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What happens when the checklist says “no,” but your body and life keep saying “something is real”? We open the new season by taking aim at diagnostic gatekeeping—across therapy offices, clinics, and urgent care—and making the case for care that centers lived experience alongside criteria. With returning guest Jessica Kirkberg, LMFT and sex therapist, we untangle how the medical model can flatten people into labels and why cultural humility, social location, and context should guide treatment just as much as manuals do.

We get practical fast. Jessica shares how training in cultural humility and pain reprocessing reshaped her supervision and client work, from asking about the menstrual cycle to mapping how Ehlers‑Danlos syndrome, endometriosis, migraines, and autoimmune flares affect mood, attention, and safety. We talk about the rise of self-diagnosis through social media—not as a problem to be mocked, but as a tool that gives people language and community when criteria were written for someone else. For many, an EDS diagnosis won’t unlock a cure, but it can unlock clarity, reduce shame, and point to better pacing, sensory supports, and boundaries.

Ableism shows up everywhere: patients feeling forced to “look sick” to be believed, therapists policing how clients sit or move, and insurance barriers that turn access into a maze. We offer concrete ways to lower the mental load in therapy—allow movement, normalize comfort items, keep heat packs and tea on hand, dim harsh lights, and keep curiosity at the center. We also challenge clinicians to name their own social locations and examine internalized ableism, because what we hide in ourselves we often project onto clients. If your setting is rigid, build a consultation circle, follow disabled clinicians, and test one new adaptation at a time. Better care isn’t a slogan; it’s a series of small, repeatable choices that trust what people say about their bodies and minds.

If this conversation pushed you or gave you language you needed, subscribe, share with a colleague, and leave a review telling us one access change you’ll try this week. Your story might be the spark someone else needs.

A Hero's Welcome Podcast © Maria Laquerre-Diego & Liliana Baylon

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The conversations that shaped our year didn’t push us to work harder. They moved us to be human. We revisit the moments that shifted our lens: naming white supremacy inside everyday clinical decisions, strengthening cultural competence with Latinx clients, and turning judgment into curiosity so the therapeutic alliance can lead. We also reframed the parts of the job that feel “scary.” Subpoenas, high-conflict divorce, and big behaviors became step-by-step, consult-supported tasks that protect our licenses and regulate our nervous systems.

Joy showed up as an ethical practice. A listener-favorite segment on travel hacking reminded us that rest isn’t indulgence. It is the infrastructure that makes good therapy possible. From there, we traced the path toward sustainable careers: mentorship as an attachment relationship, releasing the “pay your dues” myth, and setting down the armor that keeps us guarded. With guests who offer lived expertise and practical tools, we mapped a future where boundaries are clear, play has a seat at the table, and self-compassion is non-negotiable, especially for therapists who are also caregivers.

Season three is on the way, and we’re ready to build on these practices: culturally responsive care, court-smart documentation, nervous system literacy, and a professional identity rooted in our values. Join us as we bridge generations of clinicians, dismantle what no longer serves, and create a community where difference is strength. Subscribe, share with a colleague, and consider: what shifts are you making next year?

A Hero's Welcome Podcast © Maria Laquerre-Diego & Liliana Baylon

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The mental health field has a problem we need to talk about - one that's driving talented clinicians away and ultimately harming the clients we all serve. In this candid conversation, two Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists strip away professional pretense to examine the dysfunctional systems governing our work.

We tackle the uncomfortable reality of gatekeeping in mental health - how established professionals and institutions often block access to knowledge, training, and credentials through arbitrary barriers and outdated "pay your dues" mentalities. As systems thinkers, we examine why professional structures resist change even when that resistance contradicts the very values we promote in therapy rooms.

What happens when a field preaches growth and possibility to clients while enforcing rigid, exclusive pathways for its practitioners? The dissonance is both striking and damaging. We explore how newer generations of clinicians bring vital perspectives and boundaries that are frequently rejected rather than welcomed, and how decision-makers are often disconnected from current clinical realities.

This conversation isn't about tearing everything down - it's about questioning why we maintain systems that no longer serve the majority of practitioners or their clients. It's about being curious rather than defensive when faced with calls for change. And ultimately, it's about building a profession that embodies the same principles of flexibility, growth, and multiple possibilities that we offer our clients.

Join us as we position ourselves as bridges between generations, valuing both established wisdom and fresh perspectives, and imagine a more accessible, supportive professional landscape for all mental health practitioners. Question the systems you're involved with, be an ethical disruptor, and know that you're not alone.

A Hero's Welcome Podcast © Maria Laquerre-Diego & Liliana Baylon