Shows
The Cultured TherapistBeing New to the Field, a Future Therapist’s Therapy JourneyJordan Smith is a new mental health worker currently acting in a capacity to help others with their needs prior to his graduation from a university in his chosen field of counseling. We discuss what got him interested in helping others and how it's been to move through his own therapy, what it's been like to try to set boundaries for self-care in a more therapeutic role, his expectations for his future, and what he looks forward to learning when we circle back and interview him again as he is deep in the future of his graduate school.
2025-04-2028 min
The KilnEp 08 - Clutch Your Pearls Elsewhere: Navigating Professional Conversations with NuanceIf you’ve been listening, you might have picked up on the fact that we have issues with the state of the professional culture among therapists.Today, we’re going to get into it explicitly.Because one of our overarching goals at The Kiln is to contribute to creating a healthier professional culture for everyone in our field, from students to supervisors. Pushing back against the prevailing culture isn’t easy, and none of us are doing this work perfectly.But if we can name w...
2025-04-0953 minThe KilnEp 07 - For Clients: MBNET ExplainedA lot of the therapists we’ve trained have asked for resources for their clients, to help them get a better grasp of our modality, Mentalization-Based Narrative Exposure Therapy for Complex Interpersonal Trauma (MBNET).So today, we’re going to do our best to translate that into more accessible language so that clients can get a behind-the-scenes view of the rationale behind the modality and what it looks like in practice.Listen to the full episode to hear:What makes exposure-based trauma processing different from other methodsHow exposure sympto...
2025-03-121h 05The KilnEp 06 - Hearing from MBNET Therapists with Phoenix McCulloch, LCSW and Rhiannon Theurer, LMFTToday, we’re continuing our discussion of our trauma processing modality, Mentalization-Baset Narrative Exposure Therapy for Complex Interpersonal Trauma (MBNET), with two of our colleagues who have trained with us in this method and are implementing it in their practices.We’re going to talk about our aha moments with aspects of the modality, how it’s changed their practice, challenges for them and their clients in working with MBNET, and more. If you’re thinking about training with us at the Kiln and how learning this modality might enhance your work with your clients...
2025-02-261h 04The KilnEp 05 - Stop Skipping the Hard Stuff: MBNET and the Magic of Deep Trauma WorkSo if we at The Kiln believe in engaging directly with clients’ traumatic memories in order to help them process, how do we go about that intentionally and effectively?Today, we are talking about MBNET–Mentalization-Based Narrative Exposure Therapy for Complex Interpersonal Trauma–the trauma processing modality that we developed and that we teach at The Kiln and use with our own clients.MBNET is a structured treatment for people with problems related to having experienced complex interpersonal trauma. Its application isn’t limited specifically to complex PTSD but can be e...
2025-02-191h 01The KilnEp 04 - Do It Afraid: Debunking Trauma Treatment MythsTrauma has been having a moment. People are talking about trauma everywhere, from social media to magazine covers, but the prevalence of trauma in our society isn’t shrinking anytime soon. Trauma happens in our families, our relationships, our workplaces, our culture, and our society.However, there is a prevailing school of thought that therapists should avoid exposing their clients to their traumatic memories and that doing so may be actively harmful.To which we call BS.We believe, fro...
2025-02-1246 minThe KilnEp 03 - The Esoteric Art of Being a Hot Mess and a Great TherapistThe person of the therapist is foundational to the work we do and the relationships we build with our clients. But all too often, the discourse stops at “You have to do your own work.”We need to talk about what that means and how our awareness of and engagement with our own deeper layers influences and can enhance the work we do with clients. Today, we’re talking about how the person of the therapist impacts us, from deciding to become a therapist in the first place to how we...
2025-02-0556 min
A Therapist Can't Say ThatIntroducing The Kiln Podcast!Dr. Kae Hixson and I started a new podcast! I wanted to give you a peek into what we’re up to.Welcome to The Kiln, where postgraduate education meets brave, bold, and imperfect therapy.We’re here to shake up professional culture—to make it braver and to help therapists rediscover their excitement for this work.At The Kiln, it’s okay to be imperfect. We’re building a learning community where practicing trauma therapy with courage is just as important as doing it with competence.On this podcast, we’ll share wha...
2025-01-2904 minThe KilnEp 02 - Breaking Silos and Reimagining Therapy TrainingIt’s impossible for any counseling graduate program to teach all the things. It’s a complex undertaking at best. But it’s been increasingly impacted by our field’s investment in differentiating professional identities. Are you a marriage and family therapist? A licensed clinical social worker? A psychologist? Your education will reflect that identity.These professional paradigm turf wars cause troubling gaps in therapist education and they impact our clinical practice when we don’t communicate amongst each other.We want to go deeper at T...
2025-01-2950 minThe KilnEp 01 - The Kiln: How We Ditched the BS and Started a SchoolWhy would we get involved in postgraduate education for therapists?Most recent masters program grads say they feel underprepared and often isolated as they face the challenges of licensure and beginning to take on clients. We believe that early-career therapists need mentorship, community, and a space where they, their peers, and their more experienced colleagues can all be honest about the realities of doing this work. If therapists are going to have the courage to help their clients put it all on the table, they need spaces where they g...
2025-01-2947 minThe KilnWelcome to The KilnWelcome to The Kiln, where we offer postgraduate education that helps you become the therapist you’ve always known you could be. At The Kiln, we’re here to change our professional culture. To make it braver.We want to help therapists get excited about this work again. And to make a place where it’s okay for therapists to be imperfect. And we want to create a learning community where we’re committed to practicing trauma therapy not just with competence but with courage.On this podcast, we’ll share what it is...
2025-01-1703 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatMBNET: Confronting Interpersonal Trauma with CourageOver the course of three seasons, we have talked plenty about trauma. And yet, somehow, I have never explicitly described or discussed the modality I use with clients, Mentalization-Based Narrative Exposure Therapy (MBNET).MBNET is a methodology that Dr. Kae Hixson and I synthesized from two different approaches that we were independently trained in, and it’s what we teach at The Kiln.On today’s bonus episode, Dr. Hixson joins me to get into how we arrived at this blended model for treating patients struggling with complex interpersonal trau...
2024-12-0450 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.12 - Into the Hall of Mirrors: Deciding What (and When) to PathologizeAs I’ve been trying to wrap up this season of the podcast, I’ve been reflecting, in particular on my conversations about psychiatric diagnosis with Dr. Awais Aftab and Dr. Miri Forbes.I keep coming back to this question: How do we decide what human traits, behaviors, and subjective experiences to pathologize? What makes something about a person a problem that we try to fix?It’s a deeply complicated question, with few, if any, absolute answers. Yet I still think we have to wander that hall of mirror...
2024-11-2026 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.11 - Redefining Psychiatric Constructs with Dr. Miri ForbesEveryone who has a foot in the world of psychiatric diagnosis seems to agree that our diagnostic system could, at the very least, use some updating, if not burning it down and starting over.So how do we approach developing constructs of psychiatric diagnoses that are more complex, more accurate, more flexible, and more context-specific than what we’ve been taught or what exists in the DSM-V?Today, I’m excited to share my conversation with Dr. Miri Forbes, an expert in psychopathology and one of the authors of the...
2024-10-021h 02A Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.10 - What We Talk About When We Talk About DiagnosisIn my last episode, Dr. Awais Aftab and I explored the controversial nature of Borderline Personality Disorder as a diagnosis.One of the reasons I wanted to discuss BPD is that it opens the door for digging into psychiatric diagnosis itself, and that’s part of what I want to discuss more today.What is our purpose in using diagnosis? How does it benefit us as clinicians and the clients who receive that label?Getting more clear about the constellation of things we may be...
2024-09-1834 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.9 - Epistemic Justice in Diagnosis: Exploring Borderline Personality Disorder with Dr. Awais AftabSuppose you polled therapists and asked them what the most controversial diagnosis is in the current version of the DSM. Many of us would likely say Borderline Personality Disorder, and it would certainly be in almost everybody's top three.I’ve been wanting to do an episode on BPD for a bit because there is something about this controversial diagnosis that allows us to explore the challenging and consequential nature of psychiatric diagnosis itself.To guide us in this exploration, I've had the privilege of inviting Dr. Awais Aftab, a...
2024-08-2842 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.8 - The Medicine of Intimacy: Embracing Anger in TherapyImagine yourself saying, “I am angry at my client.” If you immediately need to add a whole bunch of context and caveats to make that statement feel okay, you’re not alone.Admitting that we get angry with clients is uncomfortable. It’s uncomfortable with colleagues and supervisors, and it’s definitely uncomfortable with clients. It’s even uncomfortable to admit just to ourselves.But anger is powerful, and it makes itself important, whether we want it to or not. Even the...
2024-08-0721 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.7 - Getting Into It: Overt Conflict with Your Clients with Dr. K HixsonBe honest. When you think about overt conflict with a client, is your first thought that it’s a site of exciting progress, full of potential for movement?No, of course not. I don’t either.If you’re like me, and I’m guessing a lot of you are, your first reaction to actual, or even hypothetical, conflict with a client is somewhere on a spectrum from deeply uncomfortable to scared. It's a shared experience, and it's okay.It’s okay to feel uncomforta...
2024-07-1754 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.6 - How to Stop Treating Your Clients Like Your ParentsHow can we stop treating our clients like our parents? As therapists, we often share the experience of having been a parentified child, and this shared background fundamentally shapes the way we practice therapy, creating a unique bond and understanding among us.The relational patterns we developed as children, regardless of our current relationship with our parents, deeply influence how we manage our relationships with our clients. Recognizing and addressing these patterns is crucial, as repeating them without awareness can lead to disengagement, burnout, and even leaving the field e...
2024-07-0329 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.5 - From Childhood Wounds to Therapeutic Wisdom with Dr. Karen MarodaI’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: as a group, therapists tend to have some pretty similar formative childhood experiences.Our shared experiences as parentified children not only draw us to this field, but according to today’s guest, they fundamentally influence and shape how we practice once we become therapists. This understanding can foster a sense of connection and empathy among us, enhancing our ability to relate to our clients.From the modalities and techniques we employ to the all-too-common fear of hurting our client...
2024-06-0557 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.4 - Therapy in the Shaky Landscape of Contemporary NeuroscienceAs humans, we tend to like answers a lot more than we like questions. When we believe we have found answers, re-examining what we think of as truth is inherently destabilizing.In a relatively young field like neuroscience, paradigm shifts, misconceptions, corrections, retractions, and foundational remodels are inevitable. We already have more questions than answers, and each answer spawns a thousand more questions. That ever-unfolding feedback loop of curiosity, seeking, and finding is beautiful. However, it also causes problems when the paradigms we’ve adopted as true turn out to...
2024-05-2224 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.3 - Unraveling Popular Ideas: Challenging Neuroscientific Narratives in Therapy with Kristen MartinIf you’re a therapist in 2024, odds are you have given a client a neuroscientific explanation for a symptom they’re experiencing or an intervention you’re using. You’ve probably done it sometime in the last week. So have I. Neuroscience-based language is the lingua franca of our field nowadays.As a field, we have largely abandoned the languages of behaviorism or psychoanalysis, though there are still therapists who use those frameworks. But if you asked most therapists right now why they think what they do works, you would get an answer about the brai...
2024-05-0151 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.2 - Finding Our Place in the Lineage of Therapeutic PracticeSince the last episode’s conversation with hannah baer about the Jewishness of therapy, I’ve been thinking a lot about lineage.When I first decided to do an episode on the topic, I was primarily motivated by wanting a deep sense of admiration for the Jewish pioneers of the field. Their contributions, which, like any minority group, tend to get erased as they are absorbed into the dominant culture, are invaluable and deserve explicit recognition.But our conversation and hannah’s original article also helped me connect to someth...
2024-04-1726 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 3.1 - Between Mysticism and Modernity: Reclaiming the Jewishness of Therapy with hannah baerRaise your hand if this sounds familiar: In a group of leftie social justice therapists, someone says that therapy is a profession founded by white men. Everyone else in the room nods along and acknowledges the white male hegemonic roots of the profession, then moves on to discuss other things. The problem with saying that white men founded therapy and is part of a white hegemonic legacy is that it just isn’t true.If you go down a list of the founders and early theorists of therapy as the...
2024-04-031h 05A Therapist Can't Say ThatIntroducing The Kiln: Revolutionizing The Therapy Training LandscapeCo-conspirator and friend of the podcast, Dr. K Hixson, returns to share some exciting news about a true labor of love.We’ve joined up to create The Kiln, a comprehensive supervision and training program for pre-licensed therapists in Oregon. The Kiln will also offer continuing education to practicing clinicians.This venture was born out of our mutual frustrations and concerns with the direction, trends, and tendencies in the current state of our field, and our deep dedication and commitment to our work.Today, we...
2024-03-0650 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.12: 10 Things I Have Learned in 10 Years as a Therapist – Part 2To wrap up season two of A Therapist Can’t Say That, I’m continuing my reflections on my ten years as a therapist.I’ll be back in April with interviews on some juicy topics, but for now, here are lessons six through ten that I’ve learned over the last decade of doing this work. Listen to the full episode to hear:Why being overly passive for fear of screwing up might be the biggest mistake of allHow courage is the true gatekeeper of all my clinical...
2023-12-0621 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.11 - 10 Things I Have Learned in 10 Years as a Therapist – Part 1Every therapist remembers their first client. Many look back and cringe at what a bad job they think they did. But for me, I look back and remember the magic I felt in the room with my very first client. Which isn’t to say I’ve never done a bad job with clients. I have, just like we all have.But after ten years of being a therapist, when the work I do has become part of the mundane fabric of my day, I stil...
2023-11-1523 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.10 - Client Relationships in the Trenches: The Role of Self-Validated IntimacyIn the last episode with Dr. K Hixson, I said that our field is defined by the wish fulfillment fantasy of the parentified child. The parentified child wants nothing more than to get it right, manage the relationship, and have the parental figure be healed and available to youIf you are a therapist and you think that you were not, in some way, a parentified child, you’re probably wrong or in denial, or you’re one of the very, very few exceptions to this trend.I stand by w...
2023-10-0432 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.9 - Immediacy in Therapy: Breaking the Fourth Wall with Dr. K HixsonImmediacy may seem like a stale topic, but I truly believe that it has the capacity to be the primary tool of magic in the therapeutic relationship.Immediacy is risky. Immediacy is counter-cultural. Immediacy is a disruption to our people-pleasing tendencies. Immediacy challenges us to stretch our tolerance for uncertainty. Immediacy is a key to unlocking difficult clients.Immediacy invites us to do therapy by taking off the therapist mask and being seen. Immediacy is the mediator of therapeutic intimacy that can change lives....
2023-09-131h 04A Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.8 - Paradox, Love, and the Therapeutic JourneyInspired by my conversation in the last episode with Dr. Andrea Celenza, today I want to talk about tolerating paradoxes and about love in the context of therapy.In our conversation and in her book, Sexual Boundary Violations, Dr. Celenza discusses the concept of the “multiple irreducible levels of reality in the therapeutic relationship.” None of those multiple realities is more or less real than the others and it’s essential that we, as clinicians, maintain our awareness of them. Yes, it’s hard. These multiple realities evoke a whole ran...
2023-08-2329 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.7 - Let's Talk About Sex: A Humane Approach to Sexual Boundary Violations with Dr. Andrea Celenza Sex with clients.It’s an interesting topic because it’s both very taboo and not at all polarizing. Many taboo topics are just that because discussion of them invites conflict. Sexual boundary transgressions aren’t like that. We can pretty much all agree that they’re wrong and bad.So then why is it so hard to talk about?I would argue that in this case, it’s because of fear of being in any way associated with a transgression of that magnitude, and the vica...
2023-08-0950 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.6: The Vulnerability of the Therapist as ClientBeing in therapy as a therapist, and being a therapist for therapists, is a bit like magicians trying to entertain each other. We’ve studied the tricks and techniques. We’ve seen behind the curtain and we can’t pretend otherwise.There is enormous pressure for each of us to do our own work in therapy in order to be good clinicians for our clients, but therapists are truly a special population. We carry the weight of other people’s stuff, and we’re much more likely to need to unload about our work in session...
2023-07-2623 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.5: Behind the Scenes: When Therapists Become Clients with Dr. Elena HerreraWhy is it so hard to be in therapy as a therapist?Why is it so hard sometimes to be a therapist for other therapists? What happens when we sit down and try to play this game we play with each other?I’ve been wanting to do an episode on therapists as clients since I conceived of this show, so I’m excited to share my conversation with Dr. Elena Herrera today.Dr. Herrera specializes in working with thera...
2023-06-2847 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.4: What Happens When Our Clients Encounter Our Humanity?Trauma therapists are often told that we have to prepare our clients for any and all disruptions to our schedules well in advance, to avoid causing harm to them or causing therapeutic rupture.But life happens. We have unexpected and unforeseen circumstances that mean that we may have to suddenly cancel sessions or rearrange our entire schedules around a new preschool pickup time. (Ask me how I know).And there are most likely therapists out there on TikTok or in Facebook groups who will judge us any time we...
2023-06-1431 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.3: Normalizing Vulnerability: The Power of Authenticity in Client Relationships with Onyx Fujii and Asher PandjirisIf you’ve been in this field for even a couple of hours or so, you have almost certainly had someone try to impress upon you the importance of self-care. Not usually in the context of your self being valued for its own sake, but self-care that enables you to show up effectively for your clients.On the face of it, there’s not much to disagree with there. Yes, when we are adequately cared for, we are better equipped to show up and care for our clients.
2023-05-101h 02A Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.2 Deep Play: Exploring the Therapeutic PlaygroundFor the last few weeks, I’ve been reflecting on the conversation I shared with you in episode 2.1 with Silvana Espinoza Lau about therapeutic goal setting.And what I’ve realized is that when you set out to look at the topic of setting goals in therapy in anything more than a superficial light, you relatively quickly start running into the question of what therapy is.Why, in order to examine the topic of therapeutic goals deeply and honestly, do we first have to reckon with the question of what...
2023-04-1926 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEP 2.1: Balancing Goals and Healing in Therapy: Navigating the Tension with Silvana Espinoza LauIn the final episode of my last season, Therapists As Makers of Culture, I asked you to think about what kind of professional culture you want to leave behind for the next generation of therapists and clients. We have an opportunity, with a little luck and intention and skill, to change something important about the structures of how things have been. We have an opportunity to lay the foundations for a different, hopefully better, culture of therapy that we’d like to leave behind for whoever comes next.I wan...
2023-04-051h 05A Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 18 - Therapists as Makers of CultureAs I've been reflecting on the conversation Dr. K Hixson and I had about clinical supervision and reflecting on the past season of this podcast, I keep coming back to the piece we stumbled upon about clinical supervisors as culture makers, culture replicators, and culture changers.It feels very fitting that we got there because this podcast itself was born out of the desire to change the culture of our profession. And as I've been sitting with that over the past few weeks, I’m becoming more aware of how...
2022-12-2014 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 17 - The Intimacy and Aliveness of Clinical Supervision with K HixsonWhen you hear the phrase “clinical supervision” what do you think of?For me, the first thing that comes to mind is stacks of paperwork - or whatever the electronic version of that is. I think of the years-long slog of racking up hours while marching towards that finish line of professional legitimacy: licensure.It's not a very alive-sounding phrase, is it - “clinical supervision?” It sounds, well, clinical. And then - “supervision,” not really most people's idea of what sounds like a great time. It conjures up visions of surveillan...
2022-11-291h 04A Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 16 - Marketing With IntegrityOn episode 15, creative director and brand strategist Rachael Kay Albers said something that I have been turning over and over in my mind since:Marketing artificially accelerates the pace of human relationships.As soon as I heard her say that, something started to click for me about why therapists tend to dislike marketing, and it centers around the concept of artificiality.We see artificiality as phony or fake, as standing in opposition to authenticity. And therapists love to see ourselves as being driven by...
2022-11-1524 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 15 - Is Ethical Marketing Possible? with Rachael Kay AlbersHere in 2022, therapists have largely resigned ourselves to the fact that we need to do some kind of marketing. We have been dragged into the world of social media, user generated content, and the imperative of the personal brand. And the necessity of marketing ourselves comes with a lot of uncertainty, discomfort, and unease.How do we market ethically? What does it actually mean to be authentic in our marketing? Is there any way to do this without feeling icky or like we’re selling ourselves?And our discomfort wi...
2022-10-251h 16A Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 14 - Growing Into the Light: In Memory of David SchnarchTwo years ago, on October 8, 2020, my teacher, David Schnarch died suddenly.Anyone who knew Dave even for a few moments, could see that he had an arresting presence. Tall and broad-shouldered with high contrast, salt and pepper hair, strong features, and an electric gaze that, when focused on you, elicited the distinct and disarming feeling that he was looking into some dusty and hidden back corner of your soul.I have tried and failed to pay tribute to Dave before, but in this episode, I will attempt it again...
2022-10-1126 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 13 - Why is Subsequent Therapist Syndrome Common in Our Field?In the last episode, Dr. Ofer Zur stated that he estimates at least 50% of board complaints in some way involve the subsequent therapist encouraging a client to initiate a complaint against a prior therapist.And most of these cases do not involve egregious misconduct or predatory behavior.Many of these cases result from misunderstandings, clients who are unreliable reporters, gray areas, differences in theoretical orientation that result in disagreement about the use of therapeutic practices, or poorly handled therapeutic ruptures of the sort that all of us have been...
2022-09-2726 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 12 - Subsequent Therapist Syndrome with Dr. Ofer ZurImagine you’re sitting in your office with a new client and the intake conversation turns to their previous therapist and they toss off a piece of information or a comment about something that their previous therapist did or said that really concerns you, maybe even alarms or disturbs you.How would you react? What would you do?If it occurred to you that might encourage your client to report their former therapist to the licensing board, you are far from alone.Today, I’m ta...
2022-09-1345 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 11 - Anti-exposure Bias in Trauma TherapyIn episode 10, Allison Aosved and I discussed exposure therapy for trauma, and the anti-exposure bias that we are seeing in the field.Today, I want to dig a little deeper into the context of that conversation, the factors that are contributing to anti-exposure bias, and how opinion on theoretical orientation inevitably shifts and swings over time, and how concerns about retraumatization and vicarious trauma may be impacting therapists’ ability to truly help their clients heal.Because my concern in the context of anti-exposure bias is that many people may be...
2022-08-3035 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 10 - Leave No Stone Unturned: The Healing Opportunity of Exposure Therapy with Allison AosvedTrauma has become a huge buzzword over the past several years. In fact, I would say that trauma is having a moment.And because trauma is having a moment, there is a glut of people out there who are chomping at the bit to tell you what the best kind of treatment for your trauma is and what you should be looking for in a trauma therapist. And this has become a prime opportunity for people to sell their own theoretical orientation or opinion on trauma therapy, not as if it's an opinion or...
2022-08-091h 00A Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 09 - It's Complicated: Why We Become TherapistsWhy do we become therapists?You wouldn’t necessarily think this is a spicy topic, but it is.Some therapists would say that we as therapists are just people who are unusually compassionate, empathetic, and giving, even selfless or altruistic. I don’t agree.I don't think we're more inherently compassionate or giving people than anybody else. Often, we're people who took on caregiver roles in our families of origin and we learned to give in order to get, and u...
2022-07-2626 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 08 - Why We Become Therapists with Ben Fineman and Carrie WiitaThere are so many ways, so many careers we can choose where helping people is the central thing.And the type of helping that we are interested in and pursue says at least as much about us, if not more, than the fact that we want to help in general.Yet, if you ask a therapist why we decided to get into this field, the answer you're most likely to get is to help people.But what are some of the other deeper, more...
2022-07-121h 01A Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 07 - The Poison and The Cure: Expanding Our Understanding of the Wounded HealerTherapists are tasked with being secret keepers.The first layer of secrecy seems easy and simple. Maintaining client confidentiality. You can probably recite the limits of confidentiality off the top of your head, and you probably do it regularly during intake sessions.Everything else goes in the vault. But the vault isn’t a what, it’s a who. The vault is us.We mostly talk about confidentiality from the client’s perspective. The absolutely crucial nature of it, the ethical dilemmas that come up whe...
2022-06-2825 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 06 - Carrying the Weight of Moral Injury with Dr. K HixsonMoral injury.It’s a term that often evokes images of soldiers deep in the fog of war or perhaps of a surgeon in scrubs holding their head in their hands in the hallway of a hospital emergency department. A therapist sitting quietly in their office or in the cubicle of a community mental health agency’s open office plan isn’t really what pops into most people’s heads when someone says the words “moral injury.” But maybe sometimes it should be.As therapists, we...
2022-06-0752 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 05 - How Are You Doing? Building A Culture Of SupportAs therapists, we know about the power of silence and how much someone is saying when they aren’t saying anything at all. And we know how silence around something big, like a client’s suicide attempt, sends the message that this is too big or too scary to talk about.But if we mostly all agree that therapists are responsible for doing their own self-work, it’s necessary to facilitate conversations around the decision-making that precedes a serious event or to simply check in on a clinician.
2022-05-2524 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 04 - Doing Our Own Work: Mental Health and Workplace Culture with Rebecca Ching, LMFT, PCC, Certified IFS TherapistIt’s something of a cliché that being a therapist comes with the obligation to do your own work. And it happens to be a cliché I agree with. And if you’re listening to this podcast, I’m guessing you do too.But what happens when the institutions and systems that train us, employ us, and regulate us act as barriers to actually doing that self-work?Today I’m talking with psychotherapist and certified leadership coach, Rebecca Ching. In addition to therapy and coaching, R...
2022-05-1056 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 03 - Uncharted Waters: The "Good Therapist" and Collective TraumaThe “good therapist” isn't necessarily the type of therapist you want to be.It's not the most actualized version of you as a therapist. It's not even necessarily a particularly effective therapist.The good therapist is about being seen as good and about being able to reassure ourselves that we are good when maybe we don't feel so sure.Maybe we bump up against the specter of the good therapist when we have difficult clients and we genuinely feel at a loss for what to d...
2022-04-2620 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 02 - The Myth of the "Good Therapist" with Nancy Jane SmithIf you’re a therapist, even if you’re far from your practicum days, you can probably relate to the feeling of sitting in a session and being distracted by the thought of whether you’re living up to the standard of a good therapist.And you’ve probably had a moment where you’re sitting with a client or group and you heard something come out of your mouth and immediately thought, “That doesn’t sound like something a good therapist would say.”Who is this mythical good therapist? What are their qualities and where do those i...
2022-04-0552 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatEp 01 - Why I Started A Therapist Can't Say ThatI got the idea for this podcast in late 2019. I had been in the field for several years at that point. Long enough to work through the first wave of impostor syndrome, experience my first episode of burnout, bounce back from burnout, get high on the grandiosity when I realized I really was helping people and changing their lives, go through the second wave of impostor syndrome when I realized there were some people I really WASN’T helping, and then settle somewhere relatively comfortable between confidence and humility.When you’ve been in a fiel...
2022-04-0515 minA Therapist Can't Say ThatIntroducing A Therapist Can't Say ThatWhen you became a therapist, what did you think you were signing up for?Maybe grad school prepared you for the endless introspection, the awkward intake sessions, and the pile of unfinished notes that is somehow always waiting for you, even when you were pretty sure you just finished it.Maybe you weren’t too thrown by the onslaught of personal problems your Uber driver suddenly reveals to you when you mention what you do for work.Maybe you’ve even found a workaround for the lower back pain that comes from sitting in a...
2022-03-2202 min
The Happier Approach: Quieting your High Functioning AnxietyEpisode 152: Therapy: Committing to Doing it Differently with Riva StoudtI didn’t always know I wanted to be a therapist. It took me a while to ADMIT it out loud that I wanted to be a therapist (I was 34 before I got my license). I honestly have a love-hate relationship with the world of therapy and psychology. It endlessly fascinates me—and yet the industry as a whole is notoriously dysfunctional and, at times, archaic. At 25, I was getting ready to start my second year of my Masters in Counseling. I had registered for classes and was less than a week from starting when out of the blue, I dec...
2020-09-241h 02