Who Am I?

Why I Do This Work

Over the years I’ve been asked by people I meet on a personal level and even by clients (especially children for some reason) why I became a therapist. I thought it would be fun to blog about it. I’ve had a lot of different jobs in my life; some well-paying and interesting and others not so interesting or well-paying. Probably my favorite job was actually as a volunteer at the Center for Grieving Children. I did a several things there; I ran the Pet Walk a couple of years, I wrote the monthly newsletter for a few years, and I was on the Fund Development Committee and the Board for a while. But most importantly, I was a facilitator and worked directly with the children and families who had lost a loved one through death. It was the richest experience of my life. After being a facilitator for about four years, I moved on and became the Team Coordinator, the person who facilitated the facilitators, although I still had direct contact with the children and families.

I learned so much about myself and what I might have to offer the world while volunteering at the “Center” and doing all the different jobs I had there. And I knew I needed to finally decide what I wanted to do when I grew up, instead of drifting from job to job with no real long term goal in sight. I had a few opportunities at the time. After thinking about them, I realized that what brought me the most joy was working with the children and families at the Center.

My undergraduate degree was in Elementary Education and being at the Center reawakened my desire to work with kids; so the path I chose was going to graduate school to get my degree in Clinical Counseling. It was the right choice for me. I went on to do my internship in the Children’s Unit at Tri-County Mental Health Services in Lewiston, and they hired me when I got my license. I often say I’ve never had a job interview for a therapist position, so who knows if anyone would ever hire me. But really I know I had a nine-month long job interview. I loved my time working with children and families at Tri-County; I learned a lot and grew as a therapist.

After about seven years I decided it was time to move due, in part, to a lot of changes happening in the world of mental health agencies. So I opened a private practice in Yarmouth, part time for about nine months, then moving to full time. In my practice, I worked with children, families and adults up until recently. I felt like I needed to shake things up a little, and I have been learning a lot of exciting things that made me feel at this time in my life I am better suited to working with adults. I have not lost focus on families and still work with parents on parenting issues, although maybe from a different perspective than I had grown used to.

Like everyone else, I’ve had my trials and tribulations over the years, and have been on my own healing journey for quite some time. I’ve been lucky to have had many excellent guides along the way. Some of them have been professionals, others were supervisors, fellow students, co-workers, friends and the families and other volunteers I worked with at the Center for Grieving Children. I went to the Center because I wanted to make life easier for children who lost a loved one through death, but I feel like I got so much more back from them than I gave. That’s the true gift of volunteerism. In fact, I doubt I would be a therapist today if I hadn’t made that phone call to sign up to be a volunteer. For many years my clients, both children and adults, have been and continue to be my best teachers. Some of you keep me on my toes, but I don’t regret that. I am grateful that I have a job where I grow and learn every day, and I hope my clients grow and learn as well. Peace.