Exploring Life & Business with Kelly Klene of Cairn Counseling

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kelly Klene

Hi Kelly, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’m one of the lucky people who has always known where they want to be, and what kind of work they want to do. I read the DSM as a child because I thought it was fascinating, and was deeply engaged in learning about how the brain responds to its environment. When I began my private practice in 2018, it was just the natural next step.

I began my practice working with folks who had experienced trauma, and soon found that folks in the queer community, my community, were seeking out skillful support. I also learned that there was a huge need for skilled clinicians for queer and trans clients. Many queer and trans folks have experienced trauma, and some clinicians who I met were treating trauma without any understanding of how to support these other identities. I sought out consultation from a trans therapist and expert in gender, and, as I grew my practice, have continued to provide trainings for the clinicians that I work with to ensure competent care for queer and trans clients.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Despite my incredible luck in knowing where I want to be professionally, it hasn’t been easy to get here. It took a lot for me to believe that I could actually become a therapist. It was easy for me to look at my own therapists and believe that they had it all figured out, and so I couldn’t do that work until I had it all (or at least much more) figured out. Even therapists who I knew personally, who I could tell had their own challenges, seemed to be in such a different place in their own confidence.

Ultimately, the rise of women talking about this feeling of inadequacy helped to buoy me to be brave enough to take the next step. Brene Brown talked about the bad first draft, and the FFT (fucking first time); how everything seems so hard and scary and awful the first time, and so sometimes it’s best just to let the first time be the mess it might be. Ruth Soukup talked about doing it scared; how you can’t wait to stop being scared to take the first step. Glennon Doyle promised that we can do hard things.

So I took a step and did hard things, and I did them badly. But then I did them a little bit better. I saw clients and learned from them, and took hundreds of hours of trainings in order to be sure that I was learning outside of our sessions as well. I brought on brilliant clinicians and learned from them, too. I learned that I was bad at running a business, found people who were good at it, and learned from them. I have done every piece of this business scared, I have made many mistakes, and I will make many more, but I am so proud of the work that we all do.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Cairn Counseling?
Cairn Counseling is an outpatient therapy practice in Denver, Colorado that provides skillful and effective therapy to traumatized and/or LGBTQIA+ folks. We take most insurances, including all types of Medicaid in Colorado, and Medicare. We are client centered and trained in modalities like EMDR, TF CBT, somatic experiencing, and internal family systems in an effort to have as many tools as possible to support recovery from trauma.

We are proud of the care and compassion we have for our clients. We build deep and meaningful relationships with our clients, and are so happy to see them progress. Research indicates that the relationship between the client and therapist is one of the greatest predictors for client progress, so our care for our clients is also a highly effective intervention.

All of our clinicians are trained in working effectively and supportively with LGBTQIA+ folks, and trained in evidenced based practices to support healing in our clients. Once that foundation is set, clinicians are also able to seek out their own interests and grow how they feel called to. Thus, we also have clinicians who specialize in acute and chronic suicidality, neurodivergence affirming therapy, couples and families, and children, among other specializations.

What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
During COVID, we saw a shift in our industry that I never expected. I had not believed that virtual therapy could be as effective and certainly didn’t believe that there was a real market for it. I hated FaceTime calls and would usually multi task while watching a movie. However, once we had to stay home to keep ourselves and our loved ones safe, it became clear how wrong I was. The shift to virtual therapy (which multiple studies have shown to be as effective as in person therapy) is one that I hope will never go away. I see my own therapist virtually. So, while I have some ideas, there are changes that no one can anticipate.

Most folks accessing therapy these days are seeing it as a medical intervention, and thus want to use their insurance. My hope is that insurance continues to expand their coverage of mental health to cover interventions like longer sessions and to provide wider coverage for interventions like medication assisted psychotherapy (think ketamine).

The general trend has also been towards the use of mental health care. As compared to when I was a young person, there are a lot of people in therapy and many young people don’t have the stigma around accessing mental health care that was present even just a decade ago. This is a move from an illness model (I get this support because I am sick, like going to the emergency room when your arm breaks) to a wellness model (I go to my doctor annually to get tests, vaccines, and share any concerns that have come up). Mental health care is focused on maintaining and enhancing wellness, and not simply crisis management and decreasing illness. I believe that this will continue, and more folks who do not consider themselves as having mental health challenges will seek support.

Pricing:

• 150 / 45 min hour for therapy
• 500/3 hour trauma intensive
• 1000/6 hour trauma intensive
• 500/3 hour phobia intensive
• 1000/6 hour phobia intensive

Contact Info:

• Website: https://Www.cairncounselingdenver.com
• Instagram: @cairncounseling
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cairncounselingdenver/