1. Navigating Therapy: Insurance, Big Tech, and Finding the Right Therapist with Dr. Amber Lyda

Welcome to the first episode of the Say Hello to Your Therapist podcast! 

In this premiere episode, we have an engaging conversation with Dr. Amber Lyda, a seasoned psychologist with extensive experience in various roles within the therapy world. Dr. Lyda shares her journey from being a client to becoming a therapist and practice manager, and now, a mentor helping other therapists navigate private practice. We delve into impactful topics such as the pros and cons of accepting insurance, the rise of big tech therapy companies, and finding the right therapeutic match. Dr. Lyda also provides practical insights into starting and managing a private practice and offers valuable advice for both therapists and clients. Tune in to gain a deeper understanding of the complexities in the therapy landscape and learn how to make informed decisions about your mental health care. 

Find more about Dr. Amber Lyda:

Youtube Channel 

amberlyda.com 

Or contact her at dr.amberlyda@gmail.com

To learn more about Bethany Valenti, PsyD:

Bethany's Website

Say Hello to Your Therapist Podcast Instagram

Bethany's Instagram

Bethany's Facebook Page

Things and people we talked about: 

Kym Tolson

Steffeny Feld

Justin Pruder

Abby Swandal

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) training videos 

TIPP Skills

Psychology Today 

00:00 Introduction to the Podcast 

00:10 Meet Dr. Amber Lyda 

00:36 Navigating the Therapy World 

00:51 Finding a Therapist 

01:44 Amber's Journey to Becoming a Therapist 

04:10 The Rise of Telehealth 

08:39 Challenges with Insurance 

18:02 The Importance of Therapist-Client Connection 

26:44 Degrees and Specializations in Therapy 

33:01 Marketing and Niches in Therapy 

41:29 Marketing Strategies for Therapists 

42:56 Balancing Online and In-Person Therapy 

43:40 Challenges of Insurance-Based Therapy 

46:03 The Rise of Big Tech Therapy Companies 

47:27 Privacy Concerns with Big Tech Therapy 

56:18 Texting and Therapy: Pros and Cons 

01:12:46 Financial Strategies for Therapists 

01:13:54 Personal Insights and Wrap-Up

Transcript

0:00

Welcome to the Say Hello to your therapist podcast. I'm so excited that this is our first episode. I can't wait to share this conversation with you. I want you all to say hello to Dr. Amber Leida, a psychologist who is worn every hat when it comes to therapy. The client, the therapist, the practice manager. She now uses her experience to support therapists in navigating private practice work so that they can provide the best care to their clients. Her brain is a treasure trove of knowledge and she is just plain fun. So who better to chat with about the therapy world? We're gonna talk about insurance. Why therapists may or may not take it. Big tech companies. All sorts of fun stuff like that when it comes to therapy. Let us know if you have any other questions that we can can address in the future. A few things to clarify. We make some references to how to find your therapist, and I think just as a quick intro, you can like Google people. To find a therapist. You can use Psychology Today or similar directories. There are, ways that you can try and find a therapist through your insurance, and then there are sometimes these other online companies that help you get connected to their specific therapists that they have contracted with. So that gives you a little bit of context as to what we're talking about. Just tune in and have a good listen. I'm so excited.

Bethany Valenti 1:42

Hello, Amber. I would love to start out by asking with most of my other guests, I'm pretty much gonna be starting out unless they're like returning in the future with how they ended up becoming a therapist. But like you have that journey and a little bit of an extra journey on top of it that really speaks to your current work and your passion right now. Do you feel like you're comfortable with kind of doing a little, like, here's how I became a therapist, but here's how my second part, all of that went down. Yeah, that'd be great.

Amber Lyda 2:12

Being a therapist is still pretty core to my identity, even though

Bethany Valenti 2:15

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 2:15

a lot of other stuff

Bethany Valenti 2:16

yeah.

Amber Lyda 2:17

years. I knew early, early what I wanted to do it was either marine biology or psychology. It was gonna be one of the two,

Bethany Valenti 2:26

I got

Amber Lyda 2:27

turned down for an internship in Costa Rica when I was 17, but I got said yes to for a job at an inpatient hospital.

Bethany Valenti 2:34

Oh

Amber Lyda 2:35

So at 17 I was working in a crisis stabilization unit and it was like one side was regular crisis stabilization. The other side was a DID clinic, dis associated identity disorder back then

Bethany Valenti 2:48

wow.

Amber Lyda 2:48

multiple personality disorder

Bethany Valenti 2:49

Yes.

Amber Lyda 2:50

And I was like, this is my freaking calling. This is what I am

Bethany Valenti 2:55

Wow.

Amber Lyda 2:55

on this planet to do. I would work double shifts constantly and this will date me, but the internet had just come

Bethany Valenti 3:03

Just come out

Amber Lyda 3:05

I would

Bethany Valenti 3:05

those times.

Amber Lyda 3:06

and I would come home to my dial up internet and be waiting so I could do research on everything that I was learning. I mean, I was totally obsessed

Bethany Valenti 3:14

making that sound.

Amber Lyda 3:16

yeah, forever and I would print it out on those like scrolls of paper.

Bethany Valenti 3:22

Oh, I,

Amber Lyda 3:23

it was the

Bethany Valenti 3:23

I forgot about those. You pulled the edges on? Yes. Oh, I remember those. Yes. Really great for the sensory like needs. Yeah.

Amber Lyda 3:31

ASMR. So you know, I worked with Complex trauma since then, so for about 30 years in a variety of settings. But really found my home in university counseling

Bethany Valenti 3:43

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 3:43

my graduate school. And absolutely freaking loved it. I felt Had found my family in

Bethany Valenti 3:50

Yes.

Amber Lyda 3:51

it was incredible work. But there were a couple things that I didn't like. One of them was that I would work with a student for four or five years

Bethany Valenti 4:00

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 4:00

and then they would graduate and we couldn't keep working together.

Bethany Valenti 4:03

Yeah. Bye.

Amber Lyda 4:04

Like, You know, most of them aren't gonna live in the town that they went to

Bethany Valenti 4:07

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 4:08

they would move to some other city. And I started dreaming way back then about, it would be so cool if we could do therapy online. You know nobody was doing

Bethany Valenti 4:15

Yeah,

Amber Lyda 4:16

that.

Bethany Valenti 4:17

no, There was like a stigma around it for a long time too, right? Like when I went to grad school, it was talked about, like, can you have a real relationship online, like, of what you get in the room, you know?

Amber Lyda 4:30

totally.

Bethany Valenti 4:30

yeah.

Amber Lyda 4:30

was even before stigma.

Bethany Valenti 4:32

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 4:32

people were like, is that even legal? to do

Bethany Valenti 4:35

yeah.

Amber Lyda 4:35

And it was kind of unclear And I was such a rule follower that I was like, I can't even

Bethany Valenti 4:40

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 4:41

look at that right now, but maybe in the future. But then the other piece was that I was, as much as I loved my work, I really didn't have a life outside of work.

Bethany Valenti 4:49

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 4:50

I'm thinking, you know, geez, I am working a lot of hours. I don't have time outside of work. I really dreamed of being able to be location independent and travel

Bethany Valenti 4:59

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 5:00

To long term travel, so I had that kind of percolating in my head. And then way down the road decided that I was gonna try telehealth in a private practice. It went so freaking well, it was just like, I

Bethany Valenti 5:15

Wow.

Amber Lyda 5:16

knew after the the second session, the first session was a hot mess. 'cause the technology and I were like, what's happening?

Bethany Valenti 5:23

Yeah. That can really scare you away,

Amber Lyda 5:26

totally. It's crazy now, but at the time it was, you know, it was like totally new, but I fell in love with it. And I started working like 20 hours a week and making the same amount of money that I was working at a counseling center and commuting.

Bethany Valenti 5:41

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 5:41

50 hours a week, I was making a good salary, but I could make the same salary in half the time by doing a private practice. So that's what I. Started doing. And then I had friends who were like, how are you doing this all online? So I started

Bethany Valenti 5:55

Mm.

Amber Lyda 5:55

teaching people how to do it online. And then my second business was born.

Bethany Valenti 5:58

Mm-hmm. Which is how I found you for the first time. Honestly, like I, you are one of, like, you actually don't know this, I haven't told you this. You're actually one of the key reasons I'm where I'm at. Do you remember when you recorded your like little podcast series on like, going online and stuff like that? I was in process of trying to decide if I was gonna leave my university counseling setting. Just like you I just don't know if the work life balance is there, but I love it so much. and I'm so social you know, how am I gonna survive? How am I gonna work at home? some of the things that you addressed in your podcast were things I was really wrestling with, things that you work with in your courses. I was doing part-time to try it out and I was doing it, listened to that, did the step up stuff as I transitioned to full-time. And then one of like your workshop ads for your more recent like marketing one came up and oh, I always love seeing where like you are connected to other people. I found, I can't remember if I found you first or Kym Tolson because I just happened to search. Like I bet there's traveling therapists out there because my husband and I are super into travel and I was like, it has to have been done. So I found Kym Tolson first and I think saw that you two were connected. It might be the other way around. It's all blurry now. But all that to say then I like learned about intensives as I was like designing my website and I went to Stephanie Felds workshop.

Amber Lyda 7:21

Yes,

Bethany Valenti 7:21

Which, if I can get her on here, I would love to talk about Intensivess. But then you were literally in there, hyping her up and I was like, and I had heard her say, hi Amber. And then as you're talking, I was like, oh my God, this is Amber Lyda. We're in the same workshop together. And then when you were doing your more recent launch, I jumped in, I was like, you know what? I really love the way her brain works. She sees the big pictures, she sees client need and balances it so well with like therapist need and focusing on both. And I was, yeah. So here we're actually here. Probably a big, you're a big piece of it. Yeah.

Amber Lyda 7:58

That's so cool

Bethany Valenti 7:58

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 7:59

It is neat to see, the people who've been around for a long time in this very weird online course creator for therapists,

Bethany Valenti 8:08

Yes.

Amber Lyda 8:08

micro niche,

Bethany Valenti 8:09

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 8:10

I met Kym way back She was one of my very first students, and then we got to

Bethany Valenti 8:15

Oh,

Amber Lyda 8:16

become friends And she's just a crazy talented entrepreneur. Like she can do anything.

Bethany Valenti 8:21

Yeah, she's so smart. Yeah. Yeah. And I love the work that she does. Because I listen to her podcast a few times. She specifically says taking insurance is really important to me. That's a passion, that's a value.

Amber Lyda 8:31

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 8:31

gonna carry,

Amber Lyda 8:32

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 8:32

so while I haven't spoken to her directly about it, it just speaks really well to what I want us to talk about today. So we could start with insurance maybe, if you want.

Amber Lyda 8:41

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 8:41

Because there are therapists like Kym Tolson, for instance, who. Feel like part of the issue is educating therapists on navigating the insurance. And then there are people who are like, we're jumping ship on providing insurance for our clients. And there are people that promote just stop taking insurance. You'll get what you want. And then what drew me in from your workshop? 'cause that's where our most recent connection was, was you saying there's a middle ground and here's how we can manage that. And you don't have to forego all insurance. Maybe you just, like, there was a step to it, a step down,

Amber Lyda 9:27

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 9:28

Can you tell me your own personal, like philosophy about that?

Amber Lyda 9:32

Yeah. I don't love zealot beliefs, you know?

Bethany Valenti 9:35

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 9:36

I feel like there needs to be some kind of nuance. I'll tell you, when I started my private practice, your audience is gonna be like, she has an anxiety disorder. Yes, I do.

Bethany Valenti 9:47

Why do you think we get along?

Amber Lyda 9:48

right.

Bethany Valenti 9:49

adhd, it's all there.

Amber Lyda 9:50

my gosh. I was so afraid of insurance as a clinician

Bethany Valenti 9:55

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 9:55

I had heard

Bethany Valenti 9:56

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 9:56

how many issues therapists were having with I don't know if the consumer knows, but We have to submit something to insurance, it has to be so freaking perfect to get paid and even the way we write our therapy note, For us to be able to conceptualize what's happening over the course of our work with you and make sure we're staying on track with your goals. And you know, there are good clinical reasons to have notes.

Bethany Valenti 10:21

Absolutely. You can't get rid of them. Sadly, for those of us who don't like documentation, they're a necessary evil, as it were. Yeah.

Amber Lyda 10:27

of the reason we don't like documentation is insurance.

Bethany Valenti 10:30

Yeah, I think that's fair.

Amber Lyda 10:32

the note

Bethany Valenti 10:33

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 10:33

for us clinically. We have to write it in a way that's gonna convince the insurance company that they should pay for the session. It's no longer even all about the client. So all of that to say, I was terrified of getting something wrong with insurance, having them claw back my income,

Bethany Valenti 10:50

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 10:50

them not pay for sessions, and then I know me, I would have a hard time telling a client like, listen, insurance didn't pay the 125, I'm gonna need you to pay me.

Bethany Valenti 10:59

Yep.

Amber Lyda 11:00

I probably would just eat the

Bethany Valenti 11:01

Eat the money. Yeah, that's, I have such an issue, be like being able to go back and be like, Hey yeah. And I didn't even know what clawbacks were until after I started working, I was like, oh my God. I'm hearing people talk about, so clawbacks is literally when insurance goes back and says, nevermind. And they take the money back Right from, from the person who has been paid. So it's not necessarily from the client.

Amber Lyda 11:23

It's

Bethany Valenti 11:23

It's the therapist.

Amber Lyda 11:24

And you paid your mortgage with that money

Bethany Valenti 11:26

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 11:27

Hey, by the way, we're gonna need that 25 Gs back There

Bethany Valenti 11:30

It's not small amounts.

Amber Lyda 11:31

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 11:32

Yeah. Or like some sort of loophole of I don't know it, and oh man, there's so much overlap here, but, well, when we get into online and stuff like that, especially people who are like a hundred percent online, there's. talk out there, right. Of like insurance companies being like, oh, we're not gonna pay as much if you're providing services virtually, even though it is actually more accessible for a lot more clients to be able to utilize. I was talking to a client yesterday who I just happened to be like, do you ever wish your parents went to therapy? And she was like, all the time you know, and I said, how has it gone when you've talked to them about it? And one of them's response was, I'm so busy, I can't do it. And she was like, well, it's online.

Amber Lyda 12:14

Right.

Bethany Valenti 12:15

She sees me.

Amber Lyda 12:15

There's

Bethany Valenti 12:16

Yeah. There's room in there somewhere.

Amber Lyda 12:19

I think that for me, I didn't take insurance because I was so afraid of messing up and getting in trouble,

Bethany Valenti 12:24

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 12:25

I found out that I could fill my practice with people who wanted to pay and were willing to pay out of pocket.

Bethany Valenti 12:30

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 12:31

So I had that experience. When you ask like, what do I think other people should be doing? I think they just have to do what works for their personality, for their phase of life. Would it be ideal

Bethany Valenti 12:45

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 12:46

if we could all take insurance? Of course.

Bethany Valenti 12:49

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 12:49

Well who wouldn't wanna make therapy as accessible as possible? Insurance companies, that's who, because they're for profit. So in case a consumer doesn't know how they work, the idea is that all of us pay a bunch of money in and they make money by most people not using the benefits. That

Bethany Valenti 13:09

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 13:09

keep the money. So we noticed during the pandemic use of therapy went up astronomically because everybody's like wait, I can do this online?

Bethany Valenti 13:19

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 13:20

So everybody started utilizing their insurance more. Insurance companies started making so little money Because people were using their benefits. that now they're introducing loopholes to be like, oh, you have to see your telehealth therapist in person once every six months. Knowing darn well, most of us don't live close to our clients when we're doing telehealth. So I think that the average consumer may not know how difficult insurance companies make it to work with them, and that their priority isn't always the best care for the client. It is, making a profit. And so if I need to see a client for 25 sessions to help them with X, y, Z issue, company's not paying unless that person has a diagnosis and they're only gonna pay for a certain number of sessions based on the diagnosis, which

Bethany Valenti 14:12

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 14:13

puts therapists in a real awkward position. I'm unwilling to lie about a diagnosis and put my license on the line in order to leverage sessions for a client.

Bethany Valenti 14:23

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 14:23

needs therapy and I know that they can't pay it out of pocket and the

Bethany Valenti 14:27

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 14:27

didn't wanna get into that game at all.

Bethany Valenti 14:29

Yeah, for sure. it's hard because like you said, there are some people who are willing to invest the time and money into therapy. Then there are people who are like I don't have that income. I need it to be through my insurance. What I have found that is even more gut wrenching is that I will do intakes with people I use one of those third party sites that does the insurance for you. But I can put in the benefits and know exactly what they're going to, need to pay.

Amber Lyda 15:02

Mmm. That's great

Bethany Valenti 15:02

And I can tell them before they make an appointment with me when I use insurance. Essentially, I've had people be like, oh yeah, I'll do this. And then their plan is awful and they're paying out of pocket until they reach a certain deductible or whatever. there have been a couple where I've switched to private pay just for that reason, because I'm like, I'm willing to take less than what they're giving you.

Amber Lyda 15:25

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 15:26

And because I'm in the, this particular third party site is that their copay goes to this manager and not to me.

Amber Lyda 15:32

Oh, interesting.

Bethany Valenti 15:33

I'm not charging them the copay, they're paying them on there and I get paid whatever the reimbursement contract amount is.

Amber Lyda 15:39

I see. Okay.

Bethany Valenti 15:40

That's one of those kind of give and takes. There's other sites where they find you clients and you have a whole EHR. Right. I don't know if we're supposed to, we're allowed to say their names, so we just won't. But there's one that rhymes with sch me and one that rhymes with, remember. But the me one is actually one that is kind of considered more ethical and good and they'll help you find clients or whatever, but, and you're paying, paying them a service. So when you see people who are like working by themselves, like on their own right, they are likely paying a fee, like to be a part of those things. Or some of their money is getting cut,

Amber Lyda 16:21

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 16:22

in some way. And that's still their ability sometimes to be likely a part of a solo practice instead of a group practice. Because people in group practices sometimes choose to be in a group practice because they don't wanna deal with figuring out the insurance and they can say, this is our policy. So they can still have all the benefits of being in a group practice and not have to deal with the headaches of the insurance stuff quite as much. And that can be a big barrier to some people who. Potentially are just in a not great like situation right in, in their office. Like I've known some therapists who've literally like had to leave their group practice and start all over because of poor management or whatever.

Amber Lyda 17:03

that should give the consumer like some clue about what a pain in the butt insurance is.

Bethany Valenti 17:08

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 17:09

that clinicians will work for group practice, that's gonna take 30 to 40% of their income in order to deal with marketing and insurance

Bethany Valenti 17:20

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 17:20

when they're already getting paid, not a lot through the insurance company. Reimbursement tends be lower through insurance companies in private pay, so they're already taking, on average if a therapist takes insurance, they're earning $60 less an hour than if they were in private pay. Then on top of that, they're giving up 30 to 40% to the group practice owner, because marketing and insurance can feel totally overwhelming to deal with yourself. That gives you a little indicator. If your therapist Takes insurance, like give them a high five. They're doing a lot of work to try to make sure that therapy is as accessible as possible.

Bethany Valenti 18:01

Mm-hmm. I think you and I are the type that are really into giving personal examples because it helps illustrate a lot more accessibly. I remember you've told great stories about. When you found your therapist who did not take insurance. And I love that story. I've heard it a couple times, so I'd love to hear that again. But there's also a story that you told of, I found somebody who had all the credentials and also took insurance. the two side by side are really kind of indicative of what situations a lot of therapists are gonna find themselves in. do you feel like that would be helpful to share?

Amber Lyda 18:36

I was looking for a therapist. I found this woman who had every credential under the sun. I mean the most advanced degrees, all of the certification. She was clearly brilliant and very well-trained,

Bethany Valenti 18:49

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 18:49

I went to see her and she knew all the right techniques, but it was so clear that she was not particularly invested in me. She was seeing 40 plus clients a week to

Bethany Valenti 19:02

Oh my god.

Amber Lyda 19:03

earn enough through insurance to pay her bills. So there just wasn't a lot of, you know, emotional

Bethany Valenti 19:11

Connection.

Amber Lyda 19:12

resources left to connect. With me in the way that everybody who's ever been in therapy knows, like you have to have a connection with your therapist for it to truly work. And so I left her, even though it was only a $20 copay

Bethany Valenti 19:25

Oh,

Amber Lyda 19:26

It's a 20 dollar copay.

Bethany Valenti 19:27

I'm doing the system,

Amber Lyda 19:28

Right. But it wasn't, it wasn't working we were not vibing. a friend, several friends had told me about this other man who was a therapist. He did not have his rates on his website.

Bethany Valenti 19:39

I remember that.

Amber Lyda 19:39

him.

Bethany Valenti 19:40

know. So it's we've talked about that there's such a mixed thing of put it on your site so people can make an informed decision, but also how are they gonna connect with you if they don't chat with you?

Amber Lyda 19:50

right. I would've never called him

Bethany Valenti 19:51

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 19:52

had known what his rate was, but I didn't. So I called him and we had an amazing free consultation and I was like, oh man, this is my dude. Like this is the guy who's getting me. Therapy's gonna be so much faster. 'cause he so clearly gets me

Bethany Valenti 20:05

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 20:06

And then he told me his rate and I thought I was gonna throw up.

Bethany Valenti 20:10

Oh,

Amber Lyda 20:10

I was coming from counseling center world too, where we didn't charge.

Bethany Valenti 20:14

yeah.

Amber Lyda 20:14

was just like shocked and appalled frankly.

Bethany Valenti 20:17

Yes.

Amber Lyda 20:18

he was also so good and he was like, I can see you're shocked.

Bethany Valenti 20:23

I, I can read the room. I can read the screen,

Amber Lyda 20:26

I'm a therapist.

Bethany Valenti 20:27

yeah.

Amber Lyda 20:28

he was basically like, let's give you a minute to get over the sticker shock. And you look at your finances and I'll look at mine and I'll see if there's any room for me to be able to come down a little bit and let's meet up again next Thursday or whatever

Bethany Valenti 20:40

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 20:41

we did. And we found a place where, I could make it work. I literally gave up cable to make it work because I was like, this is my dude

Bethany Valenti 20:49

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 20:50

I need help. I was in

Bethany Valenti 20:52

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 20:52

of pain at the time and it was absolutely worth it.

Bethany Valenti 20:56

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 20:56

it work.

Bethany Valenti 20:58

Yeah. Yeah. And I've even remember times where I went into those search, like you go into your insurance thing to find like whoever is in the directory or whatever. And I found somebody, but then wanted to like, check them on the website, went to the website, saw somebody else that I thought might be a better fit. I didn't realize until after I started seeing her that that particular person in that practice was not a part of my insurance.

Amber Lyda 21:27

Oh no.

Bethany Valenti 21:27

So I ended up, I forget about that sometimes. And that was such a bummer. So I barely got to see her like once or twice, and then we stopped. And so you start all over, you find somebody else. I had conversations with friends and colleagues at the time, and they were like, well. and I went to this other therapist who was much closer to my house and I thought it was gonna work and it was not a good fit. And was talking about how hard that was and what did I do? Trying to find a therapist is so hard, like I'm as a therapist saying that, right?

Amber Lyda 21:55

Yes.

Bethany Valenti 21:56

and so I talked to a friend and she's like, well, what would you like? Because she knew about this couples therapist that we had seen as sort of a fake premarital, 'cause we were already married

Amber Lyda 22:08

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 22:09

thing. That my husband and I went to go do. And I was like, I loved her. If I could see her, that would be so great. but she didn't take insurance. She did do a super bill, which we can chat about because I remember her explaining that and that was my first exposure to it. I was in university counseling and had no idea about insurance stuff at the time. I remember her being like, I'll give you a super bill, which I love how you explain it. It's kinda like a fancy receipt and you give it to your insurance and they see if they can reimburse anything. And I remember looking at her and be like, in my head, I'm never gonna do that.

Amber Lyda 22:41

I know I'm never gonna do that.

Bethany Valenti 22:42

I know I'm never gonna do that. Which is partly why I now am a part of, I think since I pay them, I can say this, Mentaya, who manages that for you?

Amber Lyda 22:50

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 22:51

been able to do that with some of my clients. There's other ones out there. But that's what I use, so I'm gonna mention them. No ad, no endorsement, but essentially like, it's so hard all the way around. And so I ended up seeing her and paying out of pocket, and my husband and I were like, you could at least go see her once a month because of like, where I was at. And I just, I was gonna benefit from that so much. Now I see her fairly frequently. I stopped seeing her for a while when I had babies. Went back to her, her fee had gone up, and I'm like, okay, I, I, I love you too much.

Amber Lyda 23:24

Right when you know it's gonna work. It saves you money in the long term to work with somebody who can actually help make

Bethany Valenti 23:33

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 23:33

they're insurance or private pay, or whatever the heck they are. When you

Bethany Valenti 23:36

find

Amber Lyda 23:37

your person, you

Bethany Valenti 23:39

yeah.

Amber Lyda 23:40

know, it's like finding your soulmate in regular life. You just don't. Wanna give that up if you don't have to.

Bethany Valenti 23:45

Which is why sometimes even if you find like a good therapist who takes insurance, they're probably busy 'cause they got people who never wanna leave, you know? So it can really add to the challenge of finding a therapist. That's one of the reasons, one of the main reasons I found this podcast, so that you could get a sense of the different therapists and how they are in the room instead of just going to their psychology today and looking at like a 32nd video if that. It's actually 20 seconds, I think. So, yeah, it's, it's tough.

Amber Lyda 24:15

way to pick somebody. it's better than nothing,

Bethany Valenti 24:17

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 24:18

really works on that profile or works on their website so that you can see the personality that they treat,

Bethany Valenti 24:27

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 24:27

diagnosis is one thing that you have to have a certain expertise to treat each diagnosis. But personality fit is a big deal, so that part is harder to capture in what they write on their psychology today or their website. So if you're catching that vibe on their website or psychology today, scoop 'em up.

Bethany Valenti 24:46

Do the initial consult or whatever to make sure to verify. like you and I have talked, we've both talked about this in our work, but like how there's the whole social media trend. A lot of therapists are feeling like they have to be online in that way. And the way when I decided to do it, I thought, well, let's see if anything comes of it. But if nothing else, it's a way for people to cyber stalk you, to make sure you're real and also see a little bit more of you. So it's not necessarily a bad thing that, that they have it, but like. Seeing therapists who like are putting all that energy in to try to make that work as well. It's hard.

Amber Lyda 25:26

your therapist's skill is not predicted by how many TikTok videos they've made.

Bethany Valenti 25:32

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 25:33

a totally independent thing.

Bethany Valenti 25:35

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 25:36

it is nice. I think when therapists will put at least a little bit of something out just so that we can see, like, you know, who are they attracted to? Are they Brene Brown folks or are they that, what's that guy's name? Tony, his name?

Bethany Valenti 25:51

I see Jay Shetty all the time though.

Amber Lyda 25:52

Oh, I like Jay.

Bethany Valenti 25:53

Yeah. You like Jay?

Amber Lyda 25:54

the guy that's like Mr. Positive Psychology and he makes a ton of money. Tony Robbins.

Bethany Valenti 26:00

Yeah, I've heard that name.

Amber Lyda 26:00

if, if, who

Bethany Valenti 26:01

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 26:02

putting quotes up from that's gonna tell you something about how they think about the world? I'm never putting up Tony Robbins quotes. He's not my dude,

Bethany Valenti 26:10

Not my dude. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a good point.

Amber Lyda 26:13

bit of insight, but don't think that your therapist needs to be an influencer to be a good therapist. Those are two totally different skill

Bethany Valenti 26:19

Mm-hmm. On the flip side, some therapists are purely influencers and some are influencers and still see clients, you know,

Amber Lyda 26:28

Yeah

Bethany Valenti 26:30

so just because they're on there doesn't mean they're necessarily taking clients, but just because but if they're on there, that doesn't mean they're not taking clients. So it's, it is kind again, just adds to another layer of like, what, what we're doing. But, oh, where could we go from here? Do we wanna talk about types of degree? Because I feel like that kind of does touch on some of the money too, and like people like feeling like they need, you were mentioning it when you were talking about finding your therapist, I think.

Amber Lyda 26:54

And then let's also circle back to the big tech stuff, 'cause

Bethany Valenti 26:57

Oh, absolutely. We're gonna, yeah.

Amber Lyda 27:01

Yeah, there's a real weird degree hierarchy It feel like, it used to be more present that when

Bethany Valenti 27:07

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 27:07

looking for a therapist, they only looked for people with doctorates.

Bethany Valenti 27:11

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 27:12

And if they're doing that, you're really missing out because some of the best therapists I have ever known have been

Bethany Valenti 27:17

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 27:17

over the degree spectrum.

Bethany Valenti 27:19

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 27:19

it's really, the degree I think for consumers is a shortcut to thinking through like, are they qualified enough?

Bethany Valenti 27:27

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 27:28

20 bajillion therapists to look at, how can I narrow down the pool?

Bethany Valenti 27:32

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 27:32

it down by degree,

Bethany Valenti 27:34

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 27:35

That's just trying to like make the search go faster.

Bethany Valenti 27:38

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 27:38

I'd really recommend narrowing it down by the type of treatment they provide, what their specialty is, and the personality match that's gonna help you more than anything else. There are like different levels of clinical experience that you get through your grad program.

Bethany Valenti 27:57

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 27:58

doctorate, I had two years, of practical experience before they even sent me to internship. And then I

Bethany Valenti 28:04

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 28:05

internship and then I did a year of residency. And all of those are me doing clinical work supervised by somebody else, like literally watching the videos of my clinical work telling me where I'm doing an okay job, where I need to improve.

Bethany Valenti 28:17

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 28:18

that's super valuable. It does make me a better clinician than if I hadn't had that.

Bethany Valenti 28:23

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 28:24

But let's say somebody has their LMHC and then they've been working in the field for 10 years,

Bethany Valenti 28:29

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 28:30

they've gone to all these certification trainings and CEUs and all of this. you just can't say that one is gonna be a better clinician than the other based solely on. Degree. And some people are just intuitively freaking good

Bethany Valenti 28:42

Yes.

Amber Lyda 28:43

without any degree,

Bethany Valenti 28:44

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 28:45

good at helping other human beings What do you think?

Bethany Valenti 28:48

well, oh, I feel very strongly about that. Yeah, same. I feel like I'm totally on the same page. I've been on multiple sides of it. I think one of the sad truths of it is that if you have a doctorate, insurance will pay more or you can charge more. So I think there is kind of an element to it. my mother really always regretted not getting her doctorate. She was in social work. Just kind of had that messaging to me. And I ended up going into a doctorate program. But I'll be transparent. Like I, 'cause I don't know if enough people talk about this, I didn't get into grad school the first time and used a year to do a lot of soul searching and gain experience, and I have no regrets about that. And then got into the program that I went to and I fully believe that that's how it was supposed to go. I think I was so much more ready, all of that. But I applied the second time around to more master's programs. 'cause then I was like, I'm fine, I'm fine with that. You know, like I know I can do the work that I would wanna do at some point. with just a master's. I loved the program I went to. and then I've seen, because I've also worked in settings just like you, university counseling centers where it's multidisciplinary and the benefits of that like are rampant, there's no limit to it. And unfortunately you do see, like you said, sort of a hierarchical thing there. We saw that in some of our training stuff sometimes where doctorate level trainees were not loving that they had somebody who did not have a doctorate, as part of their training. Oh yeah. it was really painful. And so that really kind of opened my eyes to some problematic stuff because that person was highly, highly skilled, brilliant. And I learned so much from them. And I have gone to therapists that did not have a doctorate. I actually have never seen a therapist that had a doctorate, honestly.

Amber Lyda 30:41

don't know whether the therapist, I, I don't know what his degree was.

Bethany Valenti 30:45

yeah.

Amber Lyda 30:46

I don't know if

Bethany Valenti 30:46

that's cool.

Amber Lyda 30:47

or not.

Bethany Valenti 30:48

Yeah, can't even tell you. See, see?. So like I, and then there you get, because you get doctorate who also like, are really honed in on one specific type of training. Like different programs do different things. That's why you just have to kind of like, feel people out.

Amber Lyda 31:02

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 31:03

so I do know that I have had better experiences with different therapists. I had one really bad one who was like, well, what's different about like, what you do, what I can do? And it was just quite unpleasant. I was pretty unhappy with that therapist.

Amber Lyda 31:19

weird thing to say to your client.

Bethany Valenti 31:21

Yeah. I story for another time. She was, she was great. So, and then the person that I pay private pay out of pocket, I'll just say it, $200 an hour

Amber Lyda 31:34

Huh.

Bethany Valenti 31:36

is an LPCI think.

Amber Lyda 31:38

Yep.

Bethany Valenti 31:39

She's fantastic. I wouldn't have it any other way. She gets me.

Amber Lyda 31:43

Right.

Bethany Valenti 31:43

That's worth its weight in gold. Right? To be understood is to be seen and known.

Amber Lyda 31:48

I will say, and this is like, might be controversial, but I will say that it is important to me

Bethany Valenti 31:58

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 31:59

of the degree that the person is well-trained clinically.

Bethany Valenti 32:03

Yes. Absolutely.

Amber Lyda 32:04

So you know, like if you're gonna be doing EMDR on somebody, you dang well better have gone through a lot of training to do. That. If you're gonna be doing complex therapy treatment. You'd need to have gone through a lot of training, whether it's CEUs or

Bethany Valenti 32:17

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 32:18

courses or whatever.

Bethany Valenti 32:20

Don't just be winging it,

Amber Lyda 32:21

Yeah. Like this is not follow your intuition land.

Bethany Valenti 32:24

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 32:25

part of it. But also part of it is like we have learned through research what not to do

Bethany Valenti 32:29

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 32:30

there's, we don't need to go out there harming clients like experimenting willy-nilly.

Bethany Valenti 32:34

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 32:34

grad degree, don't care. Clinical experience and training and good supervision care.

Bethany Valenti 32:40

Mm-hmm. And you mentioned, do they have the specialty that you need? Do they have the type of treatment, like training, like EMDR or what have you that you're looking for? So many people these days separate from degrees like the, I mean, the recommendation is consistently let people know what your specialties are, even if you're trained big picture and you like working with everybody. You have a pretty strong philosophy about this, right? can you speak to it?

Amber Lyda 33:06

from a marketing point of view, it is very hard to get found as a generalist 'cause nobody's typing in. I need a generalist therapist into Google. And even if they were, there would be so many therapists that that would match with that. It just wouldn't work

Bethany Valenti 33:23

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 33:23

marketing point of view.

Bethany Valenti 33:24

And what consumer knows what generalist is, unless they like had a therapist parent, you know, like it's, yeah.

Amber Lyda 33:31

exactly. So really a lot of therapists niche because it's easier to get found that way. Much easier to fill your practice that way. They usually will have many niches. Because we like working with a variety of people.

Bethany Valenti 33:46

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 33:47

you'll see on their website a bunch of niches always go from psychology today to their website because we

Bethany Valenti 33:52

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 33:53

we can't fit enough on the psychology

Bethany Valenti 33:55

Yeah. They literally have character limits.

Amber Lyda 33:57

right? And, You might match with the person that they treat well. So think mostly from a marketing point of view, and then while I can work with a lot of people, think it is important to know who we don't work well with. So we get them matched to people who do. So I'm big into figuring out who your anti niche client is so that you're not bringing people into your practice just because you're like, I need another client. But you're bringing in people who fit with the methods that you use. here's a good example, y'all, I'm gonna just be vulnerable when I was in training. I was seeing this guy as a client and he needed help being able to feel his feelings and name his feelings and express his feelings. And I'm like, Aw, sweet. I know how to do all of that, you know? And like I'm applying psychodynamic therapy and we're working on it. We worked on it for a while

Bethany Valenti 34:53

Mm.

Amber Lyda 34:54

and nothing was changing. I messed up real bad and I have apologized. I never asked for his medical records. Just didn't even

Bethany Valenti 35:02

Oh

Amber Lyda 35:03

occur to me.

Bethany Valenti 35:04

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 35:04

You know, like it was such a clear presenting issue, like, I need to, and it was a dude. So I had some stereotypes of like, okay, it's a dude. He wants to get in touch with the feelings.

Bethany Valenti 35:13

Gotcha.

Amber Lyda 35:13

months go by, no progress. And he's literally like, no, you don't understand. I don't feel it. I'm like, but in your body. He's like, no, I'm not feeling anything

Bethany Valenti 35:24

there's nothing. It's gone. Like there's nothing.

Amber Lyda 35:26

I'm like, okay. This is beyond my skillset. So I start asking around, one of my supervisors was like, let's get his medical records just in case he's had a head injury.

Bethany Valenti 35:35

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 35:36

records, homeboy had multiple concussions, had a head injury.

Bethany Valenti 35:40

Oh my God.

Amber Lyda 35:41

diagnosis of alexathymia

Bethany Valenti 35:43

Oh

Amber Lyda 35:44

find the words to name his feelings, and he had damaged a part of his brain that would've given him access to feelings.

Bethany Valenti 35:53

So also these were probably all things that would have allowed him to like, tell you that, you know, like, to be like, oh yeah, I've had a head injury. Or like, I can't say certain things like that. Would that, that makes it kind of hard. It's not like, you know, sometimes we hope that our clients tell us everything but one, they either don't remember or don't know necessarily what's relevant.

Amber Lyda 36:10

Right.

Bethany Valenti 36:10

had that many times.

Amber Lyda 36:12

tell him like,

Bethany Valenti 36:13

Yes.

Amber Lyda 36:14

chart.

Bethany Valenti 36:14

The amount of, yes. So much. I think that happens in our field plenty. Like I, I'm guilty of it too because I put a diagnosis to a point for the insurance, not because of what I think it needs to do for us in the room. I think some therapists are much better about that, about being transparent about it. But yeah, the amount of times where like you hear stories about client being like, oh, I was diagnosed. I might have an anxiety disorder. And they're like, oh, well, I diagnosed you with generalized anxiety like years ago. And they're like, what are you talking about? And that's just in our field. Like I have a client who recently was like, I was somehow along the way diagnosed with Ehlors Danlos, and no one told me, even though I suspected that I had some joint stuff, you know? And so we're like totally unpacking it and we're like, oh, okay. We actually like, looked up the list of diagnosis like check mark for criteria together. Yeah. Yeah.

Amber Lyda 37:07

geez. So this is why like knowing what your therapist treats is important. And I've even had clients who come in, I'm trying to like wrap my story back with some sort of meaning. Right now, I've had clients that have come in and been like in a free consult. You know, I'm having panic disorder. I know from my training that panic disorder is best treated with behavioral interventions. I'm not a behaviorist. I don't do good behavioral therapy.

Bethany Valenti 37:34

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 37:35

referring that person to somebody who does. if your therapist is referring you to somebody, it's probably non-personal. It's probably just that they know the sort of

Bethany Valenti 37:43

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 37:43

need that is not the kind that they know how to do Well.

Bethany Valenti 37:46

Yeah. And it might be that it, at least in my experience, referring out and then continuing to work with somebody is pretty unheard of. Because of ethics. Because of the ethics that we're taught, unless you like, really are able to stay in each other's lane. Like for instance, like you said, the behavior's like, oh, I won't treat the panic, but maybe I can treat. Family stuff or whatever, but a lot of that could have some overlap. And so especially when we were in university counseling, we would have people be like, oh, like I see this person for sports psych and then I see this person for like other stuff. But they were finding like, oh, I do tell you guys the same thing because I like hearing your different opinions

Amber Lyda 38:30

you're like, wait, wait. That could be counterproductive. In our trainings, all of the different degrees have different trainings. Most of it overlaps. But there are some cases where some degrees trained that you should not have two therapists for one person, even if they're working on different things. My program taught that and since then I've done the opposite. There have been times where I've brought another therapist into the room with me and my client to do the behavioral work because I'm

Bethany Valenti 38:56

Oh

Amber Lyda 38:56

this is not my jammy jam. Plus, I wanted to learn how to do it by watching her

Bethany Valenti 39:00

yeah.

Amber Lyda 39:01

And then there are, like for example, there are some people that believe that if you're seeing a couple and couples counseling that you should never, never, never, never see one of the individuals privately

Bethany Valenti 39:12

Oh yeah.

Amber Lyda 39:13

Because it could bias you from the couple's work. The couple's supposed to be your clients and there are other degree types that do that all the time. And we all feel like the way that we do it is the correct way.

Bethany Valenti 39:24

This is what's best.

Amber Lyda 39:25

yes,

Bethany Valenti 39:26

Yeah,

Amber Lyda 39:30

see how as a consumer, it would be freaking hard to find a therapist and know that you're finding the right fit when there are all these elements to juggle. Like insurance, not insurance, what degree type. Oh, does it matter? Okay. If it doesn't matter, what kind of training do they have? Is that the kind of treatment that I need? How would I know I haven't been through grad school?

Bethany Valenti 39:47

And these are all things you're supposed to be navigating when you're struggling with something. Right.

Amber Lyda 39:50

Right?

Bethany Valenti 39:52

It sucks and it's sort of the reality. 'cause you deserve to shop and you deserve to know what's best. And so I think I just wanted to touch on, go back to the nicheing down part of it. So if you're looking for somebody, well, one of the things that, when I was looking for a therapist, I was like finding those sites that like spoke to you directly. And I think I was just like, well, let me, what, what therapy do they do? Like I just don't, you know, and I don't know if that's because I am a therapist and I was like, I don't know if they're speaking to me directly so I don't know. Sometimes you'll see on like their psychology day, it's much more of like a, like, big picture, but sometimes it is like a letter and that actually is, you know, you, you're gonna say it like, that's actually recommended. 'cause we want, if you feel like the therapist is speaking to you, that means hopefully that they're understanding you.

Amber Lyda 40:40

If the vibe matches, you're like, this is cool, and if it

Bethany Valenti 40:43

this is cool.

Amber Lyda 40:44

are you talking to me like that?

Bethany Valenti 40:45

Yeah. And then I know that you've made a really great point about people who are concerned about speaking to directly is that even if someone is interested in working with you and they don't necessarily relate to the exact words you're saying on the site, the way that you're talking is hopefully resonating with them. So if you feel like you have potentially a good vibe with somebody it doesn't hurt to reach out and do the initial consultation, And then they will let you know if they either don't have openings or they think someone else would be a better fit for you.

Amber Lyda 41:13

Oh, I'm so glad you said that. I wasn't even thinking of it from that angle, but it is just because you're reading as the consumer something on their site and you're like, man, they really get that person, I bet they would get me. Don't assume that that's the only kind of person they treat.

Bethany Valenti 41:29

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 41:29

we are told from a marketing point of view to market to one person. And sometimes we just change up our Psychology Today profile to a different person every few months. So you might just Hit it when they weren't marketing to you in particular, but they would like to work with you. So if you're feeling the

Bethany Valenti 41:46

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 41:46

vibe, reach out and they should tell you whether or not they're a fit. Great point.

Bethany Valenti 41:51

oh, thank you. Thank you. I remember we had somebody in our course who was saying that they had Child stuff specifically on their psychology today, but she was like, I am rotating it out. So if somebody who wanted to work with her, like as an adult went there, and they read that, it might not have been like, oh, like for me. So I think that's a good example. Like you said, another reason to sometimes just go to the website and not rely on the psychology today,

Amber Lyda 42:16

Yes.

Bethany Valenti 42:17

or check out the social media. What are they putting out there? Is that kind of like your approach to the world? Is that what you might like your approach to be, you know, what are you looking for?

Amber Lyda 42:26

y'all give us a little bit of grace because we

Bethany Valenti 42:30

Mm.

Amber Lyda 42:30

graphic designers. We are doing our best over here.

Bethany Valenti 42:33

Literally, yeah, we're just trying to survive. I bought a template and I dolled it up.

Amber Lyda 42:39

That's exactly what, I'm doing too. I cannot do that myself. I have tried. It is not cute.

Bethany Valenti 42:45

and knowing your limits in all areas of life,

Amber Lyda 42:50

and

Bethany Valenti 42:50

when you need to outsource, I think is a valuable piece of insight to have for yourself. Really quickly, is there anything else we wanna touch on the online versus in-person thing, and like, where we're at with that?

Amber Lyda 43:02

a lot of therapists have gotten a taste for online work now, and they're getting to live more of their lives because they're working online. So if you are seeing that the therapists are only online, which I think has really been the trend lately,

Bethany Valenti 43:18

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 43:19

give them some grace. They wanna be home with their kids and their dogs too. and. If you have done online work and it's worked well for you, go for it. you're feeling like, I am so freaking sick of being on my computer all day, every day. And I need to go to someone's office, just know That there might be fewer of those folks out there than there have been in the past. And especially, it's really hard as an insurance-based therapist to afford rent.

Bethany Valenti 43:46

Okay.

Amber Lyda 43:46

not making enough money and then you're adding an expense on. So you might see it even more frequently with insurance-based therapists because legit, they're like, how can I make it work to keep offering insurance

Bethany Valenti 43:59

Yeah,

Amber Lyda 43:59

afford to pay my own bills? So

Bethany Valenti 44:01

yeah,

Amber Lyda 44:02

say, you know, if you can give a little grace to those folks, if that might work for you.

Bethany Valenti 44:07

yeah. And I think you actually touched beautifully on kind of the different factors with you have, you take one therapist, are they solo? Are they in a group? Do they take insurance? Do they not? And are they online? Are they in person? Now, all the things that could factor into all of that, like you said earlier was like, that could be a phase of life that they're in. They may want to be home with their kids. That's a big part for me. Keeping the overhead costs low to make sure I can kind of keep doing this is a big part for me as well. What's another thing? Anything else? I mean, traveling, wanting to travel, like you mentioned that. Yeah. I mean that's, that's big for us. We literally, like I told you, just went to Pittsburgh and had a great time and I was able to do that because I don't work on Fridays, you know, and I was able to be in charge of my own schedule. I think a lot of people in our country these days don't really want someone like a lot of oversight anymore. and so all the different factors as to like why a therapist might take insurance, why their fee looks a certain way. I mean, you have a great way of talking to different people about trying to determine where your fee needs to be to like, get the bills paid

Amber Lyda 45:19

Mm-hmm.

Bethany Valenti 45:20

Be able to do your work ethically. Because like you spoke about that one therapist which was if like you are so burned out, you're not providing care, but you're feeling like you have to hustle to get your bills paid. You know, if, if they're a single parent, if they, just had upheaval financially or you, you just don't know. Or as you and I spoke off mic about they may just have done all the insurance and they're tired and they're in a different phase of life where they don't wanna have to account to that anymore. And that's just where they're at.

Amber Lyda 45:56

Yeah. Just finding the match between what you need and how they offer it.

Bethany Valenti 46:01

Yeah. Absolutely. Big tech. You wanna talk about big tech?

Amber Lyda 46:05

Let's do it.

Bethany Valenti 46:06

Let's do it. Okay. So what,

Amber Lyda 46:09

We're gonna be very careful.,

Bethany Valenti 46:11

we're gonna be very careful. What are we talking about when we say big tech therapy companies? That's what we're talking about, right? Yeah. Without naming names,

Amber Lyda 46:19

yeah. no naming

Bethany Valenti 46:20

while being careful what we're referring to

Amber Lyda 46:22

We don't wanna get sued.

Bethany Valenti 46:24

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 46:24

If you could kind of like separate out, this is how I think about it conceptually. There are companies that I'm gonna call Big Tech that are sort Of like the big box stores for therapy. they spend a lot of money on ads to get a lot of clients, and then they match those clients to therapists. And they provide that therapists the video that they need, the health record system that they need, and all the marketing. So because they're providing all those services, their payment to the therapist is usually pretty low. So therapists are not, they're getting paid usually less than, much less than they would be getting paid with insurance. So think of that as big tech. And then there's other companies that are more like middleman. So therapists might partner with a company who does all the insurance billing for them, or brings clients to them. There's some shady stuff happening there.

Bethany Valenti 47:26

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 47:27

The overall issue for both sides of this is that as a consumer, it is hard for you to know how safe or unsafe your personal information is with these companies. Some of them have structured themselves so that they're not healthcare companies, they're some other kind of company,

Bethany Valenti 47:49

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 47:49

the rules that therapists have to abide by about confidentiality, protecting your records,

Bethany Valenti 47:55

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 47:56

they don't have to legally abide by. And in some cases, they have not communicated that to the therapist. In some cases, they lied and said that they were practicing with what's called HIPAA compliance, meaning every piece of software. Your private information goes through is locked the heck down, nobody's getting in there. And turns out that was not true for at least one of these big tech companies. So That's one side of the risk about your junk is just not locked down. And rando people on the staff we're watching videos of therapy sessions.

Bethany Valenti 48:36

Oh my God.

Amber Lyda 48:36

Yeah, some scary stuff. But then in addition, if you look as a consumer, where do these companies make their money?

Bethany Valenti 48:44

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 48:44

you start getting a sense of like, are they really in it to keep my stuff safe?

Bethany Valenti 48:50

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 48:50

some of these companies, like the big tech companies in particular, they're not making enough money on clients paying for their services 'cause the prices are so low then the therapist fees come out of that. So the profit margin will be way too slim to pay for the amount of frigging marketing that you see them doing. So where is that money coming from? Sometimes it's coming from venture capitalists. Often it is coming through them, sharing your private data with marketers. we have to be careful about how we frame this because the paperwork you will sign, we'll say things like share, not sell data. Because legally that's like a little loophole,

Bethany Valenti 49:38

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 49:39

getting paid somehow.

Bethany Valenti 49:41

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 49:41

So, I think you have to be careful when you're going with big tech. I think the positive thing I will say about them is they've done so much freaking marketing that I think everybody knows now that online therapy is legitimate form of therapy.

Bethany Valenti 49:56

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 49:56

have

Bethany Valenti 49:57

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 49:57

us to de-stigmatize

Bethany Valenti 49:59

Do destigmatize online, but also therapy in general, I'd say. I think if we're gonna give them anything, we'll give them that.

Amber Lyda 50:06

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 50:07

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 50:07

can have this. I don't think that was their intention, but.

Bethany Valenti 50:09

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 50:10

that is the outcome. So something you should know as a consumer is that if you're working with a therapist through one of these big tech companies, you could see them in their private practice and not go through the big tech company. You could literally say to your therapist, Hey, I reread the paperwork in the contract that I signed and I ran it through chat GPT to see if there's anything shady happening

Bethany Valenti 50:34

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 50:35

And I don't wanna go through the platform anymore. Can I work with you privately? And then they are legally required to use compliant video, HIPAA compliant you know, everything, email, EHR, all of that stuff where they keep the records and then they own the records with you rather than some big tech company

Bethany Valenti 50:57

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 50:57

those records.

Bethany Valenti 50:58

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 51:00

Yeah. And I wanna be like, really, I wanna say something a little extra.

Bethany Valenti 51:05

Okay.

Amber Lyda 51:06

Ugh. Deep breath. I think we're so comfortable now with we're being listened to all the time and getting ads thrown at us all the time from, you know, our phones listening to us. Oh, the kitty

Bethany Valenti 51:19

I was gonna say she's coming. I saw her to the corner. I was like, oh, she's gonna be so happy. I warned Amber when we were off mic and she was like, well, I hope she shows up.

Amber Lyda 51:27

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 51:28

Here she is. Oh, she is beautiful. I love her. Can you see? actually, your face is right over here.

Amber Lyda 51:35

Well, they would prefer not to show their

Bethany Valenti 51:37

I know.

Amber Lyda 51:37

just wanna show their rears.

Bethany Valenti 51:39

I will send you pictures.

Amber Lyda 51:40

Thank you.

Bethany Valenti 51:41

Hey, can you, okay. Thank you for the appearance.

Amber Lyda 51:46

Oh my

Bethany Valenti 51:46

My microphone,

Amber Lyda 51:47

pretty. Oh, I hope you guys are watching on YouTube so you can see her. She is gorgeous. Hi. at her. She's, she's like giving me a little bit of side eye. She's very

Bethany Valenti 52:03

She's, she's very, she is, she does not like to be held so.

Amber Lyda 52:10

as Bethany

Bethany Valenti 52:11

She, as I hold her, that's the longest I think I've actually pushed it so that you all can try and see her. She's giving me a look. She's I don't like that. But she's, I remember telling my husband when he picked her up to move her. I don't remember if he was moving or if he was holding her, and I said, yeah, I don't think she likes to be held. And he said, honestly, though, she's still responding so much better than other cats. He's had to pick up who really didn't like to be held.

Amber Lyda 52:32

Uhhuh.

Bethany Valenti 52:32

Oh I told you off mic, but I could say Juniper. This is Juniper.

Amber Lyda 52:36

But you have to say it with the pun.

Bethany Valenti 52:38

Juniper. Juniper, yes. It was great. we knew that she was kind of like a just mature old soul like lady, and we weren't happy with some of the names that she already had, even though, I mean, she was Sarah Lee, which, because she, they said she was like a loaf and I loved that so much.

Amber Lyda 52:54

That's cute.

Bethany Valenti 52:55

it was great. But it wasn't one that other people in our house were in love with. And there was no other kind of like. Bread that was fitting her.

Amber Lyda 53:07

Sourdough,

Bethany Valenti 53:08

Yeah, I know. I went with Ginger for a minute. But she just doesn't look like a ginger. She doesn't feel that spicy in that way. She's a little spicy, but not that spicy. And so my husband was like, let's look at some older names, And he just was reading off of it and I was like, I really like Juniper. And then I stopped and went, Nate Juniper, and he was like, oh,

Amber Lyda 53:30

it's done.

Bethany Valenti 53:31

it's done.

Amber Lyda 53:32

Aw.

Bethany Valenti 53:32

So I really actually don't remember what exactly you're saying. I think you were talking about the big tech, right? And where, I don't remember where you ended.

Amber Lyda 53:38

I was about to say something scandalous.

Bethany Valenti 53:40

Mm. Oh, you were leading up to the scandal. I thought, did you already say the scandalous thing? Okay. We're building up to the scandalous thing.

Amber Lyda 53:45

We're building up. We had to take a break to emotionally regulate.

Bethany Valenti 53:48

Yeah. She knew.

Amber Lyda 53:50

to say this.

Bethany Valenti 53:51

She was here for you, she sensed it.

Amber Lyda 53:52

I, yeah, I appreciate that. 'cause I do feel nervous saying it, but one of these companies who I will not name

Bethany Valenti 53:59

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 53:59

found to have been having clients fill out some paperwork ahead of getting matched with a therapist, which is not totally unusual,

Bethany Valenti 54:06

Right.

Amber Lyda 54:07

it included clinical stuff, which is not always a great idea to

Bethany Valenti 54:10

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 54:11

on pre-intake

Bethany Valenti 54:14

Right. But as a client you're like, oh, this is a part of why I'm here. You're not second guessing that.

Amber Lyda 54:18

Right. But now we've put like some very intimate things into this paperwork. The paperwork, because it was given before they got matched with a therapist, was not considered protected information and was sold. Data was sold based on it. So this paperwork could include things like suicidality betrayal, trauma a recent acute trauma. Now this person could be seeing ads related to the things that they said in that initial paperwork. So picture this You're a couple and you're having like a real tough time in your relationship. Maybe there's been some infidelity and you share this in the paperwork. You start meeting with your therapist and all of a sudden you start getting ads for resort retreats for infidelity and couples.

Bethany Valenti 55:10

Oh, wow.

Amber Lyda 55:11

How are you gonna feel? You're gonna feel like your therapist is sharing your business somehow. Like that's

Bethany Valenti 55:16

Mm,

Amber Lyda 55:16

not gonna be a good situation.

Bethany Valenti 55:19

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 55:20

and that's what some of our concerns are.

Bethany Valenti 55:23

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 55:24

I said that as carefully as I Could,

Bethany Valenti 55:26

I think you did it well. There may or may not be some legislation out there about some of them.

Amber Lyda 55:32

Just Google the company that you're thinking about going with. And then you can see not all the lawsuits are public yet because they're still in process, but there are some that are public information. So you can look at that and if you're ever in doubt, do what I did and just email the company and ask directly Because they do not want to add to you in an email. And then have that as written information so you can say, is the video software HIPAA compliant? Is it end to end encrypted Who has access to it? Do you use any of my information for marketing or share it with anyone else who might use it for marketing?

Bethany Valenti 56:06

I'll just blame Juniper, but I'm not remembering if you said anything about how some of those big, well a lot of the big tech companies are really short changing therapists too. Like the, the ones that you see a lot of ads for the amount of work that they're doing, the amount of accessibility they're supposed to have to their clients. Like they're literally advertising. You can reach your therapist pretty much any time.

Amber Lyda 56:33

Right? as if your therapist doesn't have to eat dinner or put the kids to Bed or, like, that's, it's also such a, it's so incentivizing unhealthy codependency

Bethany Valenti 56:44

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 56:45

that it, you know, it's,

Bethany Valenti 56:46

Under the guise of like, convenience and, and kind of like, anonymity, like space a little bit, So it's understandable like how the marketing like hits for some people, but there's a big difference between, so I, I've, my therapist has been fine with us, us texting. But the times that, what, you know, what I use the texting for, and this is as a therapist, I have texted her about like, Hey, I need to cancel, I need to reschedule. She's been sitting in there with me and we're talking about like, oh, this product that she has in her office that I could benefit from or like, whether it's mental health or just as a therapist. And she'll text me the Amazon link, right? Like, recently she was like, Hey, I know that you, when you get a second. You heard this one podcast episode that really helped you look into getting diagnosed with A-D-H-D-I think a client would really benefit listening to it. Can you shoot that to me real quick? That took me two seconds. Same for her. And she just was like, thank you. And one of the other things I did was when I did get my A DHD diagnosis, I updated her and it was so funny when I literally just sent her the diagnosis with no other information, and she was like, congrats question mark talking about, it's for so long, you know, because she knew, I was at the point where I was like, if I don't have this, I don't know what I'm gonna do.

Amber Lyda 58:09

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 58:10

But that's the extent of how it's gone. I'm not asking her to give more of her time to me.

Amber Lyda 58:15

And that should be a clinically guided decision.

Bethany Valenti 58:18

yeah.

Amber Lyda 58:18

If you're gonna have out of session contact Your therapist should be making that decision because it's clinically wise and there should be a lot of conversation about it and clear limits and a solid container, not a big company prescribing that

Bethany Valenti 58:36

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 58:36

because you're paying for it,

Bethany Valenti 58:38

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 58:39

that's dangerous.

Bethany Valenti 58:41

Yeah. Yeah, that is part of the service. You are to be on demand at least during these times. And that's before do you, this is just me going off on a soapbox kind of tangent minute. Like how many times has we have therapists had to be like, yeah, this is really hard because this communication is over text. Some of these literally the amount of miscommunication or all of that can happen over text. I don't want therapy via text. Like it's, there's just way too much that could

Amber Lyda 59:13

for

Bethany Valenti 59:14

like room for error, misunderstanding. There's just so much to go wrong even in our personal life. The exact thing that someone would say in a therapy room that is written down would sound I remember when I was in undergrad, I'll just use this as an example, we were doing role play. 'cause I joined a warm line to do kinda like crisis line work, like phone call stuff. And we were doing practice and I was the caller and talking about this like situation that I, I came up with that I was a college student and had this roommate who had gotten ironically a cat without telling me. And it had scratched up the curtains and done stuff like that. And so there was this long pause 'cause we were not looking at each other 'cause we were emulating a call. So it's a warm line. Just so you know, A warm line means you can call for like whatever, not just crisis, not like a hotline. So I remember there was this long pause and I know for a fact that it was because she was getting help from somebody, but there was this long pause and she said, that must be really hard for you. I remember, and I, you know, developmentally where I was at, I just, I was just like, okay. You know what I mean? maybe if there hadn't been the pause, if she hadn't sound so rehearsed, like, 'cause I think he literally wrote down

Amber Lyda 1:00:28

Right,

Bethany Valenti 1:00:29

her to like, say this to her and she just like, read that sound. No, but you know what it was. She said, that sounds really hard. Like, and when we're reading text messages without the vocals, without the context in the same way, we can literally, like, that's how we will hear it. Like, someone recently said that she was having conflict with a family member. Someone told them that their text messages, this is trying to keep it loose so it's not, you know,

Amber Lyda 1:01:01

Identifying.

Bethany Valenti 1:01:01

So identifying someone told them that their text messages were. Disingenuous.

Amber Lyda 1:01:09

Mm.

Bethany Valenti 1:01:09

And the example of the text message was, good for you, proud of you. Smiley face, heart emoji.

Amber Lyda 1:01:23

Right. There's a lot of room for error.

Bethany Valenti 1:01:28

Like, That's the nature of their relationship. You know what I mean? And that like, that's, so if you, I don't know man, like just think about that. Like how we misconstrue messages. I dunno that I would want that with my therapist. Like consistently

Amber Lyda 1:01:44

I have

Bethany Valenti 1:01:45

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:01:45

'cause I think as a clinician I would need to know my client for a long time.

Bethany Valenti 1:01:50

Yes, yes.

Amber Lyda 1:01:51

to know each other well enough that I would trust that they could interpret me or at least gimme the benefit of the doubt.

Bethany Valenti 1:01:58

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:01:59

I did use this really sweet like walkie-talkie app thing that was end-to-end encrypted with one of my clients

Bethany Valenti 1:02:07

That's cool.

Amber Lyda 1:02:08

that was super helpful. 'cause it was audio. You could type in it too, but it was mostly audio. I think if I were

Bethany Valenti 1:02:15

That's nice.

Amber Lyda 1:02:18

solely texting, I'm trying to think of like what kind of therapy would I be doing that I would feel super comfortable with that if I was a DBT therapist.

Bethany Valenti 1:02:25

Yes. I was just thinking DBT therapist, which is actually like part of the work, if you're doing deep DBT, like full on DBT, the theory is right, they need that level of like, I need to reach out to my therapist in between because I am not in my emotional window of regulation. It's kind of like having a sponsor, like in like AA or whatever. That's kind of the approach I would liken it to. And that's the theory of that, but that's like part of the therapy and has been discussed, right?

Amber Lyda 1:02:53

And it's super contained.

Bethany Valenti 1:02:55

yes.

Amber Lyda 1:02:56

you say in a text, if you're a DBT therapist, you're not doing emotional processing. You are skills, like what Skill have you tried to regulate What is the next skill you are going to try regulate? Do we need to talk about a crisis stabilization

Bethany Valenti 1:03:10

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 1:03:11

Like

Bethany Valenti 1:03:11

it's very regimented

Amber Lyda 1:03:12

regimented,

Bethany Valenti 1:03:13

the first time I ever heard that example, was a phone example. 'cause my, I heard a lecture on it by one of my favorite professors. And she was like, she was super into ACT and had started to learn more about DBT and was starting to teach about it and was gonna get into it. And so I think she saw certain clients or a good fit for this and certain, and she was describing like, yeah, like I'm not normally somebody who would be like that kind of level of accessible, but if it's around these parameters and she talks about it, someone's like, giving me a call and I pick up the phone. I say, okay, how are you feeling? Okay, go stick your head in a bucket of water and if you're still struggling, call me in an hour or something like that. You know what I mean? like bucket of ice water. 'cause that's one of the skills, and I remember because I didn't know the skills yet they're called the tip skills. Google 'em, they're great. But like it is putting your face in ice, ice water. And so I was like, huh.

Amber Lyda 1:04:04

Dude I used to have access to a bowl of ice water in my office when I was in person in the counseling center doing a lot of complex trauma work. I'd be like hold on! Run down the hall, get in the refrigerator, grab my bowl, bring it back.

Bethany Valenti 1:04:20

Stick your face right on in there. Just we got a mirror in here for afterward. You're fine, you're fine. You'll get to class. It'll be good. This is how you're gonna be able to take your exam today. Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:04:29

Exactly right.

Bethany Valenti 1:04:31

Shove that face in there.

Amber Lyda 1:04:33

I mean, we could do wrist too. Your wrist'll work

Bethany Valenti 1:04:35

Yeah. You're wrist or what's the where you just hold the ice cube. The ice cube one. I love that one. Yeah. For grounding and stuff. Anyway.

Amber Lyda 1:04:42

This stuff works.

Bethany Valenti 1:04:43

Yes, there's so much science behind it when, you go into the DBT manual and it's this is actually enacting the diving thing and it literally is gonna force your body to calm down and Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:04:54

It's cool as hell.

Bethany Valenti 1:04:54

It's so cool.

Amber Lyda 1:04:55

In case any of you guys listening are interested,

Bethany Valenti 1:04:57

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:04:57

there is a website for dialectical behavioral therapy. I might be saying it wrong, DBT is how I say it.

Bethany Valenti 1:05:03

That's right. Dialectical behavioral therapy, that's one of the ones I do know.

Amber Lyda 1:05:07

training videos for consumers on all of the skills and it's totally free, and they're awesome. They're really good.

Bethany Valenti 1:05:16

I might be looking into them, so thank you for that. But definitely plug for that for sure. We were talking about texting. I did wanna then put a little asterisk and come back as, as we were talking, I was like, technically I do message with my clients, but that's either over email and I tell them it's not hipaa, it's like not encrypted. one of the reasons I went with my EHR that I have is that it has messaging that is considered then protected. So they can message me and say, Hey, I need to reschedule. Hey, da, da, da. Or I can say, Hey, I had an appointment come up, or My kid is sick. Like, can we pick another time? Or we're able to talk about insurance issues real quick. I sent one to someone recently and then something happened. What's cool about it is it does feel like if you get it on your phone and use the app there, which you gotta make your own decisions about who can see your phone and stuff. But it will say, new message from, and then it'll put the initials for me so I can immediately, I, it's, it, it, yeah. So it's like private I put the app in a place that you can't find it immediately if you open up the phone, which is really annoying for my A DH, ADHD when I'm trying to like school when I, every time I'm like, I gotta move this. I'm like, it's there for a reason. You did that for a reason. You don't want it to be accessible. you don't want it on the first page, somebody happens to unlock your phone, whatever, Bethany. So the person was like, I think it's because it was on the phone because I don't think I could do it on the desktop. Put an emoji in it and said like, did like a thumbs up. And I was like, oh, I didn't know you could do emojis on here. Lit.

Amber Lyda 1:06:39

Love of our clients, I love them,

Bethany Valenti 1:06:42

I love so much the best.

Amber Lyda 1:06:44

it's so stinks that you can't go to your husband or somebody and be like, you gotta check this out. This is hilarious.

Bethany Valenti 1:06:49

I think I was with my therapist, so I was able to be like, listen to how cute.

Amber Lyda 1:06:53

I know.

Bethany Valenti 1:06:53

Someone put lit in a message to me.

Amber Lyda 1:06:57

It does make you feel cooler as a therapist You're

Bethany Valenti 1:06:59

I know.

Amber Lyda 1:07:00

I'm cool.

Bethany Valenti 1:07:01

So great. Anything else that we're missing that you would wanna touch on?

Amber Lyda 1:07:07

Okay. So we talked big tech just to mention the proxy companies that are helping us like bill insurance Not all of them are innocent either,

Bethany Valenti 1:07:14

absolutely.

Amber Lyda 1:07:15

And some have also not locked down your personal information. So, you know, just Google them is all I'll say about that.

Bethany Valenti 1:07:24

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:07:25

know.

Bethany Valenti 1:07:25

One of the reasons I keep them totally separate. when I started mine, I was actually, I had a reaction of like, really, you guys don't have an EHR? And that stands for Electronic Health record for people who know what I'm talking about. Where we keep our client info. And you wanted in a safe place. And I remember like I thought it would be good if they had one. That was before I knew some of the other stuff. But since then I've been like, no, I'm happy keeping my stuff entirely separate from you.

Amber Lyda 1:07:51

Absolutely.

Bethany Valenti 1:07:51

Even though they have now started to be like, you should do our EHR, you should start keeping your notes on here. I'm like, I refuse. And then they make you literally check off. Whether like to say, I'm acknowledging that I'm putting my note elsewhere, and yes, I will provide the notes within like three days if insurance reaches out for it. Like you actually have to click multiple buttons now to say, I'm putting my notes somewhere else. They really push it.

Amber Lyda 1:08:16

Dislike.

Bethany Valenti 1:08:18

So as my, and they're providing me a lot of convenience, blah, blah, blah, like I spoke to earlier. So in my phase of life right now that's where I'm at and you know, as I continue my journey, I may change, but yeah, I guess one of the big takeaways we could say your therapist that you have had in the past or that you are looking into or currently have, have a number of different things. They are also human. They have different decisions that they have to make for their day-to-day and business. I think you've even said like some people have. Almost like the privilege to be able to take insurance because it's a dual income household or whatever. So just be mindful if a therapist is like, for one, I gotta go on maternity leave or like, I'm leaving the group practice. Or for instance with mine, when I stopped seeing her for a while and I reached out to her, she's like, transparently my fee went up $50 since I've last seen you.

Amber Lyda 1:09:11

Hmm.

Bethany Valenti 1:09:12

and I was like, okay. Because I knew, I was like, I need, I need to be back with you. But like the fees will likely change over time. Some do sliding fee stuff, some people don't. Anything else I can think of?

Amber Lyda 1:09:25

I would just say that most private pay therapists that I know sliding scale and pro bono work because they're making enough money.

Bethany Valenti 1:09:34

Yes.

Amber Lyda 1:09:35

So if there's somebody you're absolutely, like that is my person. Just ask. It may be that those spots are already filled, but it doesn't hurt To ask.

Bethany Valenti 1:09:44

Yeah, thank you so much for bringing that up. Just for examples, I've heard some therapists just like, just do insurance. I've heard some that are fully private pay, but they offer some sliding scale or they offer some at like pro bono, like you said, zero cost or just like a $20, like a copay. At a super reduced rate, but they're only doing it for like a couple a week or something. And then that's their way of giving back. I've heard of, one therapist who's not into insurance at all once said, I give back that. Like, my clinical work doesn't have to be the place where I necessarily give back. I use the money. I'm in a place financially where I can then give back to other causes or fight for the things that I was really doing when I worked with lower income clients or whatever. I'm contributing my time and my money and energy in a different way separate from my clinical work. So People have different approaches.

Amber Lyda 1:10:46

it's so interesting that like, as a profession, we are expected, I have heard people say, but you're supposed to be caring about people or you're, you know, almost like if you're in a caring profession, you're expected not to have to make a living. And That's weird. Nobody says to plumbers Hey, can you gimme a discount? Like you're supposed to wanna help people Or to neurologist

Bethany Valenti 1:11:14

I need my toilet.

Amber Lyda 1:11:15

Yeah, you're supposed to wanna help people.

Bethany Valenti 1:11:18

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:11:18

a kind of weird thing that we put on therapy. I can't even call to mind another profession that we put that same pressure on

Bethany Valenti 1:11:27

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 1:11:29

Yeah. I don't even know the right word for it. You're supposed to care about people. Well, yeah, I do. And also I have to pay my bills. Those two things exist simultaneously.

Bethany Valenti 1:11:39

Yeah. Well put, and I think it comes, like, I didn't also say, I'll just tack onto earlier, like comes down to individual circumstances, philosophies, and just kind of like your values and time and where you're putting it, you know? So, so just things to be mindful of. And if we get a ton of questions over time, maybe we'll have you back and see if we can

Amber Lyda 1:12:04

Yeah, that

Bethany Valenti 1:12:04

address some of this. Would I have some of the usual kind of wrap up questions that I plan on having for everybody. Do you still see clients?

Amber Lyda 1:12:12

I took a hiatus and I have not hiatus my way back

Bethany Valenti 1:12:16

Back.

Amber Lyda 1:12:17

right now my full-time job is teaching therapists.

Bethany Valenti 1:12:20

Yes. Which, you know, we might have some therapists listening, that is like your full-time right now is really helping therapists learn how to go online.

Amber Lyda 1:12:31

Yeah. Teach people to

Bethany Valenti 1:12:31

how to set up a

Amber Lyda 1:12:32

practice online.

Bethany Valenti 1:12:34

market themselves so they can be found.

Amber Lyda 1:12:37

Did

Bethany Valenti 1:12:38

yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:12:38

the other day that I think is super interesting for therapists who are insurance based but haven't been able to start putting money into retirement yet. We did this formula where if they're about my age and if they've only put $10,000 into retirement yet, that if they could put $2,400 a month into retirement, they would be able to hit their retirement goals. Now this is based on like a, a calculator I found online, and so we were all like $2,400. How the heck

Bethany Valenti 1:13:05

I know. Where would that come from? I'm like thinking that's that's straight my income right now

Amber Lyda 1:13:10

Right,

Bethany Valenti 1:13:11

by putting that extra, yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:13:12

right. But if they picked up literally three private pay clients at a hundred and no at $200 a session or four at 150 a session, they would be able to fund their retirement. Teaching people to market to private pay. Client can look exactly like what you talked about earlier. It could be just a few. It could be your full practice, it could be your full practice for a while, and then you go back to insurance when you know that you've taken care of your financial obligations. So I love my work

Bethany Valenti 1:13:41

Yeah. And you're so good at it. I love your brain. I love how it works, and I love your approach to people, so it's. Thank you so much for being here. Okay. So I'll skip some of the clinical related questions. Y'all will have to listen to future episodes 'cause this is gonna be our first episode.

Amber Lyda 1:13:57

Oh,

Bethany Valenti 1:13:57

But I like to ask what do you nerd out about?

Amber Lyda 1:14:02

Oh, geez. Anything related to science, I'm super nerd on. Like if it's marine biology, if it's tech and ai, if it's like new medical stuff that's coming out, I'm a super nerd on any of that. then anything to do with marketing and business, I mean, I'm just like such a geek. I probably spend 10 hours a week learning something in

Bethany Valenti 1:14:24

That's so Thank you. We appreciate that. My brain like shuts off when some of that stuff comes up.

Amber Lyda 1:14:33

love it.

Bethany Valenti 1:14:33

but you also explain it so well,

Amber Lyda 1:14:35

I Have a fun time thinking, okay, how can I make this make sense to normal people who don't geek out on this

Bethany Valenti 1:14:40

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 1:14:42

That's a fun challenge.

Bethany Valenti 1:14:43

Yeah. do you have any pets?

Amber Lyda 1:14:45

I have had pets in the past most of my life. I have had dogs. We lost our babies in December

Bethany Valenti 1:14:54

Oh,

Amber Lyda 1:14:54

now we're like super dog people, it's hard not to have them. So I'm just babysitting all the neighbor's dogs until we

Bethany Valenti 1:15:01

Yes.

Amber Lyda 1:15:02

where we're ready to adopt again.

Bethany Valenti 1:15:03

Feeling ready to have another one? Yeah. Do you know what you might want or like,

Amber Lyda 1:15:08

We're thinking something smaller because we wanna do a lot of More traveling. wanna be able to bring them with 'cause living in a van for three months with two large 60 pound dogs. Was It was pretty tight.

Bethany Valenti 1:15:19

Yeah, I could see you kind of like pulling that back a little bit, so maybe something smaller. So we'll stay tuned there. But yeah, really quickly, the van travel stuff, if my husband and I like, that's part of our, hopefully in the future sort of thing. Like, just so you know, we did,

Amber Lyda 1:15:33

was so fun.

Bethany Valenti 1:15:34

when I saw that you were doing it, I was like, man, that's so awesome. Because first time we ever tried it was, we went to Hawaii for a two week trip. The second part, second half of it, we were gonna be we with family. And so we were like, let's go a week early and get a camper van. And we made such great memories.

Amber Lyda 1:15:52

I love that. It's so fun. It's so fun.

Bethany Valenti 1:15:57

Yeah, and it's, 'cause I you've used like camper vans, like the smaller ones, right? Yeah, so not like a full camper. We have a camper now that we 'cause of, again, phase of life stuff and convenience in that regard. But I mean, for instance, did I already say it was Hawaii? It was Hawaii. So we were able just to like go to all sorts of places and know that like when we had a bathroom with us, but also our place to sleep if we needed to. And having that all in one place is so great. But also like it fit in a standard parking spot,

Amber Lyda 1:16:27

That's the gift man.

Bethany Valenti 1:16:30

it's so great.

Amber Lyda 1:16:30

to navigate around little cities and pop into the grocery store, but also go into the woods and

Bethany Valenti 1:16:37

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:16:38

That's so fun.

Bethany Valenti 1:16:39

Yeah. That is so great. So what's something that you find comforting?

Amber Lyda 1:16:44

Hmm. Gosh. Snuggling up in my bed with my planners. All around me and my

Bethany Valenti 1:16:54

yeah,

Amber Lyda 1:16:55

and my post-it notes and a

Bethany Valenti 1:16:57

yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:16:57

video of one of my favorite traveling people like Amon and Beck,

Bethany Valenti 1:17:00

Ooh, I don't know them.

Amber Lyda 1:17:03

woo-hoo.

Bethany Valenti 1:17:03

Oh, I love that. Coffee or tea?

Amber Lyda 1:17:06

coffee, for sure.

Bethany Valenti 1:17:07

Coffee. And let's see, well, you kind of touched probably on some of these, but what is your least favorite misconception about mental health work?

Amber Lyda 1:17:17

Mm. Probably one that I am so susceptible to, which is like, it's very easy to put yourself second when you're a therapist, because when you're in the room with a client, you're so fully in that room and you're so centered on that human being that it can be hard for that not to bleed over. Into the rest of your life or that might just be part of your personality and that's why you're a good therapist and then it's obviously gonna be in the rest of your life too. So I think that part of it's just hard to separate out being fully present for one individual where all of their needs are the things that you're attending to and not your own. Especially as an interpersonal process therapist, where like sometimes you're dragging out some projection or some transference and like that's Part of the work..

Bethany Valenti 1:18:10

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:18:11

We get so used to being able to hold people's emotions even when they're at you. to not do that in everyday life too.

Bethany Valenti 1:18:19

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 1:18:20

dude, in the grocery store parking lot that just hit my car with your cart, that's not cool. Instead of like, I bet you had a bad day.

Bethany Valenti 1:18:29

Right,

Amber Lyda 1:18:30

Don't worry about it.

Bethany Valenti 1:18:32

That makes me think of, I don't know if you've ever seen on this. Kind of therapist influencer. His name is Justin Pruder, I think is his name. And he will do, do you know him? Do you know him? Yeah. Isn't he? Oh, personally. Oh my gosh. Okay. Well, we'll talk more about that. But isn't he just, his content is just awesome, but he is literally like, the stuff, will he be like, he's like, Ima like what people think therapists in traffic are like, versus like what they are like, oh, I wonder if they had some sort of misplaced childhood trauma that led them to cut me off just there, you know,

Amber Lyda 1:19:04

I

Bethany Valenti 1:19:05

versus like, oh my God. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, same. There have been, like my, I have a, friend I've known since I was like six years old, and she will always be like this is, I think she started really pointing this out when I was still in grad school. She was like, you know, sometimes I just wanna like say something about somebody, but then Bethany will just be like, you know, maybe they're having a bad day.

Amber Lyda 1:19:29

It makes life more peaceful.

Bethany Valenti 1:19:31

Yeah, I would rather give the benefit of the doubt that someone cut me off because they're trying to get to the hospital or whatever, than just believe, oh, literally I've said that to somebody. Yeah. when I was in college, I was like, I'd just rather believe that about whatever's going on, than just assume that everyone's an asshole,

Amber Lyda 1:19:48

right. that belief does not serve

Bethany Valenti 1:19:50

Yeah.

Amber Lyda 1:19:51

it is time to be assertive and

Bethany Valenti 1:19:53

Yes,

Amber Lyda 1:19:54

difficult to do that

Bethany Valenti 1:19:55

yes. So there are different circumstances for different settings,

Amber Lyda 1:19:57

yes.

Bethany Valenti 1:19:59

one of the big things that I loved learning about when I was in training, kinda my clinical years before graduating, was one of my supervisors had a sign in her room that said something like, don't mistake my kindness for weakness. You know, and people who know me know that I can kind of flip quick, especially if you're coming at my people,

Amber Lyda 1:20:19

Well,

Bethany Valenti 1:20:20

That's the truth. Yep, yep, yep.

Amber Lyda 1:20:23

My therapy clients have also known that. They're like, oh boy, when I tell Amber this, she's gonna be.

Bethany Valenti 1:20:31

so I, it's so funny. I'll share one more little anecdote. I'll let you go, I promise. But like, I have somebody who I'm hoping to have on the podcast in the future, but like, her name is Abby Swandal. She's, she's on Instagram. She's got like 2000 followers and she just did a reel other day with like a soundbite where it was saying like, the caption was like your people pleasing client talking about their ex-boyfriend's new girlfriend. And like, I think that's how it was. I remember being like, she, so she was performing as somebody who was describing like, maybe there's like a reason that she's like this, blah, blah, blah. And then somebody cuts in by being like, well, she's ugly. Or like something like, and she's ugly or something like that. And her, lip-syncing. Then she, which was like, well, let's not, you know, and it like cuts off there. And I was thinking that that was the client and that the therapist was chiming in because that's, how I can be in,

Amber Lyda 1:21:22

Yeah.

Bethany Valenti 1:21:22

with certain people that like people have been dealing with for forever. I'll say like petty stuff in session. 'cause I'm never gonna meet 'em and I know they had an impact and like, yeah, like I'll say stuff like,

Amber Lyda 1:21:33

you're holding the anger for the client. That's what you're doing,

Bethany Valenti 1:21:36

that's part of my role.

Amber Lyda 1:21:37

Right? That's right. Sometimes our clients need to know that the people in their lives piss us off too.

Bethany Valenti 1:21:42

Yeah, I don't think I would say that they're ugly, but I would say something else, petty. Just, putting that out there. So, if there are therapists that happen to be listening that are like, I've never heard of Amber before, or like, oh, I didn't know she offered, this kind of stuff. Or if you have people who like to follow you anyway how can people find you? Because you have YouTube content. You're on Instagram, you have some stuff out there,

Amber Lyda 1:22:02

YouTube is where I'm trying to make my new home. So I'm putting more and more teaching content on there for therapists who are trying to build an online practice, but largely who are trying to market to some private pay clients.

Bethany Valenti 1:22:14

Mm-hmm.

Amber Lyda 1:22:15

learn all about how to market. Right now we're in the middle of a free training series that I do at least once a year teaching therapists how to market. and then I think probably the other place, like if you just have a question, do I offer something that you need? Don't trust my website, which is amber lyda.com. My last name is LYDA because I have not updated it. So you can just email me and my Email is so hard to remember. It's Dr period Amber lyda@gmail.com. So you can just reach out and let me know if you have a question and if I have it, I'll tell you. If I don't, I'll send you to somebody who does.

Bethany Valenti 1:22:53

awesome, yeah, and she's really good for that. Amber really loves to try and provide as much help as possible

Amber Lyda 1:22:59

I do.

Bethany Valenti 1:22:59

to a fault sometimes where she has to keep herself in check from what I understand. And I think, 'cause you know, what I'm thinking is that what if we have like some therapists in training or something like that, that are listening because one of the things we didn't touch on is that therapists do not get taught business stuff in grad school. If they do, it's very minimal and it's probably pretty rare. They may get some training at like a private practice and might get to see some stuff and learn some stuff. if there's someone listening who just kind of would like to know more of the ins and outs, I'm sure Amber's content would be kind of helpful to just sort of hear and just like, oh, maybe this is why my therapist chose to do this, or this might be something I need to know. Going into building a practice in the future.

Amber Lyda 1:23:41

For sure, and you can always, I have a free Facebook group called the Online Therapist Group. You can join that group, and I mean, it's a community of people who want to help you be successful, so come on in.

Bethany Valenti 1:23:52

It's big and active, so yeah, I've gotten some helpful advice on there. But

Amber Lyda 1:23:57

That makes me happy.

Bethany Valenti 1:23:59

Dr. Amber Lyda, thank you so much for your time today. I've had such a great time.

Amber Lyda 1:24:03

Thank you so much for having me on. I appreciate it.