We're incredibly proud that KATC 3, Acadiana's News Channel, has selected our very own CEO and Founder, Maria "Mica" Istre to be honored during their upcoming 'What's Your Story' segment. Check out the video read on to learn more about Mica and the support she offers diverse communities across the Southeastern United States.
Your Tree of Life Bio mentions you were born in Las Vegas as a child of immigrant parents. Can you tell us how that shaped both your upbringing and the path to success you’ve found today.
My childhood and upbringing has informed my personal and professional goals. I was fortunate enough to have experienced my culture integrated into my education and further my linguistic skills. I believe this made me more aware of the need to provide inclusive mental health services to the Latinx community in the Acadiana area.
Outside of being a CEO and having a full calendar as a Counselor, you’re a mother and wife with a full personal life. How do you find the time to balance it all and what advice would you give to women in your position?
There are certainly parts of my life that don’t always get tended to, but having a strong support system helps me balance these areas. I have to prioritize my personal life and be extremely flexible to find quality time with loved ones. I receive a lot of support and compassion from my TOL team and my personal friends and family.
As a minority business owner, you’ve been able to bypass every obstacle one might face when opening a new business, and enabling it to expand so rapidly. What advice would you give to other entrepreneurs as they start this journey?
Finding the people that are supportive of your endeavors is pivotal to reaching your goals. It is extremely difficult to overcome the barriers we face as minority entrepreneurs, that others might not relate to or experience themselves. We do face discrimination and more often that I’d like to admit, I have heard others say “I would have never thought of that”, referring to the unique needs of minority clients. I personally have to dig deep sometimes to push forward and provide more services to the underserved. I believe it’s this perseverance and determination that has helped me expand and move past the barriers.
Tree of Life is the only multi-culturally focused group counseling practice in the region. Why is it so important you provide a space for different communities to seek mental health services?
We are informed as clinicians that we should be culturally competent, but being competent is just one level. We want to be inclusive and experts to provide the community with culturally sensitive and appropriate mental health care. Oftentimes, we hear from our clients that they knew they would find someone who would be able to address their needs without much effort on their behalf. This is the type of environment we want to establish for them.
You’re known for providing bilingual counseling - can you expound on which languages your team provides counseling in and where to access that information?
I personally am the clinical director of the bilingual staff that speaks Spanish and supervises them. We have other clinicians that speak Arabic and Hindi. To counsel in a different language is a completely different skillset that requires an understanding of jargon and certain words that would not directly translate properly.
Where did you get the inspiration to open Tree Of Life and what has led to your recent growth to TX, GA, FL, and CO in recent years?
My personal experience of being from the West Coast and being in another state for a few years has made me drawn to serving clients from all across the country. It also allowed me to serve more people and I have encouraged our counselors to do the same.
You provide a versatile array of therapies as a counselor including: Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR). What would you briefly share about these different modalities of therapy if an audience member is interested in learning more?
I personally specialize in EMDR therapy and consider myself a trauma counselor. That means that I specialize in trauma treatment and have over 300 hours of trauma training. I am also a Certified First Responder counselor (CFRC) and EMDR Certified Therapy through EMDRIA. EMDR therapy is the gold standard for trauma treatment for people struggling with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and other forms of trauma. It has been found to be the most effective and rapid result that allows our clients to feel relief from their PTSD symptoms to return to their normal life.
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