutes to go to the bathroom in between clients. I don't know if it relates, but I was at Trader Joe's and they sell my favorite protein bars but they're like full protein bars and now they have another brand that's like half the size and I was checking out and then the lovely cashier was like oh, do you like these better than the full size one? And I was like I don't, but the work that I do, sometimes I need to be able to finish two bites because I don't have time.

Sam: 34:25

You chose the size of your meal because you only had a couple of minutes in between. Yes, but yeah, sometimes it's like, okay, well, I don't have time to eat, I have to go to the bathroom and then I have to be right back here, right?

Angel: 34:35

And that's what you're saying. Well, yeah, and which is another thing of like, when I was in at my first internship, there were two supervisors that I sort of looked to a lot and they were very different in the way that they carried themselves and the way that they did their work. And one was very structured, very boundaryed, everything had a place, everything had a time, just really well managed. And the other supervisor was like just I don't even know the word, but like a mess, like scattered, just like scattered, yeah, just overwhelmed, always running from place to place, just like it felt like the work, like you know what I mean, Like she was pulled by the structure of just no control.

Sam: 35:28

She had no power here.

Angel: 35:30

Yeah, it was just like there, I don't know. Anyway, I just sort of observed that right and like I was just like I do not, I will never be that.

Sonia: 35:40

Yeah.

Angel: 35:40

Right, I'm just so overwhelmed that I like don't have lunch right or that I don't nourish my body Like my. I will never let my work and this thing become all consuming, right, and so that was another part of, too, of like I need to just be able to structure my day. I need to be able to know what time I'm doing things, be able to have the flexibility to move things around, because, yeah, I mean never hectic, you know, just like all over the place, I mean that doesn't do anything for me or for anyone.

Sonia: 36:21

I mean, we tell clients all the time take time for yourself. When I was working with teens, it was like, oh, sonya, I don't have time to even eat or take a walk outside, and the work was okay. Studying is important, homework is important, but also nourishing your body, getting sleep, resting all of that is important. And if we can't do that as their therapist and we're not doing that or have the opportunity to do that then what are we doing?

Sam: 36:48

Well, therapists can be the worst clients and never take their own advice.

Sam: 36:52

But I think that that's like. I've been trying to figure out how to word this, because that's almost the expectation, because you're giving so much of yourself you don't have time, so you're doing it right, you're being the martyr that give her the helper. But I appreciate the change in that that I'm seeing in a lot of clinicians to where we it's the old you have to put on your own mask first before you can help others, and so I appreciate that that narrative is starting to change. I am noticing it more in associates than I am in people who have been in this profession longer. I am also starting to notice and change in language too.

Sam: 37:34

Oh, I noticed that I was doing this all these years. So I'm starting to change and it is, I believe, influenced by the new set that are coming out and being associates now and the influence we're starting to have. And you still do get the people who are like, no, you have to put in your dues and go through community mental health, and I don't know if that's because that's what they fully believe that we should be doing. Of course there's a community mental health. Clinicians are always needed, and it's important.

Sonia: 38:07

It's important, that is an important point I'm.

Sam: 38:10

I feel like right now is kind of a transitional period and it's just like the start of a transitional period in our profession and, like any big system, is going to be really slow going. So whatever we're talking about and trying to do now, maybe we won't see the immediate effects of, but hopefully down the line it'll be easier for other people.

Angel: 38:30

Yeah, I mean. I think even the issues with community mental health are a part of this whole systemic problem.

Sam: 38:39

Managed care.

Sonia: 38:41

Yeah, yeah, I knew that I would not be a good fit for community mental health. I know that about myself and I wouldn't be great for the clients that would be there. So I was. I am happy that I ended up in a group practice for my internship, but, yeah, I also don't know where I'm going with that. But yes, yeah, this profession is changing and I think clients are changing too. The reason why people are seeking therapy, the age groups that are seeking therapy. I think that's also changing with the profession, which is exciting.

Angel: 39:24

Yeah.

Sam: 39:27

A whole bunch of agreeable Good job.

Sonia: 39:30

We all said good thing I I do want to return back to the work. Yeah, what is the most challenging part of this work for you? Not private practice, but just being a therapist. Or also, what's the best part, what keeps you here?

Angel: 39:53

I feel like the hardest Part changes Right, and so I think, right now, as I'm learning and growing, I think that that's hard, right. The learning by doing Is hard. It's hard to not. I don't have a. I haven't been doing this for 10 years.

Angel: 40:18

I don't have a lot of Experience to to draw from. You know what I mean, and so, yeah, I think you know as a recovering Perfectionist, right, I don't, I can't perfect therapy, it's not a thing, yeah. And so I think for me is the hardest part clinically is All allowing myself and having compassion for myself, that I'm learning while I'm doing and that's gonna look like a whole different Things, all kinds of different things. But, yeah, right, like it's hard, when you you come out of session You're like, uh, I should and that move or I should. You know what I mean. It's so, it's like it. I think it's hard to tolerate that. Right, we work with living human beings and that it's okay that I don't always know, and I'm gonna know more tomorrow than I do today, and I think that just that is a lot for me, right, I there isn't. I don't know if there's gonna be a day where I'm like arrived.

Angel: 41:24

I'm gonna know something I didn't know. And so I think, yeah, like that tension of like I'm never gonna be Perfect at this, I'm always gonna make mistakes, right, I'm always gonna need to be accountable for those mistakes and repair those ruptures, and right, I think, kind of what I'm saying is a vulnerability, I think the vulnerability of being a therapist is hard Right, like I think about Sue Johnson a lot, since your fangirl of her, and Often like she'll say like help me understand that, can you help your partner?

Angel: 42:03

Is it this like help me with that? And like the vulnerability for me as the expert to say to my client help me very? Like I, as soon as I fry.

Sam: 42:16

Like all of our bodies, I saw them all right.

Angel: 42:18

Yeah, like it's I have, I that vulnerability is important to me in my work, and so me too. I think that that is, right now, the hardest part.

Sonia: 42:31

Yeah, we're. We're not perfect beings. I actually yes, as hard as that is of so expressing vulnerability, showing vulnerability to your client, I think. For me, I see it as a way to Not return power back to clients, but, like you, have lived your life, you have lived in this body and the soul and this heart and in this mind and I am. I am removed from that. Help me understand you better, because maybe this is the only space where someone is deeply Questioning you about your history, about your story, and I don't know it. I don't know it as, like you said, as the expert, we don't know it.

Sam: 43:14

Well, I would say that it's actually is returning power back to yeah, I.

Sam: 43:18

I think it's because I didn't want to feel like I was holding it and so well, yeah, yeah because there is that power differential and just inherently because people are coming to you seeking guidance, help, answers, right, because they're in Not maybe a not so good place for themselves, and so it's like going to your doctor and being like, hey, I have this, fix it.

Sam: 43:40

And so there's this expectation that they're coming to you because you know something, you have something that they need, and so that power dynamic is part of the reason why, like, I will never have a license or a diploma or anything on the wall, I will never say that I'm an expert, but being able to hand a little bit of power back and be like, hey, I might be able to help, but I'm also a person and I really want to get to know you and I want you to tell me About yourself, and so I'm not going to be right all the time and also them being able to practice stint like self advocacy and click, clarifying for themselves what their needs are, that is, it's so powerful.

Sam: 44:22

I have, oh, my personal experience going into therapy and having a therapist really be like you know the quote-unquote blank slate, and would get upset if they thought they made a mistake and like, almost make it my fault. I'm like You're a human being and you're fallible, just like doctors and lawyers and all these other professions are also fallible, even though our society lifts them up like they can do no wrong. And I think that there's a lot of power in spreading the word, that we don't have all the answers, but we are definitely here to try to figure it out together. It's that collaborative nature I think is is helpful and important. I always wonder why people want to hold on. Oh, I don't. I probably know why, but it's always confusing why people sometimes love to hold on to that power in the therapy room because it's not needed In that way.

Sonia: 45:12

Yeah, I've said to a client Maybe I don't know if you both have, but I don't know. I don't know. Let's figure this out together. I I don't know why you made that decision. I don't know why you are feeling this particular way. Here are some possibilities, but I don't know. Yeah, help me understand. This is what I'm seeing.

Sam: 45:32

Is that right or that did not seem to land. Tell me what I said there.

Sonia: 45:36

That wasn't right for you, but it's wild as a therapist to say to your client I don't know, but because, right, what? We're just talking about being vulnerable and saying I don't know, I don't have all the answers. Yeah, yeah, that can be uncomfortable. It's trust, it's modeling too right.

Angel: 45:54

Unless you tell me and so, like with relationships, you have to help me, or else I can't know you. And so, as a therapist, I get to model that with them and they get to feel that with me and then practice that with their other people. It's skill, right.

Sonia: 46:13

So OK, what's the best part? What do you love about this work? What's keeping you here?

Angel: 46:19

Oh my gosh, there's so many things I don't know. There's not just one thing I mean. It's amazing, right, it is amazing to witness people grow and change, and it's just it's incredible to witness, right, that process and that experience.

Sonia: 46:46

It's such an honor. Yeah, the simplest things, but for them it's huge right, and to be a part of that is such an honor and privilege, I think.

Sam: 47:01

Andre, our colleague, said it really well that every session is an episode and a season and you only get like a season or two, maybe with a client, maybe half a season, maybe it's a mini series, but you get to look from an outside lens on the progress they make or maybe not progress and then talk about that and use that. But it's a privileged place because you get this story and their friends don't get that. They get little snippets of them and you get to witness that and it's so, like you said, there's no other profession like it. I can never think of anything that mirrors this in any way. Yeah, it's.

Sam: 47:44

I always have a hard time kind of articulating what I think, what you're saying, because it's just it's interesting work and it's also it's hard but it's also so joyous Because when somebody starts recognizing patterns or things that have not been helpful for them, and then you see it in their eyes, sometimes something just clicks and then you're like, yes, they got there. Yeah, it's like this pride I think. Maybe you're happy and joyous and proud for them, of them, and maybe they haven't been able to have that with other relationships.

Angel: 48:15

Yeah, Laura May Northrup wrote this incredible book called Radical Healership, and it's basically about building your private practice in a way that honors you, and she describes the work that we do as our medicine, and so I think that that's another part of it for me, of, like being a healer, this work is our medicine, and for me, getting to experience that right of sharing my medicine sharing, right, they don't know my life stories, right, but like that, all of everything about me and my life, I get to somehow witness, channel, share it's part of my medicine, sure, you know, and so I think that's an intangible that's hard to explain, mm-hmm.

Sonia: 49:18

Yeah, it forms who you are and the work that you do. And another thing that I'm reminded of that you said is in a group practice you don't get, you don't have much control over your marketing or really displaying you the way that you would in a private practice and all the stuff that you bring with you your history, your story, your experiences, your wisdom, the hard shit that you've been through in life. You bring all of that as a therapist and when you're working for yourself, you get to share all of that. None of that, some of that but you have control over it and the people that that resonates with will find you and that work is so powerful because they chose you to be their therapist. Right, right, I said something amazing.

Sam: 50:09

And, on that note, we're getting close to the end. So I'm curious if somebody is like I, like Angel, I want to work with her. We're connected to you in any way. Where can you be found my website?

Angel: 50:22

ohalaalliancecom. Ohalaalliancecom it means hopefully God willing. I hope so, ojala.

Sonia: 50:33

And we'll have everything listed as well. We'll have it linked. Thank you so much for being here today. Thanks for having me. This was wonderful Good job everybody. And on that note, bye. Wait, I'm Sonia, I'm.

Sam: 50:50

Sam.

Sonia: 50:50

We already did this Goodbye. We did this. This is Mental. Break it Down, bye.

Sam: 50:56

Just stop. The video Mental Break it Down is produced and edited by Sam and Sonia. Our logo was created by the amazing art of Andoi. If you have any questions, comments or have a topic you want discussed on the podcast, email us at mentalbreakitdownatgmailcom or connect with us on Instagram at mentalbreakitdown. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. Nothing said in this podcast constitutes personal or professional consultation, therapy, diagnosis or creates a counselor-client relationship. It is not intended to provide medical or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed by the hosts and guests are theirs alone. Thanks for listening. Bye.