Kathy Renfree

This is my first time writing where I won’t earn a grade, meet a reporting mandate or hide my writing from the prying eyes of one of my siblings. Of course, I admit to the usual trepidation and concern when trying something new, and if I try just a little bit I can take myself to the place where worries and fears grow out of proportion. But that’s not where I am going to go today. As I was thinking about writing this, I thought about the clients I work with and how they too, are trying something new. It takes a great deal of courage for someone to acknowledge that things are not going too well for them. At this point they may have been living with their symptoms or problems for a long time. It takes courage for them to even think about asking someone for help. It takes courage to make that first phone call and divulge their name and number. It takes courage to share what they think might be the problem. It takes courage to wait a week or so for the first appointment. It takes courage to show up for the appointment, sit in the waiting room, fill out the forms and trust some of their most personal information to a stranger they just met. It takes courage to say out loud what is going on - because that makes it real.