Liz Fletcher, LCSW
Big Sky Counseling, Inc.
Latest Activity - Blog #6
The River: An analogy for high-achieving helpers
No Surprises Act
As part of the COVID relief bills passed this past year by Congress, the No Surprises Act (NSA) was passed and goes into effect on January 1, 2022.
Please see the linked information to understand the full scope of the Act.
Have You Found
Yourself Exhausted
by the cycles that seem to repeat over and over in your life, despite your best efforts to create change? Do you wind up in relationships where your needs aren’t met? Where you feel stifled and invisible? Do you feel unfulfilled, even when things are going well? Perhaps you tend to shoot yourself down just when things are going well for you. Or have you worked hard to work in a career you feel passionate about, only to find yourself burned out and resentful? If any of this sounds familiar, you’re in the right place. These patterns we feel trapped in point to a need to understand ourselves in a deep way, exploring what these cycles mean to us and how they’ve served us in our lives, in good ways and in not-so-good ways.
Maybe You’ve Been to
Therapy Before
and had disappointing experiences. My approach to therapy focuses on relationships as agents of healing, rather than on techniques. I don’t give “homework” or fixate on your symptoms or diagnosis; instead, I listen intently to your story, to what feels most painful and urgent to you, and we work on building up those areas of emptiness or woundedness. That’s not to say that symptoms don’t improve with this kind of treatment: on the contrary, my patients have successfully recovered from suicidal thoughts, cutting, obsessive-compulsive rituals, out-of-control behaviors, trauma, trust issues, fears of intimacy, chronic depression, panic attacks, and feeling “stuck” or stalled in their lives.
By focusing our attention on what your symptoms may be stemming from, rather than exclusively on the symptoms themselves, we can figure out what things mean. If you went to a doctor with a fever, and you were diagnosed with “diffuse high body temperature syndrome” and told to take Tylenol, you probably wouldn’t feel you’d gotten very good care, even if the Tylenol did make your fever go away for a while, and the “diagnosis” was technically accurate. But if a doctor isn’t curious about what your fever means—what’s causing your body temperature to rise—they’re not a very effective doctor. Non-judgmental curiosity is our best tool for exploring ourselves, and it’s a tool I can help you develop. Rather than trying to get rid of parts of you that have been labeled “wrong” or “bad,” we’ll work to understand those parts of you as we strengthen the parts of you that have helped you survive and overcome.
What to Expect When You
Contact Me
via email or phone, I will respond within one business day to set up a time with you to speak by phone or do a brief video call. In that call, I’ll ask about your needs and expectations (so make sure you’re in a private place!) to see if I’m a good fit for your needs, if our schedules work, etc. Even if I’m not a good fit, I’ll help you find someone who might be. I have a broad network of colleagues in the Oklahoma City area, and we are committed to making sure that everyone who needs therapy can access it.
If we decide to move forward together, I’ll securely send you a packet of paperwork to fill out and sign. That packet includes information on my prices, policies, and procedures, legal information I’m required to share with you about confidentiality and privacy, payment information, and basic demographic information for your chart. Once I’ve received that back from you, I’ll send you the link to click for our sessions (it will be the same link for every session). Just click that link at the time of our session, and we’ll begin!
The First Session
In our first session, I’m most interested in what made you reach out for therapy at this time. I don’t do a formal intake process, so we can focus on what feels most important to you. If I have questions, I’ll ask them, but in general I like to let you explain your situation to me in a way that makes sense for you.
If you need guidance, feel free to ask! Lots of people feel awkward—it’s an awkward situation, after all! I’m well aware of that, and I’m happy to ask you some guiding questions if that feels better for you. Our conversation and relationship will build organically from there. There is no “wrong way” to do therapy. Whatever you bring is welcome and important.
If you’re ready to feel more confident, more whole, and more truly yourself, please contact me for a consultation. I look forward to working with you.
Phone: 405-761-2514 | Secure Encrypted Email: Liz@elizabethfletcherlcsw.com