A Hero's Welcome Podcast
A Hero’s Welcome Podcast
Hosted by Maria Laquerre Diego, and Liliana Baylon, both LMFT-S and RPT-S
A Hero’s Welcome is a podcast for mental health professionals committed to culturally responsive care. Each episode features in-depth conversations with clinicians, supervisors, and consultants who bring diverse perspectives to the forefront.
We discuss mental health topics including psychotherapy models, clinical interventions, trauma-informed practices, and the role of cultural humility in therapeutic work. Our guests share their experiences serving children, families, and communities impacted by systemic stressors, offering insights and practical tools for fellow practitioners.
Whether you're looking to deepen your understanding of culturally competent care or seeking a community that values diversity and inclusion, A Hero’s Welcome offers a space for reflection, learning, and growth.
Hosts:
Maria Laquerre-Diego
maria@anewhopetc.org
Liliana Baylon
liliana@lilianabaylon.com
A Hero's Welcome Podcast
Navigating High-Conflict Divorce Therapy with Berenice Leon-Fonseca
Few therapists willingly choose to work with high-conflict divorce cases. The fear of subpoenas, licensing board complaints, and getting caught in legal crossfire keeps many clinicians from helping the families who may need them most. But Berenice Leon Fonseca sees things differently.
Drawing from her unique background in law and family therapy, Berenice illuminates the path for therapists who want to serve families navigating the painful journey of separation but feel intimidated by court involvement. She challenges the profession's tendency toward fear-based avoidance, asking a powerful question: "When we hear somebody impacted by systems and say no because we're afraid of what might happen to us, doesn't that contradict why we entered this field?"
Throughout our conversation, Berenice demystifies court-involved therapy by offering practical frameworks, from establishing clear communication protocols with both parents to collaborating effectively with attorneys. She emphasizes that understanding each professional's role in the system, therapists heal, attorneys advocate, and courts decide, creates more precise boundaries and effective interventions.
The most moving moments come when Berenice describes her approach with children caught in these conflicts. By giving them agency in the therapeutic relationship and helping parents envision what true co-parenting might look like, she creates space for healing amid legal battles. Her powerful question to warring parents, "What would it feel like for your child to be in a room with both of you, not having to please either one?" often catalyzes profound reflection.
Whether you're a therapist curious about expanding your practice, a parent navigating separation, or someone interested in the intersection of legal and mental health systems, this episode offers invaluable insights into helping families heal during their most challenging transitions.
A Hero's Welcome Podcast © Maria Laquerre-Diego & Liliana Baylon
Welcome back listeners. So excited to have you for this episode of Heroes Welcome Podcast. I'm Marie Leclerc, your co-host. I'm here today with my bestie.
Speaker 2:That's me. I was going to say Berenice. No, that's me, liliana, and we're here with our special guest. How would you like to introduce yourself to our listeners?
Speaker 3:Well, thank you both for having me this morning. My name is Berenice Leon Fonseca it's a mouthful, but this is who I am and I am a child therapist at heart. That works more from a family systems perspective heart, but works more from a family systems perspective.
Speaker 3:And a twist with that is that I also navigate towards helping families that are navigating the family separation process. That is my niche, that is my sweet spot of working with families that are navigating divorce, family separation, court-mandated therapy all of those scary words that we hear in our practices and our profession is what drives me to do the work that I do. All right, listeners everyone.
Speaker 1:Just take a deep breath. I know she just triggered all of us, but it's so wonderful to know that there are clinicians like you who not only are willing to do this work but lean into and are really passionate about doing this work Because, unfortunately, it's becoming more and more of a request and a need in, I would say, almost 100 of our communities. Yeah, how did you fall into high conflict, because that's something usually most of us run away from. Yeah, um, and you didn't run away and in fact, you leaned in. So how did that happen?
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, I leaned in, not knowing that this really was a need in our profession. I do have a legal background. I, in my undergraduate work, was pursuing a future in law, and so I went the long route in school. I was married and traveled and then I said, oh, I should probably get an education. And so I went to school a lot later than my peers and so in my undergrad I really loved sociology. I loved the knowledge of how systems impact society, right. So that really gravitated towards me.
Speaker 3:And I had an emphasis in criminology which was like, oh, there's a bigger system, right, like the judicial system and incarceration, and so I was just really fascinated by how systems worked and the implications it has on society, communities, environments. So with that I decided to pursue law and in the interim, because I was on the slow track of my education, I got a paralegal degree and worked as a paralegal in the judicial system here in San Diego and did that for many years as, again, slow track to school, and then realized that I do not want to be an attorney. I was like, nope, this is not, you know, it was just stressful. I experienced a lot of families coming in, stressed at the system, the judicial system itself, the system, the judicial system itself, family law in particular. And so in that work I really fell in love with the stories behind what was coming in.
Speaker 3:And so, when I graduated with my undergrad and trying to figure out what I was going to do with my adult life, I then decided to pursue a decided to pursue a master's degree in marriage and family therapy, and during that course I loved working with kids. I love the idea of working with children, and so naturally, I would get children that were going through family separation. And because I have this legal background, I also had a background in understanding the judicial system, the language of the court, the implications of the court, the stressors of the court. I really felt like I could understand the language that the parents were coming in with, and it made it easy for me to feel like, oh, I know what an RFO is. I know all the acronyms, right, I know a FOA.
Speaker 2:I know.
Speaker 3:And you know they throw all these things at you. As a clinician who doesn't have that background, you're like what are they talking about?
Speaker 1:It's a whole other language.
Speaker 2:It's a whole other language.
Speaker 3:So understanding the language made it a lot easier for me. So I did have that vantage point, but as a clinician it was different, right as now, as a clinician, kind of on the other side of the bench, if you will, it was. It was a learning curve for me. It's like, okay, wait, how do I do this as a therapist? Take off my paralegal hat and my law hat and how do I help these families with the therapeutic hat? And I think, Maria, I leaned in with it because I knew a lot of therapists weren't taking on these cases and there was a tug at my heart of like, well, somebody has to do it right, we can't just leave families in despair, if you will. And so I jumped in and I said I'll do it.
Speaker 1:I love that yeah.
Speaker 2:I love that I'm meeting more and more therapists that have a different background before their counseling program, and I think that's something that we didn't used to talk about, and you're highlighting the benefit of it, right, no shade for all of you who went straight, who knew what you wanted to do, but, come on, we got a lot of crap for not having that straight road when we had a different background. So kudos to you for leaning in and taking a niche that needs our help. So can I ask you something? When we think about why do you think our field specifically play therapists when they think about high conflict divorce, they run away. So what is the most like? What is the theme? What is the most fear that you hear about working with this population?
Speaker 3:I find it that it's not the population. I find that we are afraid of what's going to happen to us. There you go. Thank you for naming that. Yeah, it is. It's like when I hear high conflict, when I hear court mandated, what I'm hearing is you want my records, you want me to testify. Someone's going to file a complaint to BBS? Well, I'm in California, so ours is the Board of Behavioral Services.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the BBS. And so you know, my licensing board is going to hear from somebody. My license is at risk. All of these risks. What I hear from therapists is I don't take these cases because I want to protect myself, and that's not why we came into this field. We are healers, we are people that sit with, we want, we've chosen. I think this is so huge and thank you, liliana, for calling this out I think it's so huge that we have to remember why we came into this profession, because it's not the pay, it's not you know, it's not you know, know. A lot of us are burnt out. A lot of us are, um, we work really hard and we want to be in this position, so we come in with this heart for people, um, and when we hear somebody that is being impacted by systems and then we say no to them because we're afraid of what's going to happen to us, that just doesn't sit well, if we say it out loud, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, I think there's a lot of fear mongering, right. I think what we fear is blown out of proportion from what's actual likely to happen. Yes, right, like it's not the worst. I mean, if you're involved in help in the helping field, someone's going to have a complaint against you at some point in your career. I think that we just need to normalize that instead of fear mongering, because it does. It keeps healers and helpers out of those spaces where we're actually really needed. This is where we're actually really needed.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So for all of you who are new, the new cohort of therapists, think about what you got from your instructors in your master's program, which is don't get grievance, don't take like it was all this fear base of the things that we couldn't do. Oh yeah, they're going to take at risk.
Speaker 3:That means that we're willing to jump in to the fire with them.
Speaker 2:With them right. With them With them right. It means like that, and that there's things that we can do in order for us to understand what's our role right. So you started with I have this degree prior to coming into master's, so I learned this language. I learned what to do here and now as a MFT thank you for being among us and then like there's something here and then. How do I integrate both and honoring the difference of both? So what is one takeaway that you would like to share with our listeners who are just starting, or you're in the season and you avoid this population, but what is one nugget that you will say take this from today.
Speaker 3:I say that you can find support. There's always going to be a support system to hold you as a clinician, and if you don't have that readily accessible, look for it, because it exists.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so it's, we're not in this alone. We it's a very small population, if you will, of therapists, like in your own communities. You, you, we all kind of know each other. But find, find that support system when within your own group of people or reach out like, hey, I'm, I'm working with high conflict divorce cases. Do you know any other clinician that does this work that I can lean in to for support? And because we are all. I've never found a therapist that said no, I can't help you. To another colleague.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Right. We're a champion of people and I have always felt, even in taking on these cases, that I have my group of people that I can lean in on. I have found a consultation group that focuses only on court-involved cases and court-involved therapists, and so the support systems are out there for you as a clinician, to lean into.
Speaker 1:Didn't have a legal background. If you know, I work with a lot of my you know supervisees and they've never even been to court for themselves and their personal life, like the idea of going to court, has just been so big and villainized for them. Where would someone start?
Speaker 3:One. It would be finding that support system. If that's something that piques your interest, you know, find another therapist that is doing that work, get curious around that work. And also I'm sure that that therapist has taken some type of training with court-involved therapy. There's an amazing training.
Speaker 3:Not that I'm plugging in or anything but there's an amazing training here in California that I attended and it was even myself with the background that I have like to still learn from others in the field. I think is very, very important. And so there are trainings out there with this population. So I say, connect with somebody, whether it doesn't necessarily need to be a mentorship, but just get curious around that work. What does it look like? Maybe bring your fears to that person that feels comfortable and safe and say, yeah, I'm really, I'm interested, but I'm scared. And then get trained in the specifics of that. Right, we have trainings in specific areas EMDR for children, right, TheraPlay there can be. There are trainings of navigating family separation and family divorce that they can lean into as well.
Speaker 3:So I say that would be just like the basic first steps. And then if you're like, okay, I really like this, this I feel equipped, I feel like I have some foundation where it's not as shaky as maybe it was just the idea in my head. I think I want to start doing this type of work, then it really is making sure that you have a mentor or a group, consultation group, Because, as you are new into this field with this population in specific or specifically, you want to make sure that you really really have a solid foundation on support for you navigating your own fears, because it's really going to be about that. How do I navigate my own fear of like, oh, I received a subpoena, what do I do next? And to find yourself with a group of people that have been through that and can walk you through the steps, it just feels so much more grounding. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I find, too, that a lot of clinicians feel like there's a power imbalance when we are being called upon by the legal system. I had a friend one time who is an attorney herself and she just told me she was like Maria, we go to the same amount of school that you do. Our schooling is the same, they're just different topics. She was like and you know me, I make mistakes, it's going to happen. I make mistakes, it's gonna happen. Um, and that helps kind of humanize the other side because and I don't think I'm alone in thinking that like it does feel like there's a power imbalance yeah and that we are like we're the ones in trouble when we get the subpoena.
Speaker 1:That's what it feels like.
Speaker 2:Right, it's our being called to the principal's office yeah, and in all of this, right like what I tell my supervisors is, when you are in systems in order to humanize and understand systems, we all have to remember what's the agenda of each entity here. So for all of us who are mental health therapists, our agenda is to help clients process and get to where they want to get. Whatever that looks like. For attorneys is to win cases, however they want to get there. For social workers for like. We can go on and on.
Speaker 2:So I always tell and remind my supervisees let's come back to tell me what's the goal. What's the goal of this meeting, what's the goal of this session, what is the goal of? So that you can have clarity in regards to what is it and how can you prepare. But what I love about what you said earlier, which is training For all of you who are new and seasoned, we tend to forget that is ongoing professional development. Everything that we do requires training, not the idea, like when we get out of school, that we can go treat everyone and help everyone. Our master's program is just a foundation, a theory foundation. Our master's program is just a foundation, a theory foundation. That's it and it's the ongoing training.
Speaker 3:So I love that you highlighted that the core involved training. Yeah, I also love Liliana that you tied that in with and Maria, how you guys tied in these other systems, right, that it does feel like a power, like, oh no, the court is telling me to do this and it's like I'm not a part of their case, like I am not a litigant in this family court case, so I am not ordered to do anything. Yes, right, I'm not a part of the case, I. I am not ordered to do anything. If it's a subpoena, that's a little different. But if a client comes to you with we have this court order the child needs to be in individual therapy, we need to find a therapist. We'd like you take the case. If it's not a good fit, you can say no, you know. If it's, if you don't have the space for it, you can say no, you can say no.
Speaker 3:But I love Liliana, with the system of our roles, or the understanding of our roles in a system perspective, right. So our role as therapists is to help process, to help, you know, with the healing process, whatever that may look like, and the attorney's position is to litigate for their client, right, it's to win, if you will, for their client and the court is there to hear all of the sides and ultimately make a decision. So we all have a role in this system of this family that's coming in, and I think that's really, really important to understand. And I think that's really really important to understand. And because the attorneys are part of the system, I love working with attorneys. When I get a case, I make sure that I have a release of information to speak to the attorneys, because part of it is quieting their voice too. Like, hey, you're doing more harm than good here. I know you're advocating for your client. That is what you get paid for. I see that wholeheartedly. But you know this may be an aggressive way of going about it in the legal part. That is then putting the child in distress. Yeah Right, can you see it from the child's viewpoint? I'm always trying to bring all the systems back to the child's viewpoint Parents alike, attorneys alike, and so understanding their roles and seeing them as not scary entities or scary positions in the system, but really collaborative pieces.
Speaker 3:How can I collaborate with these different pieces of the family system where it's going to benefit the family and I always lean in with that too when I have a call with the attorneys, and I always have the attorneys at the same time. I try to not just meet with one attorney to eliminate any type of biases, but I will say what is it that you need from me? That would be helpful. And each, each attorney is going to come with their need of their client. So now I have a perspective of like okay, now I know what their angle is in litigation. Right, I know now what they're, what they're fighting for on behalf of their client.
Speaker 3:And then attorneys generally are. So they want to know and in my experience they have also said what Liliana said, like, hey, this is my role. I don't know what you do, right, I can't, but I want to know. I've had attorneys say, hey, I want to know how I could write this order or how I can present the best order for the family to the other attorney, so that we can just not litigate in court and stipulate. So attorneys are willing to work with us and they want the language, they want to know what our positions are and they don't want to put us in a hard place. So when we normalize that, they are just human place. So when we normalize that, they are just human, like Maria said, that have the same amount of education in terms of years, just different topics, different ways of viewing systems. They're not scary because they're just like us. They went, you know, they pursued higher education and their fields are different, but they are human and I think as healers, as communicators, we are able to have access to that piece of the system.
Speaker 1:I think, extending the grace we extend, like parents and others that are in the systems right, like they're doing the best they can with what they have. They don't have the knowledge that we have right, because we'll see things like we'll see court orders or, you know, we'll have requests come through and we're like, oh, this makes no sense, why, how did you get here? There is no way. This is not even developmentally appropriate, yeah, and I have to always remind everybody and myself to step back and be like they're not doing this to be malicious. They don't know any better. They don't know any better. And if we can be collaborative, then we'll see maybe fewer of those really weird orders come through. Maybe fewer of those really weird orders come through. And I love that when you've opened the door for dialogue, they've been really collaborative with you and they want that, they want that knowledge so that they can be more helpful.
Speaker 1:I had shared that we are starting locally.
Speaker 1:We've started having meetings with our family law judges, with clinicians here in town, to kind of minimize some of these fears, to clarify our role, their role, what does this mean To talk about? Hey, this was a really weird order, how did we get here? And the judge at one point even said like tell me how you want it written? And we all just kind of were like wait, what Really Really you, you want it written. And we all just kind of were like wait, what Really Really you want that from us? Because even in these meetings we've had one so far we all file into the courtroom and it's all like we all feel like we've been called to the principal's office and part of the reason we're having them there is to help normalize being in the courtroom, being in the courthouse, that it's not a big scary thing, and so I think that that's lovely and I think we need more clinicians willing to do this work.
Speaker 1:I know in our own communities and those that I have supervisees in, like since COVID, we've had more and more family conflict and court-involved cases come through and I just don't see that changing.
Speaker 3:I see more of it now and I wonder if it has to do with, you know, just society's take on normalizing therapy right and how therapy is helpful. And you know we've come a long way of the view in society of what therapy is, what it is for, how it is beneficial. And I think that the legal system is catching on to that and saying wait a minute, you guys, I've seen you guys, I've been, you have been in my courtroom for two years like enough, right. And I think judges are kind of getting to the point where it's like everyone needs therapy. You know, parents are supposed to be an individual therapy, the child is supposed to be an individual therapy and there also needs to be family therapy. So at the end of the courts I'm seeing these orders like come in and I'm like because they're just so caught up in the cycle of the system of fighting each other where really we need to heal those ruptures. We need to help them process the pain, the hurt and move towards.
Speaker 3:What would co-parenting look like with this parent that is not co parentable? That's my meetup word. Yeah, this person is not. I cannot, that would never happen. But what would it look like if we work towards that. Let's give it a shot.
Speaker 3:I mean, you've been litigating for three years and that hasn't helped, you know. Are you willing to take this risk and work towards just to be respectful for one another? Like what would it look like? I love this. I always tell my parents this what would it look like for your child to be in the same room with you and the other parent and they don't have to please either one of you and they could just be themselves and they don't have to be afraid of what one parent is going to say or what the other parent is going to do, that you two have worked so hard to just respect each other and be in that you could hold yourself for 15, 20 minutes in the same space for your child. Like what would that look like? What would it feel like? And it's just like for the parent that hears that they're like whoa, oh of course am I doing this am I am is that?
Speaker 3:Is that what I'm doing to my child? Am I the problem? No, it's me, but in that question I Very, very alpha, but it's me.
Speaker 2:But what I love about that question is that you're naming the fantasy and the emotion, the intensity of the emotion, to balance it out into realistically. What would that look like? Which is so beautiful? A beautiful way of like. How can we balance this?
Speaker 2:Because you got together or married with one hope and you are divorcing um, with a different set of values and emotions, and and hurt emotions, uh, no one dreams about getting married. I used to, um, I used to do parental agreements and I used to ask that question Like no one gets married with the idea of like when are we going to get divorced and what are we going to fight about? And in that fight, like I'm going to make your life so miserable that we're going to fight about holidays? Like no one does that because in the honeymoon we're not thinking about those things. Yet here we are and I love what you said, which is true Judges in my county the judge was sending already to us to do the parental agreements, because the courts are all about facts, not emotion, and all of us in mental health we're in the business of emotion. How can I help you organize the emotions attached to this experience and organize it in a way that is less intensive for you, so that you can function. That's a nice way of saying healing, but that's exactly what we do in that process.
Speaker 2:So it's such a beautiful way of you asking them to neutralize the fantasy, either of the villain I always think about Maria, like the villains and bring them into reality. So, as you were talking, I was like man. This is so beautiful. As you were talking, I was like man. This is so beautiful. What is one thing that supervisees, besides all your knowledge, that supervisees tend to look for when they seek you out? Is it just for support? Is it for what forms am I missing? Is it for help me Like? Is it all of the above? What is it?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it is. It. Is it all of the above? What is it? Yeah, it is. It is part of all of the above. I might have a better answer for you in a few months, but I'm actually bringing on a new clinician and it is a lot about that, like, let me help you understand how to take this case, and we're going to take it from ground zero up until, like, you are fully comfortable and confident in being a therapist. I mean, you're a great clinician already with coming out of school and having that foundational theory knowledge.
Speaker 3:So now let's kind of work at. What do we need in these cases? Right, first, you want to speak to both parents, as long as that's allowed. Right, there are. It's important to note that there are cases where, if there's a domestic violence restraining order that's in place currently, that you want to make sure that you're abiding by that. But I would sit down with my supervisee and, okay, let's work this through. First, we're going to there's steps. Right, we're going to meet with each parent. You're going to do a consult call with each parent. Then the next step is your first session is going to be a parent session.
Speaker 3:So you want to get context information. You want to get historical information. If you can get both parents in the room, wonderful. We will always push for both parents in the room. We're always going to push for both parents on the same email thread for scheduling Everything that is communicated to one parent, the other parent needs to be included on that communication. Those are just ground rules that we are going to put in place so that the family knows what our standard is and from there we're going to start then building onto the case of seeing the case from a bird's eye view, right Meeting with the parents and then we meet with the child.
Speaker 3:So the reason for me I don't, you know, I want to assume that most play therapists or therapists that work with children work in this manner. But for me it's really important to meet the parents first, because if the parent has any inclination that I am not going to be a good fit for that child, I don't want to meet that child. I don't want to connect a bond because maybe the child may like me. I mean I'm pretty cool to meet that child. I don't want to connect a bond because maybe the child may like me. I mean I'm pretty cool and all you know, but they may like me. And what if the parent didn't and they're like you're not going to see her anymore? Then that's a ruptured you know. It could be a relationship that is ruptured and trust and it could lead to other issues that the child may have to process later on in their therapeutic journey.
Speaker 3:So for me it's really important to have that parent session and once the parents say, yes, it's a go, we'll bring the child. Then I meet the child and even with the child I give them agency. I say, hey, it's so good to have you here. This is the playroom, this is you know. And I say, but if after today or maybe we meet a couple of times and you're like you know what, but Anissa is not my cup of tea or whatever the cool lingo is, you know these days you know what you can tell your parent that you want to find somebody else, and that's going to be okay because we're here to help you and we want to make sure that you find somebody that fits for you. So I give that child that agency and generally you know they stick and they stay because they love the playroom and I'm playful, and so a lot of that work is done up front.
Speaker 3:So for the trainees, all of that, to say that, for the supervisees, the associates that are coming into your practice or that just want to learn, or even a seasoned clinician that wants to learn the framework of working with this population, it is a we're going to slow it down process. It is a slow process. We are not going to rush into treatment. We need to get a bird's eye view of what this family's system looks like. How long have they been in litigation? What is the current process or where's the current status of their separation? How long have they been doing this? Who's the judge? Right, like you want to get all of that because that's going to give you a bird's eye view of, like whoa, these parents have been at each other for years. Okay, it's not. It's not a fresh separation.
Speaker 3:Maybe, it is. And then you're like, okay, good, we're very early on, we're not in the thick of litigation for years and you hate each other. There's still hope. So yeah, I think it's slowing it down, doing step-by-step and then looking at it from a bird's eye view.
Speaker 2:I think it's just a foundational step up for yeah, even the steps right, like the way that you just named it, I was like, oh, this is like so beautiful, you know. Initial contact with parents, set up times for them to do intakes, get all the court orders, including restraining orders, for you to know. Make sure that we have the proper forms, consents, clarify the communication includes all it's replied to all the time. Everyone will be included, there will be no secrecies. And then meeting the child to give autonomy to the child, which in most cases like this, they don't have it because of the fear of invisible loyalties and trying to please. And a warm-up, conflict, beautiful foundation that you have and trying to please and a warm or conflict, beautiful foundation that you have and you're giving to your supervises.
Speaker 1:Thank you. What a gift, truly, truly a gift, and it's so needed, so needed. Yeah, no, I love what you're doing and I love that you you know we've we connected and you shared that. You've been able to talk about this with others and another podcast, and I think it's so important because I think high conflict court involved cases is still a big scary for many, many clinicians in our field.
Speaker 3:It is, and I I mean my hope is to be able to provide right trainings and where we can go into more in depth about the steps and because it is needed. It's such a huge need, especially because I'm in Southern California. So I'm seeing a lot of court orders ordering families to go to therapy, whether it's individual therapy for the parents, whether it's co-parenting. We call it conjoined therapy. It's what most states call reunification therapy, but California is a little more progressive in changing the language around that. But conjoined therapy, individual therapy for the child, and in some cases it has to be a registered play therapist. So I'm again seeing it more here in Southern California that these orders are coming out and when a parent is then given that order and going out to look for that therapist, they're being met with a wall because yeah.
Speaker 3:Because the moment they say, oh well, the court ordered that I have to do individual therapy, I'm like, well, I don't take any court mandated therapy. I don't you know, if the court ordered you, I don't do it. Even if it's an individual adult. I've had experiences with that, where the therapist is like the moment a court is said, then they don't take it. I've also heard therapists that take on a case and then they find out that it's court mandated and they're like I already seen the child twice, I don't want to take this case.
Speaker 3:Like, how do I back out of this? And I'm like you don't, right, like let me sit with you, we got this, you know, thank you for reaching out, I'm here to support you. Have you asked for this? Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And so then it becomes a consultation within colleagues. But it is scary, it is the villain in our profession. And so if we can give voice to, if we can give a platform to have that voice be heard, that, hey, we got this, we are skilled, it doesn't have to be the villain, right, we can be the heroine at the end of the movie that says, hey, this villain didn't take me down, right, I was able to rise above it, and we have the skills to do it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh, I love this, thank you. Thank you for being here. I hope our listeners reach out to you for consultations and I hope that soon we see something in regards to training so that we can all go take this training from you. We can all benefit from training, even when we think like we don't work with that population like you do. You're just not asking the right questions.
Speaker 1:And you're going to. They're going to show up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they will show up. So thank you for all of you listeners. Just know that we will include all of this information in our podcast. Please reach out to her and look out. Her trainings are coming. They're hot out of the press. You need that. That's all I have to say.
Speaker 1:Yes, Thank you so much. Thank you for having me Until next time.
