GET TO KNOW: JOE HUEY

Watch the video below to learn more about Joe in his own words and read on to learn about how Joe's career brought him to Present Awakenings.

Get to Know Joe in His Own Words

Joe received both his Bachelor’s Degrees and Master’s Degree from Loyola University. With his undergraduate degrees in Psychology and Political Science, he considered careers in the foreign service, the military, community organizing, and policy. However, after undergrad, Joe chose to start his career in direct service at Haymarket Center on the crisis stabilization unit to follow his interest in psychology and gain clinical experience. Here, clients in crisis with both substance use and mental health disorders would transfer from hospitals for treatment and case management services, and Joe would work to help them access the services and stabilization they needed. Joe notes, “At Haymarket, I learned firsthand that nothing can replace a strong therapeutic relationship, and those relationships are built on empathy, honesty, and respect.” His former supervisor praised his ability to connect and relate to clients which helped him to build quick rapport and get clients engaged. He also led therapy groups on such topics as self-care and goal setting. Then when the pandemic hit, Joe stepped up and was one of the few team members on this residential unit day in and day out, providing consistency in a chaotic time. One of his coworkers from this time describes Joe as a mentor, someone to count on for resources and support, and someone who always put the clients first.

In order to further build his clinical skills, Joe then worked for Thresholds as a Community Support Specialist. At Thresholds, he managed a caseload of over 60 clients with a range of diagnoses including mood, anxiety, psychotic, substance use, and trauma disorders. He met with clients individually and helped them to access needed resources for housing, medical services, and intervened in psychiatric crises. One of his supervisors noted that Joe’s strong empathy, creativity, patience, and being a great listener helped him excel in this role. Joe shared, “At Thresholds, I was exposed to harm reduction models that transformed my ability and understanding about meeting clients where they are.” It was also this role where Joe came to understand that his skills, values, and passions were leading him to a career in psychotherapy and a return to Loyola for his Master’s Degree in Social Work.

Joe’s therapeutic style development began with his work in Community Mental Health and continues today. While connecting with clients who opened up and shared about the trauma they had experienced in his roles at Haymarket Center and Thresholds, Joe learned that trauma work is vital to the therapeutic process. Joe states, “In seeing the sheer impact that trauma has on people’s lives, the only approach I can imagine is one that is trauma-informed.” He also learned he felt a calling to help people heal from trauma, not just manage the symptoms, which drew him to Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). Joe was exposed to Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) early in his career and led groups focusing on DBT skills while at Haymarket Center. With the influence of multiple supervisors who utilized Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Joe was also drawn to ACT as it is a modality that give clients a sense of power over their lives through reframing followed by intentional action. While at Loyola for his Masters, Joe developed the textbook knowledge for the theories and interventions he had witnessed and utilized while working in Community Mental Health. His internships while in grad school reinforced his understanding of how multiple systems impact individual clients and the benefits of using a person-in-environment lens in individual therapy.

During the interview process at Present Awakenings, Joe wowed with his thorough understanding and experience in crisis management, his willingness and love of learning, and his desire to help people who have experienced trauma. Even before starting his new job as a therapist at Present Awakenings, Joe began EMDR training at The EMDR Institute – the premiere EMDR training center founded by Francine Shapiro, herself, and dedicated to the highest standards of excellence in EMDR therapy. Throughout his training, Joe strongly connected to having a therapy modality that can help traumatized individuals make peace with their past and with how client-led – and therefore, unencumbered by therapist bias – EMDR is. Since beginning at Present Awakenings, Joe has continued to impress with his ability to connect with clients and meet them where they are at, his thorough understanding of various mental health diagnoses and how they show up in clients’ real experiences, his rapid expansion of EMDR skills, and his genuine kindness and care of the people and the world around him.

To learn more about Joe and/or schedule a free, 10-15 minute consultation call with him, connect with us using the link above!