One of the best things about working within private practice is that I get to work with clients in a long term setting. Do not get me wrong, most of my training during my internship years took place in a hospital and inpatient setting and I loved it. I have always had a passion for working with individuals that experience severe mental illness. Experiences I have had in that setting with clients that have major depression, personality disorders, or psychosis are among my most meaningful experiences as a clinician and have forever shaped the way I view therapy. It is because of my time working alongside those individuals in the hospital setting that I have structured a private practice to emphasize consistent care and a space of continuous healing. Much of the time, I feel this must be a dream that I have gotten to create this space specifically for my dream. Someone pinch me!
As I mentioned, long term counseling is the best! As much as I loved inpatient work, I was overwhelmed with frustration at the lack of opportunity to continue working alongside clients. Working within private practice, the majority of my case load are individuals who I have been seeing for years. I consider it one of the greatest honors to have my work everyday align with journeying alongside someone for years as we figure out how we want our life to look. Do not get me wrong, there are challenges along the way, as with any relationship. Thankfully, the therapeutic relationship is unlike any other and the space of safety we create together gives us groundwork to overcome even the most challenging obstacles. It is because of this overall sense of safety that I have been able to work through the most unimaginable things with clients: physical pain from debilitating diseases, grieving a lost friend, childhood trauma, assault from a spouse, neglect from a parent, years of emotional manipulation from a sibling... just to name a few.
Private practice counseling gives us space to grow together towards living a life we have always deserved. One thing I pride myself on as a therapist (yet, lack this in my personal life, sorry husband for forgetting that one thing you asked for at the grocery store!) is that I rarely forget a disclosure or story from a client. However, I do forget ways I may have responded in the moment. It is not always that I get reminded of potential impactful things I may reflect on in the moment. Who am I kidding, my clients make my job easy as they amount of work and dedication to healing they devote is the true work. Regardless, one of my long term clients recently shared with me something that I said last year to them that has stood out for quite some time and most recently in a stressful moment they had. They said that my comment to them on how 'I am way too healed to engage in that type of interaction again' has been a guiding principle in their head. I almost spat out my iced coffee right on my laptop (we love our telehealth!). I questioned how I could have ever said something so meaningful that it was a mantra of sorts to this client. Then, as all therapists do from time to time, I quieted that inner critic of mine (Go away, Larissa! Larissa being the name I have bestowed on my anxious and perfectionistic tendencies), and quickly returned to the client. We reflected on what this meant and as usual I ended that session and closed my laptop for a moment of reflection before my next client.
This notion of healing taking place quickly is chicken s&*$. I am sorry. Someone had to say it. Why on earth do we re-traumatize ourselves more by placing expectations on how long it takes to heal?! An outstanding therapist I once spoke with said that it can take up to a year and a half (specificccc) for a client to even feel safe enough to disclose specific trauma to the therapist, so be patient! It makes a lot of sense though, especially from a systemic point of view. So many things from our society are screaming at us to speed up! Schooling, get it done as quick as you can! Oh you graduated already, what job do you have? Oh no job yet? Okay well what about that person you have been dating?? Wen are you getting married, or having kids? All of this is inundated on our screens or in our ears before we can even take our first sit of iced coffee (s/o to Oh Honey Baking Co in Macon! Ya'll fuel me).
Healing is not quick. Yet, it is not slow either. It is a process and a journey that takes its' time. When this client reflected to me the significance of that statement, I also reflected on the astroastronomical amount of progress they have made and how different our sessions now look after almost 3 years of working together. Gone are the days of grueling self doubt and self manipulation tactics to be replaced by choosing wellness over pain, love over harm, and self above all. Laughing as I got up from my chair to go get my next client who was waiting on me, I said to myself that my only goal as a therapist would be for all my clients to one day have a stressful or potentially triggering experience only to reflect to themselves, 'Wow, I am way to healed for this s%*#.
