{"id":6822,"date":"2021-02-13T03:31:12","date_gmt":"2021-02-12T20:31:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/?p=6822"},"modified":"2021-02-13T03:31:12","modified_gmt":"2021-02-12T20:31:12","slug":"a-therapy-guide-to-virtual-counseling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/a-therapy-guide-to-virtual-counseling\/","title":{"rendered":"A Therapy Guide To Virtual Counseling"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By: Angela\nMurillo-Martinez<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Austin Community College enters another semester of\ndistance learning, the college\u2019s mental health counseling services have adapted\nto support students at a virtual scope. ACCENT spoke with Manuel Zamarripa,\nAssociate Dean of Counseling, about the support and resources ACC offers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The balance between work, school, hobbies and\neducation can seem like too much to handle at times–especially during a global\npandemic.. And with campuses being closed to non-essential faculty, staff and\nstudents this too means that counseling sessions have moved as an online\nservice. Students can continue to receive private\ncounseling<\/strong> from their own home through virtual sessions. ACC offers free\nmental health counseling to currently enrolled students.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You get a first session, where you get a lot of\nbackground information,\u201d  Zamarripa said.\n\u201c\u201cThen you get six sessions after that, so you get a total of seven sessions\nwith a counselor individually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some have trouble deciding when and if to visit with a\ncounselor or therapist. Mental health isn’t a one size fits all situation, but\nACC\u2019s counselors are trained to work with anyone, no matter their situation.\nAnd if needed, the counselors can always provide referrals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It can be anywhere from, \u2018Hey, I need someone to\nsupport me,\u2019 or \u2018I have a couple of decisions coming up that I need to make,\u2019\nor \u2018I\u2019m feeling kind of stuck,\u201d\u2019\u201d Zamarripa said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Students can schedule appointments through the counseling<\/a> page found on the ACC\nwebsite. In these sessions students can talk to trained clinicians who can\nspeak to you about various topics. All sessions are private and confidential\nunless the student provides written permission to share information with\nsomeone else. ACC not only provides individual counseling but also has group counseling<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe do offer groups, which are another good way to get\nsupport,\u201d Zamarripa said. \u201c\u201cWe offer about two to three groups every semester,\nand the topics always change; some of them stay the same.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The topics discussed in these group counseling\nmeetings tend to change every semester, although they are a couple of topics\nthat remain as students continue to request them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe get the most requests for anxiety and dealing with\nanxiety,\u201dZamarripa said.  \u201c\u201cSo we tend to\noffer some groups in some way about anxiety to help students.\u201d\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the idea of group counseling can seem\nnerve-racking at first, being around students who have similar struggles as you\ncan create a great support system. It can also help you realize that you are\nnot alone and see that you have others rooting for you. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt can be really supportive, but it can also be to\nthe other end, like some people who are having severe anxiety or severe\ndepression,\u201d  Zamarripa said. \u201c\u201cThey can\ncome in, and we try to help them find strategies of coping.\u201d\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although taking that first step towards therapy can\nseem scary, ACC\u2019s counselors are here to help every step of the way, so you are\nnot alone. \n\nAs we continue to physically distance ourselves from\nothers and take socialization to a virtual realm Zamarripa emphasizes the\nimportance of checking in on one another, but more importantly, on yourself.\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ACCENT spoke with Manuel Zamarripa, Associate Dean of Counseling, about ACC\u2019s virtual mental health support services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4103,"featured_media":6823,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1130,12],"tags":[1071,1101,1131,1144,1146,1072,1104,1142,1108,1145],"class_list":["post-6822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-support","category-news","tag-acc-2","tag-accent-2","tag-communitysupport","tag-mentalhealth","tag-selfcare","tag-studentmedia","tag-studentnews","tag-studentsupport","tag-studentviews","tag-therapy-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}