Living Between Cultures
Therapy for Immigrants and First-Generation Adults
You may be the first in your family to go to college, the translator at every appointment, or the one who left home to build something new. That carries pride and pressure in equal measure.
Two Sets of Expectations
First-generation adults often live with one foot in each world. At home you are expected to honor family, send money, and make the sacrifice worth it. At work or school you are expected to fit in and speak up. Trying to satisfy both can leave you feeling like you belong nowhere.
Immigrants carry their own layer: missing home, starting over, losing status or community, and sometimes trauma from what happened before or during the move.
Many first-generation adults have never seen anyone in their family talk to a counselor. Mental health may have been called weakness, or simply never discussed. Coming to therapy can feel like breaking an unspoken rule, and that hesitation is something we can talk about too.
What We Can Help You Sort Through
Clients bring us things like these:
- Guilt about wanting a life that looks different from your parents' plan
- Anxiety and burnout from always performing
- Loneliness after a move or far from extended family
- Grief for people and places left behind
- Conflict with parents about dating, marriage or career
A Therapist Who Respects Where You Come From
We will not tell you to cut off your family or ignore your culture. We also will not ask you to give up your own goals. Therapy helps you find where you stand and how to say it in a way your family can hear.
Our team is diverse and reflects many cultures, backgrounds and faiths. Sessions in Spanish are available with Debbie Vidana, our bilingual graduate counselor intern, who works under the supervision of a Licensed Professional Counselor-Supervisor.
What Changes Can Look Like
Progress is usually practical. You might set a limit with a parent about money and keep it. You might choose a career path and explain it to your family with less guilt. You might finally let yourself grieve a grandparent you could not travel home to bury.
Sessions are by secure video, with evening and weekend times available, so therapy can fit around long work hours, classes or calls with family in other time zones. You need to be located in Texas during each session.
Clinicians for This
Demetria FlowersLPC Associate, MAPractices under the supervision of a Licensed Professional Counselor-Supervisor (LPC-S).
Lyndsay DawsonLPC Associate, MAPractices under the supervision of a Licensed Professional Counselor-Supervisor (LPC-S).
Debbie VidanaGraduate Counselor InternPractices under the supervision of a Licensed Professional Counselor-Supervisor (LPC-S).
Common Questions
- Do I need to explain my culture before we can start?
- Tell us what you want us to know, at your own pace. Your clinician will ask questions to understand, not to judge.
- Is therapy confidential from my family?
- Yes. As an adult, what you share stays between you and your clinician, with a few legal exceptions that will be explained in your first session.
- Can I do sessions if I live anywhere in Texas?
- Yes. All sessions are by secure video for clients located in Texas.
Ready to Begin?
You have carried a lot to get where you are. Reach out and let us help you carry it differently.