There's a cartoon I think about a lot. The client's thought bubble is a tangled mess, and the therapist is helping turn it into a neat ball of yarn. That's pretty close to what I do. I've got the training and the tools, and I use them to help you figure out what you think and feel about what's happened to you. I believe people know, deep down, what they want. Sometimes they need someone to listen and help them sort it out.
Sessions feel like a conversation. I can be gentle, and I'll also stop you and say "wait a second" when I think it'll help. By our third or fourth session we'll set goals together. They can change, and if a crisis comes up one week we'll deal with that first, but we'll be working toward something you picked.
With kids, I use play, sand tray, games and art, because that's how they work things out. I've drawn comics with kids to help them see something like ADHD as one part of their story.
When I was eight or nine, I went to see a counselor who worked out of a big house with a beautiful library. I don't remember much about her, but I remember thinking I wanted to do that someday. Some days I wonder if I just wanted the library.
I got my bachelor's in marriage and family therapy at Johnson University, and then life went another direction for a while. I got married, had my kids, and kept working with children: Sunday school, daycare, children's ministry, and Head Start. At Centerstone, I worked in homes with new moms and their babies, some of them for up to five years. These moms wanted so badly to give their kids something different, and I could hear their own past playing over and over like a broken record. I wanted to be able to stop the record, so I went back for my master's at Trevecca.
I chose an internship in Lebanon because I was willing to make the drive for good supervision. When they asked what I wanted to do afterward, I told them I wanted to bring it back to my community. Opening this practice in Tullahoma was on purpose.
I'm currently practicing under the supervision of Kayla Varner, LMFT, TN License #2222
Pearl Counseling is named for my grandmother, Miriam Pearl Holden. She was a nurse, and she was my biggest fan. She could see the best in people, even the family members who drove everyone else crazy. She took care of people's bodies, and I get to work with a different part of the person. Naming the practice after her is my way of carrying her hope forward.
When something hard gets inside an oyster, it protects itself by building a hard layer around it, and a pearl is what comes out of that. It doesn't erase the injury. It makes a way to carry it differently, and that's what I hope therapy can do for you.