Welcome to Alia Cross Counseling! This is a therapy blog intended to help those seeking to improve their mental health, whether that be potential clients or other counselors within the field.
I returned to graduate school in my 30’s to become a therapist after surviving my own journey of having Bipolar One Disorder. The disease is something I live with and manage. During the course of my treatment, I’ve felt what it’s like to have had both poor counselors and also to have had excellent ones. I strive to be one of the better ones. I do this in a variety of ways, but the most crucial one is that I regularly check-in with my clients about their lived experience. I ask my clients how they feel counseling is going. I ask for feedback: What do they think is going well? What’s not going as well? What needs to change in order for their healing process to work for them?
Sometimes this means a client will share that I am not the right therapist for them. I don’t take that personally. With those situations, I will provide verbal praise for honest communication and see if the client would like to explore what that means. Did I say something offensive? Are we hitting a roadblock? Maybe a different specialist would be more beneficial. If the patient would like it, I can make a referral to another provider.
I’m pleased to share that I am currently accepting new clients into my private practice. Due to licensing rules, I can only work with clients that reside within New York State. I take the following insurances, IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER:
Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, Carelon Behavioral Health, Cigna, Highmark BlueCross BlueShield of Western New York, Highmark BlueShield of Northeastern New York, Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey, Oscar (Optum), Oxford (Optum), Quest Behavioral Health and United (Optum). Otherwise, I accept private pay at the rate of $160/hour. I utilize both video counseling and in-person sessions. I also run an on-going weekly, in-person Experiential Process Group therapy on Tuesday nights for the private pay rate of $423 for 12 sessions. I do not accept insurance for Group therapy. For scheduling and billing of individual sessions, I use the free Headway platform. You can schedule individual therapy with me at:
https://headway.co/providers/alia-cross?utm_source=pem&utm_medium=direct_link&utm_campaign=35877
My hope for this blog is that it will be a space for me to flex my writing skills, to share what I know about therapy, to help de-stigmatize asking for help and to increase the conversation around mental health! Feel free to provide me with feedback, comments and suggestions at: aliahealycross@gmail.com.
