Ariel’s Story
Ariel supports people when they’re seeking mental health care, but she hadn’t sought support for herself. After a series of losses, she realized she didn’t have to face her challenges alone. She found a counselor who helps her move forward with confidence, living her life regret-free.
Ariel’s Story Transcript
My name’s Ariel. I am born and raised Tennessee, down near the Shelbyville–Tullahoma area, if you know that—down near the Air Force Base. I moved up to Clarksville a few years ago.
The military community has always kind of, like, kept me busy—not being part of it, but like servicing it, you know? It’s part of what encouraged me to go to college and get my degree in psychology.
Since then, I’ve always been a really big part of mental health and suicide prevention, for most of my career and personal life. I just have a lot of passion for that.
Despite my background being in psychology, I actually had never gone to counseling. It was one of those things where you know you kind of need it, but you keep putting it off and you keep putting it off. You’re like, “Oh, well, I’ve got the tools myself,” Right? “I can do everything myself.”
Despite the struggles of my own life and past—between family and tragedy and grief—I kept putting it off. And it wasn’t until I had a very sudden cut off of someone I had been with for about three years that it all kind of came crashing at the same time. That, and loss of family, other medical issues—it all just compounded, and I realized I could not do it alone anymore.
So I did the research, did the looking myself, and I found Insight Counseling. I saw the great reviews, I saw the positive atmosphere. And after reaching out to a few other places, even their administrative team was really fast in not just getting back to me, but I found a lot of clinics kind of just place you with somebody. They encouraged me to look at who they had, what their background was, what their beliefs were, and to choose myself. Which is, I find, even working in this field, pretty rare—that you choose your clinician.
I’ll big name drop: Hailley’s amazing.
She knows when to push and when to pull. Some days, I can literally just rant the full hour—and sometimes that’s really all I need. Sometimes I just need to get it out because I’ve held it in all day, because I don’t like… you know, I’ve been so, “I can do it myself.” Sometimes I just need someone I can throw it at, and they can catch it, you know? And be like, “Okay, I’m holding space for this for you.”
And then there’s other times where she knows when it’s like, “Okay, let me stop you right there, because you’re rambling.” She definitely brings a humor to it, which is something I also very sorely need.
I know I would be much less likely to be honest with myself—and with my clinician—if it felt always too clinical, if that makes sense. Not that she’s not professional—she is super professional—but like I said, there’s a light-heartedness. It doesn’t always have to be hard work. Sometimes it can just be silly, human communication, which, you know, is important—to realize that both of us are human. I think that’s what makes her a great counselor.
I’ve seen her for quite a while. I’ve got a lot of things I’m working on, but I feel like one thing she has really brought out of me is the confidence to stand by the decisions I make.
There have been a lot of times where I’ve either not made a decision or waffled on the decision I made after it, held a lot of regret for it, instead of recognizing why I made the decision, and that it probably was the right decision for me at the time. I shouldn’t hold on to regret because of the way somebody else perceived what I did.
And that has been a really, really big change for me—because it’s pulled me from living a life where everything I do has to be for somebody else, to “I can live a life, and I can still care about the people around me, but I can give myself that same care too.”
I think my biggest encouragement would be: the worst thing that happens is you spend an hour of your time talking to somebody. What are you going to lose from taking that first step and starting? You might be scared of that vulnerability—well, if you don’t connect with them, you don’t have to continue. There’s no force. It is an encouragement for you to seek what you are ready for. And if you find you’re not ready for it yet, that’s okay. But you’re never going to know if you’re ready if you don’t start. And you’re never going to see those changes if you don’t start making those first steps.
Even me, working in this field—when I come across clients that, in my clinic, we can’t see—Insight has always been one of our referrals that I go to, and I tell the case managers about. Because I have this personal experience with them as a clinic, I would be happy to recommend to clients or people I see every day.
Which means a lot—because I’m not just going to send somebody anywhere. You know, I have to have faith that they’re going to take care of the people I care about.