Questions about Life Coach vs Therapy
For myself, I’m super curious when I hear about a job or field that I’ve never heard of before, I want to know what’s involved.
Certainly, my fields aren’t novel but just for kicks, I’m going to answer questions about therapy and Life Coach because I can. Why not.
I will answer questions in 1st person as if YOU are asking them. For additional questions, ask on Minnect, I’ll send you a text or audio message on that app.
QUESTIONS
When did you start your Life Coach business and Therapy job?
I launched my Life Coach in April 2020, my first time being an entrepreneur. I accepted a job as a Therapist at a private practice in the Chicago area in January 2021.
What are the training requirements for Life Coach vs Therapy?
For Therapy, you must be at the Masters level of education. Not just any MA, you can’t have an Engineering MA and decide you’re going to be a Therapist. There are 4 tracks in the US that I’m aware of, possibly more, but these are the main ones. Social Work, Psychology, Marriage and Family therapy, Professional Councilor. It gets even more specific, in that not everyone at the MA or even PhD level in Psychology, is a Therapist, they have to have done the specific track to allow for clinical licensing. For Social Work, which is what I am, the BA level is for community level work and the MA level allows you to do clinical therapy work. The education level is the first step, then each of those MA tracks have their own licensing requirements. Social Work and Professional Councilor, have similar requirements. You have to do field work while in school, in the corporate world, you may be more familiar with the term internship, same deal where you get on the job type training. Then you have to take the licensing exam in your state. Next are the clinical hours, can be at the hospital level or via private practice. Recap of the requirements: Masters level, field work while in school, licensing, clinical hours. For Social Work in California, you’re required to take two sets of licensing exams whereas most other states only require one licensing exam. Life Coach is unregulated, that’s why you can have a bunch of hacks, everyone and their brother calling themselves a Life Coach. For myself, whether you see me in therapy or Life Coach, I am the same, you’re getting therapy level credentials when you work with me.
What’s the cost difference between Life Coach vs Therapy.
For therapy, one of the reasons a client will choose a certain Therapist, is if that clinician is credentialed with their insurance plan. You need to be aware of two things: deductible and co-pay. If you have a high deductible, you have to pay that down before your co-pay kicks in. If you have a high deductible, then you’re going to be paying the equivalent of full price for therapy, until you’ve paid that down. If you’ve paid down your deductible or that’s not part of your health insurance plan, you just have your co-pay. I’ve seen co-pays as low as $12.50, $25 and $40 per session. If you’re paying down your deductible, you’re paying the going rate for therapy which can vary from $200 an hour in Seattle to $125 an hour in Northwestern Illinois. The private practice sets the price. For Life Coach, it’s straight cash pay because insurance companies are only going to pay for therapy from licensed clinical practitioners. Life Coach is not regulated nor licensed. When I see Life Coaches claiming to have a certificate, I think it’s laughable. Whatever training a Life Coach takes, it has zero recognition for licensing capability, does NOT allow you licensing for clinical work. For my Life Coach, I work with clients on price. I had a client who paid me out of her babysitting money, the stay-at-home mom and foreign student for whom I gave price discounts. My Life Coach rate is below therapy prices, haven't changed the price in 4 years since 2020 when I launched my business.
Why is the terminology “Patient” vs “Client” used?
Traditionally, the term “patient” is used for Therapy. I did my field work in the Psychiatric Unit of Hinsdale Hospital in Illinois, since that’s inpatient hospital, I learned to use “patient” as the terminology. The reason why Therapists use the term “patient” is that our work is clinical, we are licensed clinicians. Insurance companies pay for therapy treatment because it’s medical. Yes, it’s mental for the mind vs physical for the body, but it’s considered medical treatment. It depends on the private practice and the specific Therapist, whether they use the traditional “patient” terminology. For Life Coach, the term “client” is used because it’s not clinical work. For myself, the private practice where I work, utilizes the terminology “client” whereas one of my Therapist mentors uses the term “patient.” Because I’m a Therapist and I own my Life Coach, I refer to everyone as clients to make it easier on myself.
What’s the difference between clinical vs non-clinical?
For therapy, because I’m licensed for clinical work in the state of Illinois, I can accept insurance for treatment for medical necessity. Life Coach is unregulated and unlicensed, I personally choose to only take non-clinical cases for my Life Coach business. For example, I’ve been asked several times, if I will see someone with Borderline Personality Disorder in my Life Coach. If I’m aware of a clinical diagnosis, I will decline that for my Life Coach business. Whereas in therapy, I’ve worked with both male and female clients who are Borderline. I choose not to take clients who have a clinical diagnosis in my Life Coach. The DSM is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders for all clinicians.
How much access do clients have to you?
For therapy, clients never talk to me prior to the first therapy session. They submit paperwork, get put on my schedule, I meet them for the first time when they come to session. There is zero access to me, you cannot talk to me on the phone prior to becoming a therapy client. In my Life Coach when I first started, I made the mistake of allowing potential clients to talk to me first. I no longer allow that. There’s enough information about me via my Rumble channel videos, Substack relationship newsletter and social media presence for potential clients to know something about me. Even if I didn’t have such a large footprint of material via video and print available, I still would not allow potential clients to talk to me prior to the first session. It’s a waste of my time. I operate exactly the same for therapy and Life Coach, you talk to me for the very first time at your initial session. For therapy, current clients can call the office main phone line or email me directly for changes in session scheduling, 90% of the communication is for scheduling changes. For my Life Coach clients, I operate slightly differently. My clients have my personal cell phone, occasionally they will text me updates or questions, I will answer briefly. I allow more access to me, for my Life Coach clients.
Can you see clients from anywhere for Life Coach and Therapy.
For therapy, you have to be licensed in the state where you wish to clinically practice. Currently, I’m licensed for clinical work in the state of Illinois. I’m very interested in getting my license for Florida, we’ll see what happens. For Life Coach, that’s not a regulated or licensed field, I can have clients from anywhere in the world. Currently, I’ve had Life Coach clients from 18 US states and Canada. My goal for Life Coach, to have had clients from all 50 US states and I want to expand my international clientele.
Do you see clients in-person or via tele-session?
For therapy, the private practice where I work is located in Oakbrook, Illinois. I see clients in-person but I also do tele sessions. As long as you’re in the state of Illinois, I can see you for therapy. For a therapy approximate, 70% is in-person and 30% is tele session. For my Life Coach, the majority of the clients are tele-session. I do not have an office for my Life Coach, so I’ve seen clients in-person, but I have to meet them in a public place. For Life Coach, 90% is tele-session by the nature of most of my clients reside out of state or out of country.
What’s the caliber of clients that you see?
For me, it’s really about the person. But I’m very aware of the stereotype that men don’t go to therapy or what’s in the zeitgeist that only losers go to therapy. For that reason, I’m going to get specific for the status level of my clientele. Again, it’s about the person. This is to simply dispel myths that only certain types of people go to therapy. In therapy, I’ve had clients at the Senior VP level. In my Life Coach, I’ve had clients at the CEO level, Special Forces, Lieutenant Colonel, Chair in several medicine specialties. Again, it’s about the person. I’ve had clients in between jobs, living at home and in financial duress as well as clients who’re millionaires. It’s about the person. But you’d be surprised at who actually comes to therapy, crosses all socioeconomic and status levels. When people ignorantly make assumptions, I laugh. You do not do my job, so you do not know. In my Life Coach, I absolutely get high profile clients.
Do you have a niche?
For therapy, it’s advertised in Psychology Today where I have a profile, that one of my niches is couples counseling. I prefer couples counseling, my goal is to one day prioritize those cases. At this point in time, I still take individual clients. If I were to get very specific, it’s not just that I want to see couples, it’s that l like to see two people at once. For example, I’ve been getting a lot of requests recently for family reunification therapy. I see the parent and the child for therapy in family sessions. For me, I like to see things happen in real time. When you’re working with two people at once, you get to see those real time and live interactions. It’s also more complex when you’re working with two people vs one. If I’m being very accurate, I basically like group work, generally couples or parent/child scenarios. For my Life Coach, since I only take non-clinical cases, it’s generally dating, relationships, love + lust romance scenarios.
Do you ever fire clients?
For therapy, the owner of the private practice, can choose to terminate treatment for clients. As the therapist, I can choose to terminate too. Often, it’s for billing issues, but lack of fit and disrespect/bullying behavior from a client can also be good reasons to terminate. If the therapist cannot meet the needs of the client, it’s better to terminate. The nature of therapy is that it’s often triage treatment or crisis situations, it can also turn into management of symptoms for a longer timeframe. The goal of therapy is for there to be an end point, clients aren’t meant to be in treatment forever. For my Life Coach, since it’s non-clinical in nature, there’s more latitude in length of time spent with clients. For myself, I view Life Coach clients as lifelong, they return periodically. I encourage clients to come back minimum with the seasons, Fall, Winter, Summer, Spring. When clients touch base periodically, it’s a lot easier to remain current on their situations. It’s up to Life Coach clients, how long they want to continue sessions. Clients benefit from having an outside person to talk to, helps them both personally and professionally, this can remain beneficial long term.
Do you become friends with your clients?
For therapy, this is the rule of thumb, no engagement outside sessions. For example, I saw two prior clients this past week, while running errands. I do not engage. As the Therapist, we’re never the ones to initiate, if we see a client or former client outside the office. If a client comes up to the Therapist, we’re polite but brief, we never ever acknowledge to anyone that it’s a client. That way, clients are assured absolute privacy, we never divulge how we know them or that they’re a therapy client. For my Life Coach, most of my clients are out of state, so the opportunities for seeing them outside of sessions, is practically non-existent. But I would operate in similar fashion, the reason it works, is that I’m not in a client’s real life. Everything is strictly professional and via sessions.
What age range do you see?
For therapy, I do see children, but I keep it to teen years. Children’s therapy is niche, those therapists have their office set up for play therapy with toys and games. I don’t have that set up nor is it my niche, so I don’t see very young children. I’ve seen as young as 13 years old in therapy. For my Life Coach, I do not see children as clients. For my Life Coach, age 71 has been my oldest client.
Do you get surprised?
There are patterns to people’s behavior. There can be similar threads to divorces, affairs, break-ups et cetera. Of course, each couple and each individual, is unique. But if you deal in the arena of Love + Lust as I do, certain things tend to follow patterns, the more I know the less surprised I get. You want your Therapist/Life Coach to have a bank of clientele experiences to draw on, allows for excellent pattern recognition which helps with problem solving and solutions. But every once in awhile, something so out of this world or fantastical, will be brought to my attention, that I will be surprised.
Is there anything that you view as especially egregious?
For me, there are three things which get under my skin. The first, is predatory behavior, I can’t stand that. The second, is the children, that gets to me. I see a lot of really bad child custody cases during divorce proceedings. If one parent tries to sabotage or keep the other parent from seeing the kids, I view that as disgusting and unacceptable. That will harm the children long term, not OK to use kids as a pawn to get back at your ex. The third, is sexual abuse. Mental and physical abuse are also egregious, but sexual abuse can be especially traumatizing. Those 3 things: predatory behavior, children used as pawns, and sexual abuse are what really get to me.
Is there anything predictive that prevents healing?
Lying. Many clients will withhold things till they trust you or it’s applicable to disclose. But there are people who habitually lie, it’s very difficult to do any real work and or for real healing to occur, if the client has high delusion or is a habitual liar. The reason is that the Therapist goes down wrong rabbit holes, not helpful. The reason is that the baseline for the client, is on a false foundation, that of lies. If you don’t want to course correct, you choose to keep lying, therapy/life coach may be a waste of your time.
What are the most positive outcomes?
I’ve seen incredible things. Couples on the brink of divorce, reconciling. People with low self-esteem, simply blossom. After break-ups, finding love again. When my clients win, I’m so happy for them. I do see a lot of winning, it’s thrilling.
Is it easy to do this work?
For me, yes. I just have a knack for nuance. But I don’t think just anyone can do this work. You have to have the stomach for it. If you can’t bear to hear about sexual abuse, this is not the job for you. If you need things to be simple, this job would frustrate you because it can be incredibly complex, especially couples counseling. If you can’t nuisance, you’ll be out of your league with this work. By this, I mean that a client will tell you something, you have to nuance for the meaning behind the words. How good you are at nuance, affects accuracy and also results, it’s baseline. In every field, you have the incompetent, the average as well as the extremely competent. For my fields, I try my very best, I believe I’m competent. For your life, decisions for Love + Lust, you really need to work with the most competent individual that you can find. Your professional life matters and your personal life is just as high stakes, you really want to work with the best.
OK, perhaps 17 questions is a good place to stop. If you’re curious and you have questions, connect on Minnect, I’ll text or send an audio message to you via that app.
I hope you find an amazing Therapist or incredible Life Coach for your Love + Lust questions. I hope you win in this life.
Please keep in mind that I have 2 main jobs, also side gigs.
Job 1. Therapist employed at a private practice in the Chicago area.
Job 2. Life Coach, this is my business that I own.
rhmaldonado.com
Photo: This was me, on a day before I was going into the Riverside office. The private practice where I work as a Therapist, also operated out of Hinsdale, now it’s in Oakbrook.