Today we’d like to introduce you to Dr. Kenneth Buckle.
Dr. Buckle, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I became a clinical psychologist in the early 90’s and then worked for many years in a variety of settings such as a state hospital, a public mental health system, private practice, and doing some teaching and training. I left Houston to take a healthcare technology position with a small but rapidly growing company, consulting with very large mental health organizations around the country. While the company did exceptionally well, I felt that I was not in the right place, that I was not doing the work that God might wish for me to do.
After going through a rough personal and professional period, I opened myself up to a serious discernment process to discover what God’s will might be for my vocation or career. Over the span of a couple years, the vision became focused on starting a treatment organization back home that would be configured to overcome several of the many barriers to mental health care, especially the barriers facing the very large Catholic community in the Galveston-Houston area. After moving back to Houston, Gratia Plena was launched in early 2012. It was configured as a nonprofit so that the community could join in supporting the work, helping to break down the stigma and marginalization that so often prevents people from getting the help they need. We have grown little by little with God’s help and the hard work and prayers of so many good people and churches.
Today, we operate in four locations, and have a staff of 18. Most of our clients are Catholic, but not all. The number of people looking for help has increased, and the number of services we provide continues to increase. Our outcomes data demonstrates that our counselors are effective and people are very happy with our services. We are honored to be a small part of the effort to address the current mental health care crisis in Texas.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It has been extremely challenging to start and maintain a mental health care operation that provides high quality services to the entire community, whether or not people are able to pay very much for services. There are so many popular fundraising causes, but people are not as open to donating funds for mental health and addictions work, for marriage and family counseling. Our budget is always tight, and sometimes we cut it very close on paydays. It is also challenging to provide flexible hours for people who work or go to school, and for parents, which is why we are open 8am-8pm M-F and have some Saturday morning hours, and offer babysitting in our office for infants and very young children.
Treatment providers are in short supply in Texas, and we desperately need more bilingual counselors, and counselors who are qualified to work with children and adolescents. Houston is a wonderfully diverse international city, and we are blessed to have an international staff who can speak Spanish, Igbo, Italian, and Chinese (and Vietnamese during the summers). Thankfully, our staff turnover rate has been very low. As the demand for our services has greatly increased, we have been able to keep pace so that new patients can get an appointment quickly, which is so important when someone is calling in crisis or has had to build up the courage to make that first call.
We hope that our donor base will keep growing so that we can avoid having to start a wait list for new appointments. We know that there will always be obstacles when people are doing good work for the community, and that makes us more determined than ever when they arise. Our spirit is given encouragement by knowing that God is the one who does the healing, and we are just His instruments, His tools.
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about Gratia Plena – what should we know?
Gratia Plena is a Latin term meaning “full of grace” which is a reference in the first chapter of Luke. Relying on grace means that we depend on God’s goodness to us as opposed to solely our own efforts. Gratia Plena is unique in that all of our counselors are Catholic, and able to provide counseling and spiritual direction services in a manner that is faithful to the teachings, values, and traditions of the Catholic Church.
Our staff are trained and experienced in integrating faith with our work, with an eye on providing healing that helps people become more involved in building the Kingdom of God, a focus on supernatural and eternal goals, not so much the values of today’s culture. We have school counselors who are able to work with children and their parents. We do quite a lot of marriage and family counseling, since this is of high value in the Catholic community. We assist people who are trying to detach from addictions, and so we offer a men’s group for sexual issues and a women’s group for food issues. If a person, couple, or family has no insurance and limited ability to pay, we will work with them and/or their parish so that they can afford to get the help that they need.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
We would like to be able to pay our staff more than we have been able to at this point, but they keep working hard and doing a great job for the people they serve. They do this because they believe in the mission of Gratia Plena, and they feel that they are doing God’s work. Our staff know, embrace, and live out in action the story that Jesus told regarding the Good Samaritan, that everyone is our neighbor and is deserving of love and mercy. This quality or characteristic of our staff is the most important key to the success thus far of Gratia Plena.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.gratiaplenacounseling.org
- Phone: (832) 532-0129
- Email: drken@gratiaplenacounseling.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drkebucks/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gratiaplenacounseling/
- Twitter: http://twitter.com/DrKBucks
- Other: http://www.pinterest.com/drkbucks/
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