Everyone here has had great communication with me, answering questions, and telling me they're here for me if I needed anything, and that's without even mentioning the continuing education credits and stuff like that.
Chrissy had the pleasure of interviewing Lauren 'Ren' Keiper, LMHC, who joined us in our 30th anniversary year as a volunteer clinician. Thank you for being a part of our goal of welcoming 300 new volunteers to celebrate 30 years of A Home Within, Ren!
You can read the conversation below, or watch the interview video here:
Yeah. I'm happy to be here.
Yeah, so I've always been really passionate about social justice, and growing up I had multiple friends within the foster care community. I saw a lot of the trauma that was involved in their lives. So now as a therapist, I've been passionate about working with people who've been struggling with poverty, oppression, and trauma, so when I saw that A Home Within needed volunteers, it kind of felt like a perfect fit.
Yeah, I grew up in Brooklyn, and you know I went to public school. So it kind of feels like a natural product of that.
I would tell them that I feel really welcomed and supported here. Everyone here has had great communication with me, answering questions, and telling me they're here for me if I needed anything, and that's without even mentioning the continuing education credits and stuff like that. They've been really responsive to me and figuring out a good clinical consultation group. So everyone's been really welcoming and warm and clinically impressive as well.
I think the most surprising thing is kind of the commitment to access – to making mental health care accessible to people throughout their whole lifetime, not just when they're young. It seems like the organization has a really good understanding about how early experiences can continue to affect people into adulthood and making that care continuously accessible can really have a positive impact on people's lives.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think working with clinicians who really care to try to make the world a better place and to expand access to mental health care. I became a therapist because I cared about those things, so I really like being able to meet and work with people who share the same goals and values that I do.
In 2021, I opened a private practice, and now it's a group private practice. So I've expanded a lot and we specialize and work with sexual and gender minority groups. So it's been really rewarding work. We work with LGBTQ folks, polyamorous folks, people in the community and sex workers. It's been a big passion project of mine, and it allows me to offer services to people who normally avoid therapy because they're worried about being judged or being misunderstood. So it's been really amazing for me to get to do.
Yeah, it has made me really happy.
I don't think too much! I appreciate you doing this; I appreciate all the work that you guys do, and I think that's it.
Yeah, I was there!
Absolutely.
Alright! Thanks! Have a good day, bye!
