Counseling or psychotherapy is often a misunderstood process.  Many people believe that something has to be “wrong” with you to seek counseling services.  In fact, counseling is meant to help you identify areas of need and develop a plan to help you learn how to better address those needs on your own. So, even if nothing is “wrong” now, a counselor can help you work on skills to be prepared if something goes wrong in the future. 

 

What is a counselor?

There are so many titles in the mental health field: psychologist, psychiatrist, counselor, therapist, etc. So, what exactly is a counselor and how are they qualified? Counselors have attended at least six years of school, most of us more, and we are required to work under the supervision of a fully licensed counselor until we complete our hours.  Much like a resident who becomes a doctor.  During school and training, we are specifically trained on mental health issues, brain disorders, thinking distortions, physiology of the brain, and brain chemistry. The rest of the training focuses on identifying problems individuals and families and couples have so that we can help them find alternatives to help them resolve their issues.  Counselors are trained to help you identify issues which may be causing you you emotional pain, conflicts, sadness, anger, depression and frustration. We also work with you to identify some of the possible underlying causes of these issues to help you understand where the problem comes from. Additionally, when appropriate, we diagnose mental health disorders such as anxiety, addiction, depression, behavior disorders and other concerns that could be related to your current feelings.  Counseling is a lot about getting to know you, finding out what is going on in your life or relationships, seeing what you are doing to try to resolve the issues and identifying alternatives we can use to help you resolve your concerns and create a healthier and more fulfilling life for yourself.