Today we’d like to introduce you to Priscilla Carrera
Hi Priscilla, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I have been fascinated by people since I was a small girl! I loved learning, observing and was always curious about what motivated people to behave a certain way. As soon as I took my very first psychology class in high school, I thought, “This is it! I know what I want to do!” And I never strayed from the goal of becoming a therapist and becoming a helper. It was not an easy task. Although my mother did very well for herself, she had not gotten past junior high and my father definitely had his own set of traumas and chaos that led him to drop out of high school. I was going to be a first generation high school graduate. How do I even begin to figure out a bachelors degree and graduate school?! Nevertheless, I reached my goals and obtained a bachelors degree in Psychology from Texas Tech and then, in my efforts to explore more away from home, I moved to New Jersey and obtained a Masters degree in Professional Counseling from Seton Hall University. I am incredibly grateful for my time in New Jersey! The way that state handles mental health care is amazing and they are ranked one of the top states in the nation for it! As someone who loves to learn, I wanted exposure to mental healthcare in as many settings as possible! I did case management, children’s mobile response for crisis stabilization, therapeutic nursery, psychiatric inpatient care, as well as school and community based counseling. I gained experience working with just about all ages, demographics, and diagnoses.
Where I found my REAL and current passion, however, was when I moved to the Ft Bragg, NC (now Ft Liberty) with my husband at the time. It was there that I really fell into what I love today! I was a Green Beret spouse at the time and, in military towns, if you are not working with the military, you’re not working. I held two jobs in that time period. One was as an EAP counselor for the local hospital system. There, I was able to provide counseling to all hospital staff including paramedics, doctors, and nurses. After having children and with a husband that was frequently away on deployments or training, I decided to move into private practice, which allowed more flexibility for my growing family. This is where I gained the privilege of working with active duty military families. That is, I worked with Special Forces, Delta and 82nd Airborne families. My time in North Carolina is definitely the time period where I discovered my love for helping the helpers and people who have to do hard things! I have so much gratitude for the people that risk their lives for the sake of others and being able to touch those lives makes me feel like I am indirectly helping the people that they help as well.
Five years later, in 2017, we decided to move back to my home state of Texas, where my family was. I thought it was important to have my children around their extended family. Knowing that it takes a while for a private practice to grow, I saved some money for anticipated startup costs and, to be safe, provided six months office leasing rent up front in an office building. I opened mid August 2017 and, about 10 days later, Hurricane Harvey completely destroyed the building and everything in it. I had lost everything. I, of course, was devastated but I thought, “If I am going to start over, I am going to start over closer to my home.” I found the most incredible, hidden gem of a building in The Woodlands and have been there ever since! My individual practice has slowly grown into a small group practice and I have built a team of providers that have the same mission of helping people who have experienced difficult things or clients who are just trying to improve their relationship with themselves. I specialize in treating trauma/PTSD, anxiety and depression and I have also begun my journey into a full sex therapy certification, which is at least an 18 month process. In my work with trauma, I found that working with people who are trying to reconcile their relationship with their sexuality was most difficult. I wanted more knowledge on how to best guide people back to this part of themselves. I also saw that, even if there was no history of sexual trauma, people had a very difficult time even talking about their sexuality despite sometimes experiencing signifiant distress surrounding it. The AASECT certification process is opening many new doors of knowledge for me and it has been a great skillset to incorporate into my practice.
In our mission to continue to help the helpers, we have a special place in our hearts for veterans, first responders and healthcare personnel . We currently hold several contracts with our surrounding first responder agencies. The Montgomery County First Responders Foundation covers six sessions for all first responders, their spouses, and their children of Montgomery County’s first responder agency employees and we are one of the practices that can offer these services. It is an incredible honor for us and a game changer for our first responders to know that they have this resource; especially after difficult calls or losses.
I am also part of the Montgomery County Behavioral Health and Suicide Prevention Task Force as well as the Greater Houston Area First Responders Support Network. Both of these networks work tirelessly to spread mental health awareness in their respective communities. My practice was built on collaboration. We collaborate with these and many other surrounding organizations and we work very hard to build relationships with peers in our area. The Woodlands has a very close network of mental health professionals and we all help each other. If I do not know the answer, I know someone who will! I also have an incredible team with me (big shoutout to Ashley Stakes, Chris Estes, and Caroline Cameron). If we want to effectively help our community, we have to work together.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
As I mentioned before, being a first gen graduate had its own set of challenges. I had to figure out how to apply and get through college programs on my own. One of the biggest challenges as a practice owner is that, although my graduate school program did an outstanding job preparing me clinically, it did not cover much about the business side of running a mental health practice. A lot of the learning is trial and error! I am definitely someone that has no problem asking for help. My mentors and colleagues that have done this before me have been incredibly valuable to me.
Some of the challenges that have come with being a mental health therapist across different states is that license reciprocity can be difficult. You have to apply in each state and, in my transition from New Jersey to North Carolina, for example the differences in requirements led to difficulty counting my already completed hours.
One of the biggest challenges currently is what most providers face: health insurance limitations. Although we want to be as accessible as possible, insurance companies tend to reimburse mental health professionals at incredibly low rates, making it nearly impossible to run a small group practice getting paid at those rates. In addition, we have had to fight against ridiculous clawbacks from insurance companies. For example, many mental health providers like me who take the military insurance, spent months and months fighting against an attempt at a very large clawback for supposed mislabeling of a telehealth modifier code DURING THE PANDEMIC, when everyone was being seen VIRTUALLY during a crisis. They threatened to withhold all payments of the clients that we are seeing currently. Luckily for us, we were able to eventually straighten everything out but it took hours and hours of phone calls, claims resubmissions, and fighting to get paid. Since January 1, 2025, the military insurance for the state of Texas is also now being run by another company, which has led to weeks of withheld payments, contract confusion and anxiety for our current veteran clients about whether or not we will have to stop care for them.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Carrera Counseling Services, PLLC?
We are a small group practice consisting of four providers with varying specialties. We work with people ages 8 through late adulthood and can work with just about any stressor or diagnosis. We specialize in:
PTSD
Anxiety/Panic
Depression
Stress
Life transitions
Addiction Recovery
Sex therapy
EMDR
Relationship/Family issues
Religious trauma
First responders
Veterans
Medical personnel
Our work with first responders in our surrounding counties is something that we are incredibly proud of because we are not only providing counseling services for the first responders, but we are actively advocating to break the stigma surrounding getting help for mental health services just as one would for medical or physiological conditions. We are also assisting agencies in creating mental health programs for their first responders.
I am also proud for having built a business that values the mantra of quality over quantity. Obviously we need to bring enough income to keep our doors open but, when I hire, I emphasize that we, as therapists, take care of ourselves and practice what we preach. I do not want a revolving door of providers coming through this practice. I am particular about hiring people that hold similar values about providing care and our clinicians have a lot of say in how many hours they work and with whom they work. I have worked across many settings in my career and found that it is very easy to get burnt out when you have crazy caseloads. We definitely try to facilitate a collaborative work space where clinicians have the freedom to be who they are, which leads to better quality services for the community. The therapists that are here WANT to be here.
Risk taking is a topic that people have widely differing views on – we’d love to hear your thoughts.
Risk taking is everything! I have grown the most in times of my life that I removed myself from my comfort zone. Moving out at 18 for school was a risk. Moving across the country where I knew nobody was a risk. Starting a practice was definitely a risk! Growing the practice was a risk! I am most definitely usually a risk averse person. I love structure, predictability, and routines. However, I have learned that the only way you can find out what you are truly capable of is to just go for it. I learned very early that nobody is going to save you and nobody can do it FOR you. The failures (which WILL happen) are difficult but the successes…. so worth it.
Pricing:
- $150-$175 a session
- Some Insurances taken
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.carreracounseling.com/about
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/carreracounseling
Image Credits
Headshots by Couch Adventures Photography
