Putting The Affordability In Therapy

Being in charge of our health in 2021 is more than just rough. It’s grown expensive to take care of yourself. And taking care of your mental health requires time, patience, and expense.

Based on these three factors, it isn’t that alarming that people tend to neglect their mental health and tend to focus on taking care of themselves physically. Since, we know for a fact, that health insurance doesn’t exactly cover mental health in several countries around the world. And it is just gaining traction to be covered in all developed countries.  

Being able to afford 170$-200$ per therapy session isn’t exactly convenient for most American citizens. In some cities, the expense for therapy even climbs higher than 200$ per session and barely differs from therapist to therapist. 

So we decided to help you look for a few ways to plug affordability into therapy. 

Mental Health apps 

Today, several apps have been launched and exist precisely to provide you with the best platform to browse for affordable mental health services. And to create a list of therapists that can provide you with the help you require and fit the needs of your criterion. 

Apps such as BetterHelp help us with this process of filtering and selecting while little to no interruption to our daily busy schedules. 

The fees provided for the service of online therapy through these apps go as low as 35$-65$ a week depending on which therapist you request. They’re usually recommended to the app user with the help of the results of a questionnaire at the time of signing up for the said app. 

In addition to these paid services, some apps such as Headspace, Breathe, Buddhify, Calm, and so on, provide useful meditation techniques to fight anxiety and practice mindfulness for free. They also help us to construct a schedule of self-care to take care of ourselves regularly. 

Brief Therapy 

Most people consider therapy to be a prolonged process, one that may take years to take about their issues and recover from. 

This solution-focused brief therapy, also known simply as "brief therapy" is available on online mental health provider platforms like BetterHelp.com. This therapy helps you to focus on a central part of your life, dig through childhood issues, and is an important part of finding solutions for those who already know what the problem is.

This is a highly effective form of therapy for those who already have a name for what they’re going through, need someone to help them get through it, and lasts about 5 to 8 sessions.

Hyperfocus such as this and the short period in question increases the affordability of the therapy we seek and does give us another cost-effective approach towards mental health care. 

Free/Meagerly Charged Services

Surprisingly enough, there are quite a few avenues to look into when we want to find free therapy services that several residential community-based clinics offer. 

Even if you don’t have a provider for health insurance to cover your fees or credit at hand to pay the charge by yourself, there are several residential community-based clinics that offer the help you require.

The problem is that these avenues aren’t often as well marketed as the private standard for healthcare across the country. We simply need to know where to look.

Just because these services come for free or cost less, doesn’t mean that their value/standard is any lesser than that of the paid mental health services. 

Most of the staff hired are educated psychotherapists who help out during their free time or put in their efforts for community outreach at these clinics. 

They provide these services to college students, living-wage workers, blue-collar workers, or anyone who requires attention without having any money at hand. Some of the staff also consist of student social workers, psychologists, and counselors as well. 

Their reduced rates often has them booked so do make sure to schedule your appointments with them ahead of time. You may get recommendations to find a practitioner from these clinics from your local general physician. Or approach the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Helpline to find the local clinic in your very own neighborhood. 

Group Therapy 

Not all problems can be solved through one-on-one interactions in therapy. Sometimes, being among a group of people going through the same issues that we are, provides us with more comfort than we may realize. 

And group therapy costs one-third the amount that one-on-one psychotherapy sessions cost. So, it qualifies as a cost-effective way of checking in mentally. 

People coping with the loss of their loved ones, dealing with gender and sexuality and other identity issues, substance disorders, and so on, have sometimes benefited more from group therapy than they have through individual therapist interactions.

Studies have proven that the affirmation that none of us are dealing with issues of such a scale all by ourselves helps us to deal with them far more effectively.  

Sliding Scale Therapy 

This is yet another effective method to be able to afford to take care of ourselves mentally when we sincerely do not have the funds to do so. 

When it comes to psychotherapy, the sliding scale for a fee for our therapist is usually based on a specific parameter. And most of the time the parameter becomes your income. According to the amount of money that you earn, the base hourly rate for the therapist is decreased or adjusted. 

This provision is usually mentioned in the profiles of most therapists but the exact fee is never updated regularly. So if you want to approach a therapist who states that they provide this service, do make sure to contact them personally and directly to talk to them about it. 

Some directories for mental health in particular help with the search for sliding scale therapy providers among therapists across the major cities in the country. 

These are a few of the options that we can easily get ahold of in the day and age that we live in. Make use of the information that is available to you via the internet or the telephone and other sources, to book an appointment today.

Taking care of ourselves must take priority as the ongoing pandemic has proven. And staying strong mentally while supporting each other in such trying times, must take precedence as well.