This month is my three year anniversary of being in private practice. When I worked at agency jobs full-time, it used to give me intense anxiety to even think about private practice! I used to get overwhelmed just thinking about the business side of it. Therefore, it’s still rather surreal to me that I have a thriving private practice.

 

Starting out in private practice

I started out doing private practice one day per week when a colleague encouraged me to give it a try in her office space. At first, I didn’t even try to actively build my practice. I didn’t advertise, have a website, or even have business cards for a few months and was just “testing the waters” at first.

I ended up loving private practice and felt that I was doing my best work with clients. Luckily, there was opportunity to sublet space several days per week, and my practice grew when I expanded my time in it.

 

Finally where I want to be in private practice!

As of 1/1/19, I’ve been in my very own office and have the set up that I want in order to do my best work. I love my office, as do my clients. My practice is thriving!

It’s been a tiring but rewarding journey. It certainly didn’t come easy to me!

 

Some of the many accomplishments I’ve had along the way

Here are some of the achievements I’ve had since going into private practice:

• Accepting the invitation to present about drama therapy in Kingston, Jamaica in October 2016.
• Doing four vision board workshops for mental health professionals and three vision board workshops for the general public. I am very proud of the structure I created in these workshops. I help people let go of the old, bring in the new, and savor what is already working in their lives. I am also proud that I found a way to mix drama therapy activities with relaxing movement and art-marking in these workshops. You can learn more about the workshops here.
• Being asked by three mental health colleagues to lead vision board workshops for their staff members and/or clients. Also being asked by a local store to lead a vision board workshop for their customers.
• Accepting an invitation to be on Bmore Lifestyle’s TV show in January 2018 to talk about my vision board workshops. You can watch the segment here.
• Getting calls recently from the MD governor’s office and an office out of state that provides services to vets, inquiring about me possibly facilitating my vision board workshops for their clients.
• Being interviewed on the Therapy Chat podcast about drama therapy. You can listen to the interview here.
• Being hired by Chesapeake Beach Professional Seminars (a play therapy training organization) to present about drama therapy and specific populations. I’ve presented these trainings several times and am scheduled to do so again in June. If you’re a mental health professional in the Baltimore area and are interested in doing one of my workshops through CBPS, you can access their calendar of events here.
• Presenting about drama therapy several times for an art therapist colleague’s class at a social work school, which I’m scheduled to do again in a few weeks.
• Presenting at local psychotherapy group practices about drama therapy.
• Accepting a colleague’s invitation to do an open house event with her to talk about holistic health, which we did on 4/4/19.
• Accepting the invitation to be the assistant admin of the local therapist Facebook group.
• Starting my own Facebook group, called Creative Arts Therapists in Private Practice, in June 2017. I started the group because I became more and more aware of the unique challenges creative arts therapists face in private practice and the need for community support around these challenges. The group now has 392 people in it!
• Blogging for a year for Psychology Arts, which is a page dedicated to creative arts therapists. I was also interviewed by them, which you can read here.
• Being asked by countless colleagues to provide feedback about their work with clients. I feel honored to know that they trust me and my work so much.
• Building my own website from scratch, particularly since I’m not tech savvy.
• Learning how to use social media for professional reasons (see above about not being tech savvy, ha).
• And so much more that I’m sure I’m forgetting at the moment!

For those of you who are not familiar with the obstacles creative arts therapists often face, this is all pretty amazing. It’s tiring to constantly have to advocate for what I do as a drama therapist, especially since most people don’t even hear of it until meeting me. Thus, I’m feeling pretty proud about all of this!

 

Feel free to help me celebrate!

You can help join in the celebration by sharing a happy memory related to my work. You can also join me in celebrating by sharing any accomplishments of your own!

Another way you can help me celebrate is by reaching out if you are in need of therapy in the Reisterstown area or by sharing my information with a loved one who you think might benefit from it.