Time2Track Blog
Real-Life Resources for Students & Early Career Professionals
9 Steps to Make the Most of Your Student Loan Grace Period
Congratulations on graduation! You are now ready to rest on your laurels and reap the rewards of a long road traveled. However, you might have a sinking feeling about upcoming student loan payments. Whether you have yet to take out your first student loan,...
Are Your Patient’s Mental Symptoms Actually Caused by a Medical Disorder?
The human body is a miraculous thing. The mind-body connection is so endlessly complex that there are many things we still don’t understand, even with the use of technology. As psychologists, we probably appreciate this natural wonder more than other folks, especially since we are constantly trying to decode the mysterious ways the brain works.
Unfortunately, all of the things we have worked hard to understand about the brain can become muddled in the face of illness, when the symptoms we are so familiar with take on a different meaning…well, sort of.
Think about this: does depression feel the same whether it’s caused by a traumatic life event or a hormonal imbalance? Based on the common presentation of symptoms across patients and life circumstances, many would argue yes.
6 Insider Tips for Your Inpatient Training
Hospitals are their own worlds, and psychiatric units even more so. Most of us don’t know much of what happens in these mysterious places, leaving us to pop culture and our own imaginations to try to figure it out.
For example, will these units be like Girl, Interrupted, or look like one of Carrie Mathison’s hospital stays on Homeland?
Psychiatric units are generally locked, but you, dear reader, have the keys – and you’re headed in. Here are six tips they don’t teach you in school.
Psychologists for Social Justice: Let’s not sit on the sidelines.
The American Psychological Association’s Ethics Code preamble requires psychologists to “respect and protect civil and human rights” [1]. Psychologists share this commitment with allied professions: social work, nursing, medicine, anthropology, sociology, political science, and public health [2]. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) asserts that human rights include freedom from discrimination and access to health care, food, and housing. However, the field of psychology has a checkered human rights history, with theory, research, and practices reinforcing and lending credibility to discriminatory practices against historically marginalized groups.
How I Became a Mental Health Counselor Later in Life
While a lot of people my age are slowing down and retiring as they hit the half-century mark, I decided to make a career change and go back to school to earn my master’s degree in mental health counseling. Now, at the age of 54, I am proud to say that I am a Licensed Professional Counselor Intern in the state of Texas, currently completing my postgraduate internship hours.
If you are wondering how I decided to become a psychotherapist at this point in my life, I can assure you that it was not an idea that simply plummeted out of the sky and bopped me on the head one day.
Quite the contrary – I have been a therapist-in-training ever since I was a little girl, although I never really knew what that meant at the time. I always knew that I had a caring and compassionate heart and a special gift for helping others, but I did not know how to translate that into a career when I was younger.
How to Develop Your Professional Identity as a Counselor
So, you have reached the point in your life where you feel ready to enter the mental health field as a counselor, and you are left with the question of…now what?
You have completed the necessary educational and clinical requirements and are either in the process of pursuing provisional licensure or completing it. However, little is said about what you actually need to do next, particularly once you are fully licensed and essentially on your own.
Therefore, answering “who am I as a counselor” may seem like a daunting question and one that a lot of professionals often find themselves having to answer. Seeking the answer is not as difficult as you may think, but it requires a lot of self-reflection and a good understanding of the expectations and responsibilities the job requires.
How to Deal with Grad School Competition
Imagine that you are nervously sitting in class as your professor begins to hand back your graded midterm. You wait in anticipation as she slides your upside down paper toward you. You take a deep breath as you flip the paper over to see that you passed. Just as you breathe a sigh of relief, you begin to look around and wonder, “What did everyone else get?”
You get a feeling of unease as you ponder this question. You scan the room, wondering whether or not to ask your classmates what they received on the test. You cannot explain why you are so eager to know, yet the desire is there. The need to know where you are in comparison to others is strong, and you do not know why.
I have the answer, and it is one word: Competition.
Prescription Privileges for Psychologists: An Introduction
Almost any mental health practitioner today knows that “something is up” with the “prescription privileges debate thingy,” but for most, that’s about as far as it goes. It may surprise many readers, however, to learn that the prescriptions privileges movement for psychologists is not new; it’s actually about three decades old.
As this movement gets more coverage (and finds success at more state legislatures), it becomes even more important that students and early career psychologists have some familiarity with the “prescription privileges debate thingy.”
I’ve been pleasantly surprised at the number of students I’ve encountered that do know there is such a movement, but who desire more information about it. In a short series of articles, I hope to leave my fellow students (and psychologists largely removed from the RxP debate) with a bit more information.
A Quick Guide to Clinical Writing for Psychologists
Are there any tasks you do as a trainee, intern or psychologist that you did not expect to do before choosing a career in psychology?
One task that may come to mind is writing.
In psychology, efficient writing is a skill that is consistently required of us. Being a successful writer is a necessary proficiency to inform others about clinical matters such as patient care, reports, goals, and treatments, as well as research, statistics, and other forms of data. Oftentimes, we are not trained in professional or clinical writing and default to skills we have developed over time, which may contain common writing mistakes.
The following is a compilation of writing tips that may be helpful for a variety of clinical writing tasks for psychologists.
4 Ways to Tailor Your Practicum Experiences
Today you are you! That is truer than true! There is no one alive who is youer than you! – Dr. Seuss
There are many lessons I learned from Dr. Seuss: try new things, respect others, and know that making mistakes helps you grow. When I look back over my graduate school career, I have no doubt that I went right along with the Doctor’s orders. I was true to myself and tailored each year of my practicum experiences to cater to my strengths and interests.
As a result, I was able to stand out on my internship applications and develop an area of specialization as an early career psychologist.
With this article, I hope to impart some knowledge and suggestions that may help you on that path in tailoring your training experiences and building a competitive CV.
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