This is not the way you imagined your own business to be. You are burned out, tired, and overwhelmed.
You went from the excitement of leaving your w-2 job to building something from scratch. You wanted more freedom to have long weekends, be with your significant other/family/kids, and feel badass for creating your own biz. You feel not sure where you went wrong and you might even feel like a failure.
You’re not.
It’s hard to build your business without support. It’s hard to imagine that this is going to work for you. It can and it will.
If you have your own therapy practice, you’ve likely been told that you MUST take insurance.
Although no doubt you can fill your practice with clients who wish to use insurance in network, it brings a lot of pieces that make it less of YOUR practice and more of an insurance clinic. Let’s be honest….
You will spend at least 5-10 hours/week figuring out deductibles and copays, chasing around your clients insurance payments, and following up on payment status.
You don’t yet have the money to pay someone to do this for you and if you do, they aren’t interested in going the length it requires to get you paid and definitely don’t feel the pressure you do to get paid.
You are getting paid so little that you have to see 25-30 clients a week and the work is less enjoyable than you imagined.
Did you know that it is common in insurance contracts for therapists that they require that if you have an opening, you must offer it to someone in the plan? You’re technically not supposed to save that spot for an out of network (much higher paying) client.
It’s really not your practice, is it? Suddenly all those exciting things about having your own practice seem like a fairy tale.
So you might decide to take SOME insurance through one of these exciting new companies that promise that you can take their clients with insurance and not be on the panel as in network. Sounds great and so easy.
Yours truly joined one of these companies. It seemed too good to be true, until it wasn’t. Because the company deals with all of the insurance issues so you don’t have to, that comes with some downsides.
Clients aren’t talking to you about their insurance coverage because you are out of the loop since the amazing company that is going to make taking insurance easy for you, handles everything so you don’t have to.
Except you’ve seen your client for 3 weeks into a new month and suddenly their insurance isn’t working and you might not get paid for the past several visits and definitely not the upcoming ones. You’re notified that you can continue to see the client knowing you might not get paid, or you have to terminate real quick.
This is not good for you or the client. It might sound like this doesn’t happen often, but it happens a lot.
It happened to me.
It happens when the client turns 26 and goes off of their parent’s coverage and forgets to mention it. .
It happens when they get a new job and you’re not thinking about asking them about insurance, because what do you know about insurance when someone else is dealing with it?
It happens when they change from non-management to management in the same company. If it’s with the same company, why would anything change?
It happens when they decide they want to change plans during open enrollment and switch to another, assuming you will still take whatever they have because you take insurance. WRONG. It becomes your problem, and before you know it, you are dealing with the complexity and red tape of insurance, which is exactly what you didn’t want.
Also this company is taking a portion of your fee of an already reduced fee. Why should someone else get your money when you’re the one who is actually doing the work to earn it?
Frequent cancellations, no consistent income.
I’ve been there, it really sucks. And it is SO DISAPPOINTING! That’s definitely not what you envisioned.
It does not have to be like this. You just need guidance and support from someone who has been there.
WHY ME?
I started my practice in May of 2019 on nights and weekends. It quickly grew and I left my secure union, pension qualifying, benefit giving, full time hospital social worker job. So many people (most of the ones I worked with) said I was crazy to leave. They had decided that if they wanted to make money as a social worker, they had to stay in a miserable job for 25 years.
I didn’t listen, and left in October of 2019 to dedicate all of my time to my private practice. I was seeing 27 clients a week. I wanted to work when my kids were at school and wanted to only work 3 days a week, so I pushed 9 clients in a day for 3 days. No bathroom breaks, no snack breaks. If I had a particularly deep session, I had to jump right into the next. I knew I wasn’t the type of therapist I wanted to be. How could you possibly remember intimate details about your clients when you have 27 of them in the span of 3 days?
I started to wonder if I had made a big mistake. I was working harder than my hospital social worker job without the team of psychiatrists, medical team, and other therapists to bounce things off of.
Finally, after getting COVID19 in March of 2020 and a COVID19 induced pulmonary embolism in May 2020, I was forced to take a look at what I had created and decided to do something different.
No more insurance plans.
No more 27 clients a week.
No more half assed therapy because I didn’t have any breaks.
I started working on my money mindset blocks.
I started taking better care of myself.
I started to make business besties who were also focused on building a practice they wanted and tackling their scarcity mindset.
Guess what?
I now see 10 clients a week and have employed people to support me in my business doing the things I don’t like to. I started to talk to my therapist friends about their practices and they said, “DREW! You need to do this for a living, you are so good at it.” So here I am. My passion is helping you build and create something you are passionate about.
I have increased my income 50% in just a few months. I have a 7 figure goal and I know I can get there.
I did not think this was possible for me, but I’ve proven that it is.
I can help you find your hidden CEO.
I can help you connect with other CEO squad members that are bossing up and creating the practices they want. Sometimes all you need is someone to hold you accountable and seeing other people tackle big things and inspire you to do the same.
Who is this for?
This is for anyone who is building their own private practice and is struggling with feeling isolated, needs a support system to build the practice that they want, and is open to feedback. This is for folx who feel trapped and that they need inspiration to step it up!
Who is this NOT for?
This may not be for you if you want someone to do everything for you. This is your practice and it’s important that you design it that way. This is not for folx who believe that you must be poor to be a therapist. This is also not for anyone who doesn’t want to do the work. You will get homework, books to read, and exercises between coaching sessions and mastermind groups.
So what is the commitment?
VIP Day
5 hours of deep diagnosis of your practice and what is working and what is not. Identifying specific issues and goals for the future. We will brainstorm and create a roadmap for you to get there.
Includes:
30 days of email
Voice message support with Drew.
Investment: $2000
which you will likely make back in the first month.
3 month Coaching Package
6 thirty minute calls with Drew to assess practice strengths/challenges and develop plan to create the practice of your dreams. Ongoing support during the 3 months via email, text, and voice messages.
Investment: $3000
which you will make back within the time we are working together or be well on your way to.