Hello and Welcome to Ideas & Insights with Christy. In my Marriage and Family Therapy practice, I create sensorial moments to help adults tap into their inner child, so parents can find a moment of connection with their own child. I founded Bridges to Understanding Family Therapy Services in 2014, where I provide direct service to local families in my community. In addition, I have developed a training program for interns joining the field, and I guide them through their 3,000 hours required before they may sit for the state licensing board exams.
As one of only 97 Registered Play Therapist- Supervisors in California, I hold the highest level of credentialing within the play therapy community I have been a part of since 2006, and began practicing therapy in 2003. This solidifies my expertise in children and families.
What is the story of my business?
The story of Bridges to Understanding begins in 2014 in Long Beach, California. Inspired by the non-profit work I had been completing throughout the South Bay, but burdened by the restrictions within funding sources (i.e. time limitations, high caseloads, strict treatments that forced clients to “fit in a box” for treatment), I found myself wanting to create a practice that had the ability to make some positive changes for both clinical care and clinician care. Seeing my colleagues burning out, and realizing this career only held a few paths (non-profit, hospitals, public health, or private practice), I wanted to create something unique. I researched options, worked with the SBA, and created my practice.
Initially, as I launched, this was my side gig of sorts. I worked on branding, marketing, website development, and getting contracts with private health insurance companies while continuing full-time in the non-profit sector. I moved to the North Bay (San Francisco area) the following year, and brought my practice with me. Creating a name for myself in this new area was easily accomplished, as I held a niche focus on children and families and was respected in my field.
After a long personal journey and a desire to have a family of my own, we had our child. Realizing that he needed some significant care in early childhood, I quit my full-time job in public health and moved in my mother-in-law from Oaxaca, Mexico to help us. By focusing solely on the business and my family, I had the reason and the drive to create success, without the distraction of two jobs. It is because of my son that my practice is successful today.
Why did I build Bridges to Understanding?
My private practice was started to solve a problem: to allow more flexibility in the type of work I was providing children and families, paired with a desire to create a different experience for new clinicians entering the field as interns. Interns are notoriously underpaid (if they are even paid in their internship at all) and overburdened with heavy caseloads. This leads to desperate staff and is a recipe for burnout. My vision included an offering of quality care that was client-driven, provided by eager clinicians who were passionate about the work they were doing.
The foundation of the practice is a celebration of children, with a respect for them and a goal of helping them find their voice. Children are often overlooked, or assumed to be “resilient”, so their early struggles are brushed off due to their age. By allowing children the space to process through play, by giving them the tools they need early on to become successful and well-adjusted teens and adults, we are helping to create a brighter future one child at a time.
What is the mission?
Bridges to Understanding is built on a foundation of mutual respect with our clients and staff, helping individuals actualize their innate capacities, cultivate joy, and strengthen connections in community through an understanding that we cannot navigate this world alone. Fostering cohesion in families allows an opportunity to create permanent change in our children, and alters the multigenerational narrative we have been given before we had a choice. Bridges to Understanding facilitates this mission through offering individual, family, couples, and group therapy services, and we are honored to be a part of the creation of a brighter future for the next generation through attachment, attunement, and purposeful goal creation.