Connecting Over Shared Identity Helped This Pair of Practitioners Grow Their Careers

According to 77 percent of women practitioners who responded to SimplePractice’s February 2023 survey, a mentorship relationship is critical to career success, 

While in most traditional mentorship relationships, the mentor takes the mentee under their wing to provide guidance, therapists Prerna Rao, MA, LMFT, and Valeri Trezise, LMFT, EMDRIA AC, and CEO at Be Still Psychotherapy, have the kind of mutually-beneficial symbiotic mentor-mentee relationship that allows both women to learn from each other. 

And, they even have fun working together. 

Their paths first crossed nearly 10 years ago while working at the same agency where Trezise was an associate and Rao was a clinical director. 

The two therapists reconnected in 2017 while working in the same hospital. Working alongside each other helped them to each achieve new career growth. 

Working together in a new setting also helped the two women grow closer, compared to the previous agency where they were spread further apart. 

They learned they had a shared work ethic and philosophy: both favored a grassroots, boots-on the-ground approach to breaking mental health stigma and increasing access to underserved communities. 

Though Rao had more experience as a therapist, Trezise offered something that Rao’s colleagues couldn’t: a deeper level of connection. As their mentoring relationship grew, they bonded through discussing issues related to being women of color in the mental health field—and so much more.

Women of Color in Mental Health

Rao and Trezise have several shared interests. Their careers and family life are important to them, to start. Additionally, perhaps, the glue uniting this mentorship relationship is their shared experiences as women of color in the mental health field. 

Only 23 percent (approximately 44,000) of the 192,000 therapists in the United States in 2022 were Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) practitioners, according to a research summary by Zippia, whereas, 73 percent are white 

SimplePractice’s 2021 State of the Profession survey found that BIPOC clinicians are more likely to experience burnout in the industry. And 65 percent of BIPOC practitioners who responded to the recent SimplePractice survey said identity is important when choosing a mentor.

“My mentee and I really bonded because we know how hard it is for women of color to find the support that we need,” said Rao. “There are not a lot of women of color who are therapists, and I think our relationship is one of the reasons why we’re each able to impact our clients so much.” 

Rao and Trezise mentioned that their experiences as women of color also show up in family dynamics and other interpersonal relationships. 

While a white therapist from a different familial background might advise the importance of boundary-setting and self-advocacy, Rao and Trezise explained that this approach may not work the same way in families of color. “There’s a hierarchy in Hispanic culture,” Trezise said. “We don’t just go in and set boundaries.” 

Working with Rao taught her how to help her clients break down the barriers needed for setting boundaries in a culturally respectful way. This is a classic example of meeting people where they are. 

Rao’s personal experience, paired with her professional tenure, allowed her to provide tangible guidance that Trezise could follow. 

Rao believes being a source of representation helps their clients, too, since there are so few women of color therapists in their immediate geographic area in Newport Beach, California. 

Bonds Formed Between Two Working Mothers in Private Practice

Balancing motherhood and a career is often  more difficult than it should be due to societal double standards—which is another reason that this mentor/mentee duo work so well together. 

Rao is able to lean on Trezise as a fellow mom and therapist, which allows her to speak about what she describes as “unfiltered frustrations about the good and bad sides of motherhood,” including feelings of guilt over certain aspects of working motherhood. Trezise  validates  Rao as a mother, humanizing her struggles while meeting her in solidarity. 

Similarly, when Trezise’s young daughter received multiple mental health diagnoses, Trezise thought she should have done more as a mom because she’s also a therapist. But Rao reminded her that she did more than enough, validating Trezise’s feelings while also grounding the conversation with empathy.

“You’ve trained in this field as a therapist,” she assured her mentee. “Your daughter gets the best mom out there! A mom who has information, resources, and love.” 

Rao supported Trezise’s entrepreneurial transition into private practice so that she could enjoy more time at home with her daughter. 

Supporting Each Other’s Big Career Moves 

Trezise attempted to start a private practice while still working at the hospital, during a time when she was often working 50+ hour weeks. 

“I had two choices: wait until retirement to do private practice or make the jump with a family and leave the job with benefits,” she shared. “When I had the conversation with [Rao], her support to go for it, and to do what’s best for me, is what I needed to take that plunge.”

She continued, “I had just 10 clients, a sliding scale; it was challenging. But then, the week after the doors opened up, I had a full caseload. But without [Rao’s] blessing, I would have never made the leap.”

There are many ways to show up to care for your children. Rao reminded Trezise that taking care of herself both personally and professionally will, ultimately, help her daughter the most. 

Trezise also credits SimplePractice for helping her manage the uncharted territory of private practice. She had no idea how to navigate billing, client lists, and the myriad other items on her new to do list. 

“SimplePractice made it 100 times better, Trezise said. “And the user-friendliness of it was so important.” 

Though Prerna is not in private practice, she still uses SimplePractice as her EHR and practice management solution to simplify her administrative work as a therapist. “SimplePractice helps my ADHD brain,” she said. 

“[SimplePractice] saves me so much thinking time when it comes to documentation. I tend to be an overthinker and SimplePractice made it so much easier,” Rao said. “I charge the client, and I know when I’m paid.” The ease and user-friendliness of SimplePractice’s electronic billing features took this worry off of her plate and helped her focus on the clinical work without feeling bogged down by minutiae.

No Time For Ego

“Neither one of us has a huge ego,” said Rao. “There are often very rigid mentor and mentee relationships where there is a large ego—like gatekeeping.” 

But this duo is committed to admitting if they don’t know something, asking for help, and then learning and growing together. 

“There are already barriers in place to be successful,” Trezise adds. “The stance that we take is to uplift one another, with no ego for who has been licensed longer.”

Whereas a more stereotypical mentor-mentee relationship might contain power imbalances, Rao and Trezise are intentional about avoiding that type of imbalance. Their power and success is shared, because they are each driven by camaraderie, rather than ego. 

Rao and Trezise’s relationship is a modern illustration of teamwork, and perhaps the future of what mentorship in the mental health field can look like. 

Their experiences as women of color and mothers, along with a shared ethos, has helped them each to build a solid foundation and for each of them to grow individually and as a team. They meet each other where they are, and they are both committed to learning together. 

It takes humility to admit you don’t know something and that you’re eager to learn. Rao and Trezise learn together, consistently lifting each other up. Perhaps that is the true future of mentorship: a shared purpose and desire for growth that helps the client and the practitioner.

Grow Your Practice—and Career—With SimplePractice

To support practitioners in connecting and finding mentors, SimplePractice launched a new mentorship pilot program to help pair health and wellness mentors with fellow practitioners seeking mentorship.

And, when it comes to building and managing your practice, another tip that can help you level-up and simplify your administrative work is using a practice management system like SimplePractice.
The preferred practice management software for more than 185,000  practitioners, SimplePractice has all the features you need to effectively run your practice—including billing, scheduling, insurance, and a secure client portal—all combined in one easy-to-use platform.Want to experience how SimplePractice can help you more effectively build and manage your private practice? Sign up for a free 30-day trial today.

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