Ep.#136: Virginia Young, PEACE Center

We sit down with Virginia Young to unpack what the PEACE Center in Auburn really is and why co-locating counseling with other services can make life easier for busy families. We also dig into the personal story behind the work, from navigating neurodivergent needs to training interns to become confident, self-led professionals. 

• what PEACE Center stands for and why the acronym matters 
• building a single location for counseling plus partner services like occupational therapy and speech and language 
• strengths-based care as a non-negotiable shared value 
• how overlapping needs show up for autism, ADHD, and broader neurodivergence 
• Virginia’s “two and a half hour radius” experience and what it revealed about access 
• the realities of starting a private practice and learning by doing 
• training interns to develop self-leadership and practical business skills 
• how to contact PEACE Center and what to expect when reaching out 

www.PeaceCenterAL.com

334-610-0169

Transcript

Welcome To The Good Neighbor Podcast

SPEAKER_00 0:00

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Susanna Hodges.

SPEAKER_01 0:12

Welcome. And with me is Virginia Young. Virginia is with the Peace Center here in Auburn. Welcome, Virginia.

SPEAKER_02 0:20

Yeah, thanks for having me on, Susanna.

What The Peace Center Actually Is

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Well, tell me what the Peace Center is all about.

SPEAKER_02 0:25

Yeah, so Peace Center actually does stand for something. Oh, okay. Professionals of East Alabama in counseling and education. So Peace P-E-A-C-E is often capitalized on our marketing, and that's why, because it's an acronym as well.

SPEAKER_01 0:41

Okay, awesome.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

Say the acronym again, Professionals. Professionals of East Alabama in counseling and education.

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Okay, all right. Well, what do you guys do? Obviously, counseling and education, right?

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Yeah, we do. Um, but we actually do more than that. Well, I think it's fair to say that Peace Center has become a little bit of a center as far as a location where other um professionals do also have services. Sometimes we contract them, sometimes we'll just have them rent space near us because I I want them available to my clients.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

I think.

SPEAKER_02 1:19

Um and close. Uh I'm a I'm also a parent of kids with different needs and running all over town trying to get those met by different professionals is pretty challenging. And life is already challenging enough. So we have um occupational therapy and speech and language. We have it on site, but it's provided through Jelly Bean Pediatric Therapy. We love them very they so we have some um core values that if you're going

One Location For Many Services

SPEAKER_02 1:50

to even rent space here, you have to agree to. Um, and it's really strengths-based. We treat kids, adults, regardless of needs or whatever, um, with respect, with a strengths focus. Okay, what we we understand you have challenges, but but there's these strengths we want to build on. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

So I let me see if I got this straight. So a center where you can find the help you need, uh regardless of what it is, in one place. And and I think probably oftentimes people have more than one thing going on, right? So it is very nice to have have everything in one place.

SPEAKER_02 2:30

That's right. It um I am by trade a counselor, that's what I'm trained in. Um, I'm wrapping up my ought play certification actually in the very beginning of September will be the end of my supervision. Um, and you know, I've got my LPC and things like that. So, but our focus originally was kids and adolescents, and we do see a lot of them, but it did shift as um, you know, college kids would come, adults would come. A lot of times they're like a late diagnosed, autistic or suspected, like I suspect I may have ADHD, I suspect I may be autistic. Um, and so it's really expanded in a in a way that's you know surprise was surprising to me originally, but also very enjoyable. Um, so we serve a lot of different needs.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

Um I really like the concept though. Yeah, yeah.

Virginia’s Journey Into Counseling

SPEAKER_01 3:23

So tell me about your journey. How did you get into uh into counseling in this in this arena?

SPEAKER_02 3:31

Yeah, so counseling has kind of I'm sure my uh upbringing and all has kind of shaped it along the way. Um, because I did after uh graduation and in undergrad, uh I went into seminary and went into a program that was marriage and family therapy because that's what was available there. Um, I actually shifted that and have a completely different master's actually. Um, and then I went on and had kids and life came along. And as um as my son particularly, kind of his needs emerged more and more as he aged. Um, I think that really shifted my focus. And so once we kind of restabilized as a family, like with some understanding around his needs, um, I just had this understanding, this aching that there was a degree of privilege, and that was such a challenge for us, even just to access needs at that point. I mean, that would have been probably 10 years ago or so. Um, I called it the two and a half hour radius. Like I can go two and a half hours this way to get like specialized help, or I can go two and a half hours this way. But most people don't have access to that. And we we were able to homeschool, which allowed us to then drive two and a half hours and spend a whole day getting all of our various therapies. And so once once we kind of had our you know legs under us again as a family, I went back to school and then finished. Um well, really restarted because that has a time cap. But restarted that journey and then um finished in 2020, ironically.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

2020, yay.

SPEAKER_02 5:13

Boy, at least I did half of well, like maybe not even half, part of my internship uh in real life.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:21

And then the life all of us experienced after that.

SPEAKER_01 5:24

But right, yeah. Okay. Well, that so it really kind of came out of a personal experience and and a need that you saw raising your son. And it's really neat that you are able to see that people need to have things all in one place because they can't drive two and a half hours in two different directions, you know, two or three times a month, right? I can see how that could be a hardship.

SPEAKER_02 5:48

I mean, even in the same area, I mean, I have four kids, so that does complicate things. They're you know, just spread out enough where they're sometimes not even at any of the same schools.

SPEAKER_01 6:00

Oh, I know, yes. And I was talking with someone the other day exactly about that, having kids in different schools and three different three or four different places to drop off every morning. Yeah, that's a that's a real problem. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:13

Right. So then if just one of them has some really specific needs that would benefit from various levels, usually that it is more than one. Um, when you're talking about autism and and like neurodivergence in general, there's a lot of overlap. So often

Parenting Logistics And Neurodivergent Care

SPEAKER_02 6:29

they do need maybe maybe they need occupational therapy first, but then maybe they do have some speech issues. So we also knew that. And when it starts to stack, it it can really be overwhelming. Like, how do you even schedule that? How do you have a job if you need a job? Like so.

SPEAKER_01 6:44

And the center solves that problem. I love it. Very, very cool. Well, let's talk about you for a little bit on the personal level. What do you like to do for fun when you're not helping people at the peace center? And driving your kids around and and yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:01

Um, I think the stage of life is really interesting because that is kind of a question that I've personally been grappling with over the last few years. It's like my kids are starting to get a little older where I have a bit more of time that I could actually use for my own um, I want to say self-care with caveat because sometimes self-care isn't like getting your fingernails done or you know, yeah, sipping coffee, although that that's included too. But maybe it means going to the gym or I mean, even exercise is not always my favorite, but I found kind of a um a middle ground that I do enjoy in Pilates, so it kind of brings in this old love I had for dancing, but I'm not actually dancing and it's like I'm older, so it helps. Right, but yeah, um, so I guess for fun, fun, um, I love to go around. I'm kind of a foodie, so I like to go around and try different things, like kind of be adventurous with my food. Um, I might travel and then also just throw that in. Um but then also music. My undergrad degree is in music, so that's definitely a huge part of my family. So I love live music. Um, don't do a ton of singing. If we had more karaoke, we may, we might venture that way.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

But yeah. Awesome. Well, you know, part of the reason I do this podcast is to encourage other people to do exactly what you did, uh, find a need, and then actually uh create a business around that. So uh, but you know, when you're when you're doing that, you're gonna have obstacles that you have to overcome, right? So it's either personal or in the business itself. What are some of those things that you overcame, whether it was a personal hardship or maybe in your business that made you stronger or your business stronger?

SPEAKER_02 8:57

Yeah, that's I mean, there's probably so many as most business like entrepreneurs really, you know. Um, I do often will say, because now I I also train interns, which I love doing. Like I love passing on the knowledge and disseminating information just because it's helpful. Like knowledge actually is power or growth or whatever. Um, so we don't learn this in grad school. Like we are not trained to do private practice in grad school. Um we are mostly trained to step into a role that already exists, uh, whether it's a hospital or like an agency or something like that. We definitely are trained more for that. Not on, I don't think it's on purpose. I think how many hours can you squeeze very like and can they really teach it?

SPEAKER_01 9:48

You know, it's just it's experience, right?

SPEAKER_02 9:50

Yes. So when I have my interns, that is one thing I teach them from day one. Is hey, what I'm training you for is to go out there and start your own private practice if you want. But if you don't want, that's okay. They've now have really strong self-leadership

Self-Care, Mentoring Interns, And Entrepreneurship

SPEAKER_02 10:08

skills. So even if they work for an agency, that agency is gonna be thrilled because they're self-starters, they they know what to do. Um, so I I remember my first intern bringing me kind of their paperwork and was like, here, when do I come? And I'm like, uh, so actually, this is your job. You know, you can sit down and you can see my schedule. You need to know what the expectations are through this school, even though I definitely do know. Um, and then you need to try to align them and then come to me and say, This is what I'm thinking. Let me help, and then I'm happy to guide you at that point. But I'm not gonna, I can't do it for you. I'm not going to because it wouldn't be helpful, you know.

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Um and things a lot of it is yeah, figuring things out as you go. Yeah, absolutely. Well, what is one thing you wish people knew about the Peace Center uh that you'd like to get across today?

What People Miss And How To Reach Them

SPEAKER_02 11:04

Um I think the peace center is a little confusing because it has so many different things. So it's like, oh, do they work for you? Do they work with you? Um ideally, the peace center it well, it has evolved. So there is center counseling service, which which I do run as well as this kind of own entity. Um, but the peace center as a whole, I think, is kind of evolving into almost like a collab kind of idea for more therapeutic services. I think that's a little hard to explain just with a logo, you know, right?

SPEAKER_01 11:37

Right, yeah, yeah. So the the the concept of having everything you need in one place so you don't have to go multiple places, and you can do exactly that, Virginia. It's it's wonderful that you can like, okay, today is the day we're gonna get everything done, and I won't have to drive anywhere but one place, so yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

Yes, and you know it's imperfect, you can't always align the appointments up just so, but we definitely do our best to work together in that way, so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:05

Well, how can people find out more about you? What's your phone number, website, and where are you located?

SPEAKER_02 12:12

Yeah, so our website is I don't think you need the w's, but www.pcenteral. I'll often capitalize that just to differentiate. PCenteral.com. Um, we have just some general uh emails, info at peacecenteral, uh front desk, I think is one. Um you can definitely contact us those ways. There are forms on our website. Um, and then of course our phone number is 334-610-0169.

SPEAKER_01 12:47

Okay. Well, thank you so much for joining me today, Virginia. I've enjoyed learning more about you and the Peace Center. Yeah, thank you.

Nominate A Local Business

SPEAKER_00 12:57

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast Auburn. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNP Auburn.com. That's gnpauburn.com. Or call three three four four two nine seven four zero.