Today we’d like to introduce you to Melody Marin.
Hi Melody, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I finished graduate school in 2016 and it took me much longer than I expected to find my footing professionally. While in graduate school, I focused on disability and health psychology, and after graduating I expected to continue working in a hospital setting as I had for my pre-doctoral and post-doctoral internships. That didn’t pan out. I bounced around a bit between various medical settings and group practices, and while I always appreciated the relationships I had with clients, something was lacking. I knew I wasn’t connecting with my purpose but I didn’t know how to find it. Then Covid, a cross-country move, and twin babies happened – pretty much all at the same time. I found myself going through the motions of private practice mostly out of necessity, which I was able to accept as a temporary solution while I focused on my kids and surviving a pandemic. While I was grateful to have the option of remote private practice, I was also very professionally isolated.
When I came across an opening in a small group practice, it sounded like a good opportunity to connect with other professionals. The practice specialized in neurodiversity, which I was only vaguely familiar with. Upon researching the Neurodiversity Movement, I quickly realized that it overlapped with my passion, expertise, and values around disability – that disability is not intrinsic but arises from interfacing with an environment that is unaccommodating. Whereas I had focused on physical disabilities all this time, the neurodiversity movement focused on neurological disabilities like autism and ADHD. Ideologically I knew it was a good fit for me, and the owner of the practice agreed but knew I needed some additional training and exposure to competently work with this population. I was fortunate enough to receive supervision from her on working within neurodivergent culture and I immersed myself in it.
In addition to feeling energized by this new professional endeavor, the things I was learning were resonating with me on a personal level. I started to recognize parts of myself in the people I was working with and learning from. I went from “I have a lot in common with autistic people” to “Could I be autistic?” to “Okay, I’m pretty sure I’m autistic.” Being the classic over-thinker that I am, I made the personal choice to seek out a psychological assessment to get an unbiased perspective. Sure enough, I was diagnosed with autism and a bonus diagnosis of ADHD! This realization seemed to crack my world right open. Not only did I have a whole new framework for understanding myself and my history, I had a deep personal connection to the professional work I was doing and a profound sense of gratitude for the path that led me to it. Because my self-realization process has had such a profound impact on my life, there is so much meaning in bringing that to others through providing education, therapy, and assessment.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Melody Marin Psychological Services?
I am an openly queer/lesbian AuDHD (autistic + ADHD) Clinical Psychologist that specializes in neurodiversity, namely autism in adults. I provide affirming and therapeutic assessments, meaning that the assessment process itself is designed to be a supportive and growing experience, and that forms of neurodivergence are approached as differences and not disorders. Many people come to me feeling misunderstood by the people around them, but also often by other professionals who didn’t take their concerns seriously or whose screening measures missed important aspects of their lived experience. Many of them have various marginalized identities and most practitioners haven’t been exposed to or received adequate education on what autism or other forms of neurodivergence can look like in diverse populations.
It is important to me that clients leave my assessments feeling seen and heard, and that they have a clearer understanding of how their brains and bodies interact with the world around them. I take a similar approach to therapy, with a focus on helping people to better understand and accommodate their neurotypes and other identities in environments that are unsupportive or try to change them. My goal for my clients is to support clients in moving closer to the most authentic versions of themselves while keeping themselves safe in environments that seek to oppress them.
In addition to serving the neurodivergent community, I proudly work with the LGBTQ+ and TGE (trans and gender expansive) communities.
I am also a co-founder of a professional organization called Texas Therapists for Social Justice (TTSJ), which is a coalition of mental health professionals across Texas that are committed to providing culturally-responsible care to the diverse populations we serve and to advocating for those in marginalized communities both inside and outside the therapy room.
What has been the most important lesson you’ve learned along your journey?
That the field of psychology has the potential to be very harmful. The roots of this field are based in colonialism and oppression, and it has done great damage to so many people and groups of people by pathologizing their suffering and aiming to “fix” them. The field of psychology is at a turning point, and has so much work to do to acknowledge its role in oppressive systems and take corrective action to repair harm and build trust within the communities it serves. With the guidance of many therapists and researchers from marginalized communities, it is the responsibility of all members of this field including myself to do this work on individual and collective levels. This is why I am trying to move into more political and advocacy roles in order to utilize my privilege in service of equity and social justice.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.drmelodymarin.com
- Instagram: @drmelodymarin
Image Credits
Ginger Thompson
