Today we’d like to introduce you to Kristal DeSantis.
Hi Kristal, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Of course! I became interested in the field of psychology back when I was an undergraduate in college in North Carolina. At first, I thought I would have a career in Industrial and Organizational Psychology as I was fascinated by the impact that a healthy work environment can have on the success or failure of a company.
I was particularly drawn to how relationships can impact mental health and well-being and wanted to understand more about the interpersonal dynamics that help people work together in harmony ~ or not! We spend so much of our lives at work that it made sense to me that if we could help people feel happy, fulfilled, and connected at work they would be less stressed, function better together as a team, and perform better for the company as a whole- and the data agreed!
However, there is another realm of relationships that also heavily impacts mental health and well-being and that is romantic and family relationships. For many years work was my priority and having a healthy romantic connection was not high on my to do list. I never did the dating thing and didn’t really have any positive relationship role models for healthy relationships in my life growing up. But, when I met my husband in 2010, I suddenly realized, “Oh wow, I really want to be good at this romantic relationship thing, but I don’t know how!”
I had a lot of knowledge of work dynamics and social psychology but I was struggling to connect to healthy relationships in my personal life. So I ended up seeking out a therapist and met with a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist who changed my life and career trajectory. Through my work with him, I became HUGELY interested in how attachment and trauma can heavily impact the way a person lives in and experiences the world around them and how intertwined it is with mental health and healthy relationships. All of the fascinations that I had for industrial and organizational psychology paled in comparison to what I was now experiencing by understanding mental health through the eyes of a relationship therapist.
I graduated with my Master’s degree in Marriage and Family Therapy in 2014. Throughout graduate school and post-graduation work as a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, I focused on developing my own intuitive model for working with relationships – combining my research on healthy working dynamics with the data on makes romantic relationships successful –to create The STRONG Model of Relational Therapy which I use in my therapeutic work with relationships every day now. I also completed training in EMDR (a trauma-focused modality) and became a Certified Clinical Trauma Professional to work with veterans and first responders and their families. These brave men and women have become my passion population and my practice focuses heavily on how trauma affects relationships.
I’m currently in the process of writing a book for men on relationships and mental health -as men are a traditionally underrepresented population in therapy- and I’m a passionate advocate for men’s mental health. My book, based on the STRONG Model of Relationships, will be a guide for men (and those who love them) who want to build healthy relationships from day one. My goal is to have my manuscript to the publisher by Father’s Day this year. 🙌
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The struggles of running a business are probably the same no matter what industry you are in, but in the field of mental health and relationships, the issue of accessibility of services is a big one. Particularly during COVID, we had a few months that were definitely not smooth as we pivoted from in-person sessions to online only sessions -and then just when we figured out telehealth sessions and got into a groove, Snowpocalypse 2020 threw another curveball at us!
Stressors (environmental and relational) heavily impact mental health and relationships. When there is a crisis, we as mental and relational health professionals need to be accessible. It is a constant journey of learning and growing as just when we think we have one thing figured out, there is usually something else that pops up and forces a reset or a reconfiguration of the way we practice. However, I am super grateful to have a dedicated team of clinicians alongside me as we figure it all out.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Austin Strong: Relationship Building Center?
I opened my group therapy practice ~Austin STRONG: Relationship Building Center~ in 2016. We currently have two office locations, one in South Austin and the other in Cedar Park. We also offer online telehealth services for the entire state of Texas.
Austin STRONG: Relationship Building Center focuses on helping people have STRONG relationships. We work from an attachment-based, trauma-informed perspective using The STRONG Model of Relational Therapy as well as other empirically validated modalities for mental health and relationship therapy.
We specialize specifically in Relationship Issues (conflict, communication, lack of emotional connection) and are affirming of all genders, identities, cultures, and relationship configurations; Trauma (complex and acute trauma); Sexual health (intimacy, desire discrepancy, out of control sexual behavior ie: infidelity or porn addiction), and Cross-cultural dynamics.
Our mission is to help people have healthy relationships in their lives. This could mean a healthier relationship with themselves, their partner/s, children, colleagues, friends, parents or anyone who they want to connect with in a healthy way.
Where do you see things going in the next 5-10 years?
COVID and the increasing public conversations in the last few years about stress, anxiety, depression, loneliness has been huge for increasing awareness of the need for mental health services that are accessible to all. Now there is a huge rise of mental health services online -which can be amazing for increasing accessibility for people who cannot travel to an office or who do not have access to a local therapist who resonates with them and can meet their needs. Now you can find a therapist with a quick search and have a session from the comfort of your home which is amazing!
I hope that the mental health field is able to keep up with the changing landscape of people who no longer live and work in the same city or even state by allowing national licensing (currently, licensed therapists are restricted by state) and focusing on training new mental health clinicians not only to be solid in their clinical foundations but to be tech-savvy as well. I hope to see increasing accessibility and normalization of seeking mental health and relationship help as preventative care, rather than crisis care.
Contact Info:
- Email: info@austinstrongrbc.com
- Website: www.austinstrongrbc.com
- Instagram: @austinstrongrbc
- Facebook: /austinstrongrbc
Image Credits
Creatrix Photography
