Today we’d like to introduce you to Jana Kay McHam.
Hi Jana Kay, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I have had an interest in being a counselor or therapist for a very long time. I knew I enjoyed and was good at helping people. Growing up, I watched as my parents helped to guide couples and families in our church community and offered compassion and grace as people learned how to be in relationship with others and themselves better. So, as I started college at Oklahoma Christian University, I began with studying family sciences. Throughout my college career, life happened and I got off course. I eventually decided to settle for the degree that would get me to graduation the fastest. After college, I worked in the financial industry. In 2007 I got married to my best friend, had three kids between 2008 and 2012 and I stayed home with them. Our church was going through some things that created a shift and during this time, I realized that my desire to help people, to help marriages and families was still present and it was time for me to return to school. As a stay at home mother of three children, with the encouragement of my husband, I returned to school to get my Masters of Science in Marriage and Family Therapy from Abilene Christian University in 2015. While I was in my masters program, I recognized some gaps in our field that made it difficult and cumbersome for people of all different backgrounds and situations to obtain all the supervision and clinical hours required to complete their degrees. This is where the vision of what I have created at McHam Family Therapy began. I graduated with my MS from ACU in 2019 and began working as a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in Denton, TX. After 5 years at that private practice, I knew it was time for me to make my vision and dream come to fruition. There was a need and I was capable of filling that need. So I became a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Supervisor which allows me to provide supervision for students who are working to get their requirements met to obtain a degree as well as the newly licensed therapists who still need supervision for the first few years of their careers. So, I opened the doors of McHam Family Therapy in 2024, where I can help individuals, couples and families learn how to cope with life, have better and more fulfilling relationships and provide a space for students and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Associates to become the therapists they are meant to be. McHam Family Therapy is an incubator for therapists and a safe space for those seeking healing and hope.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
A smooth road? Absolutely not. A difficult road? Yes. A road worth traveling? You bet!
It has been a lot of work to research and discover what it takes to start a business, grow a business and maintain a stable business. There are a lot of requirements from the state to own and operate a place of business. Then there are lots of requirements from the state board about how to maintain and run that business ethically and safely. Add on to that, learning how to be a business woman and set firm expectations and boundaries while also holding on to the heart of why I’m doing what I am doing and the compassion and hope for others. I love working with my clients and I love working with my students and associates, but they each require different skills and focus from me.
Each challenge that comes my way offers a learning opportunity and each of those challenges makes the rewards along the way and the end result so much more valuable. I don’t think I could truly appreciate fully the lessons learned and growth experienced if this road was a smooth one. We learn from failure. When we keep going and work hard, no matter how many scars we earn, what a story we will have to tell!
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
McHam Family Therapy is a private practice where individuals, couples and families and seek help with healing and developing skills that allow them to experience a full and meaningful life. We specialize in offering care that has a systemic approach that considers all the areas of the client’s life and how the different subsystems in their world can affect them and how they affect others around them. We address deeper, long-term problems by exploring root causes and patterns so that people can learn how to have healthy relationship with themselves and others.
Our services include EMDR trauma work, play therapy, and talk therapy from many different modalities. We work with first responders, veterans, as well as the general public. We really are a place where anyone who needs care can come for support and help in creating change.
We are able to offer care at varying costs because we have several different levels of experience and expertise. By providing supervision at my practice for students and licensed associates, we can help almost everyone. Each therapist has a different set of issues and concerns that they are comfortable and well trained in so that we don’t just have one type of client that we can help.
Our purpose is not just provide excellent care right now for our clients, but to make sure that these therapists develop their skills and focus and become the therapist they are meant to be so that they can continue providing the best care possible for years to come!
Here is a quick break down of the different levels of therapists:
Master Student Level Therapist (MSLT) have received all the training they need to be effective and great therapists. They are working on obtaining all the required clinical hours that they need to graduate and sit for the state board exam in order to get licensed. They operate under a supervisor’s license and meet with their supervisor weekly to make sure that the clients are getting the best care possible. These providers are some of the most attentive, intentional providers because everything is fresh on their minds and they are intentionally working on getting stronger and better at what they do. Only because of the level of experience in the therapy room, these are typically the lowest cost providers.
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Associates or Licensed Professional Counselor Associates are therapists who have graduated, passed the board exam and received their associate license from the state. They are still required to have weekly supervision just like the MSLTs who have not graduated yet. They usually have a better understanding of what clients they prefer to work with and will have more of a specific demographic and range of concerns that they like to work with. Their fee tends to be a little higher than the MSLTs because of their level of experience.
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists are therapists who have had their associate license for at least two years and have accumulated the appropriate number of clinical hours for the state to issue them an unrestricted license. These therapists no longer need weekly supervision and operate solely on their own.
Do you have any advice for those just starting out?
Something I knew from the beginning that was difficult for me to remember was that growth takes time. When someone has a vision or dream for what they want to create, it isn’t usually the small beginnings that they picture. It is usually the ultimate result, the end goal, that they visualize. That is great! It keeps us motivated to make good choices and stay focused. However, we have to be able to break things down into bite size pieces and allow ourselves to see what each small step of success looks like. Those small accomplishments are what keep you going and excited for the next step. We just can’t let that excitement make us move too fast and lose sight of how far we have already come even though there is so much more coming ahead.
Pricing:
- MSLT session rate: $95
- LMFT-A/LPC-A session rate: $125
- LMFT session rate: $150
- Discounted pricing on a case-by-case basis
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.mchamfamilytherapy.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mchamfamtherapy
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61581432939909
