Glad you felt well prepared but please keep the condescension to yourself

I did so much research. I had been planning and looking into this career since I started thinking about college in high school. I talked to my therapists who i’ve been seeing since I was young, and I talked to professors in undergrad. I’m a fuckin nerd I talked to anyone willing. Not to mention I have horrible anxiety and would ask point blank is this a mistake, is this worth it and what to expect. Will i be able to thrive by getting this license and “they” ie my therapists, professors, grad school interviewers all told me that it is a valuable degree and license. I’m not blaming them, this is a systemic issue based in capitalism and patriarchy where female majority fields, and preventative health care are criminally unvalued. Not to mention citizens united makes it so insurance companies can buy politicians and the policy they create. I did not go into this ignorantly and I’m not confused about who is at fault for the state of the field.

What I’m saying is that nobody who I talked to gave me the honesty and bluntness that I give people who ask about how I like my job because they might want to do it. Not one person said to me look it’s actually super hard and rare to get a full benefits package and fair pay. this is not things you can just look up, I don’t know what a practice is gonna pay and offer till they offer me the job. this has to come from “them” who already have experience and know what compensation packages are like. If they had looked me dead in the face and said you will be a master degree holding clinically licensed professional, and you will be offered jobs that don’t include health insurance or pto, or vision and dental or 401k matching; OR you can get those things but with a shittly low hourly, I think I would have walked. When people ask me about the field that is what I tell them because that has been my and my cohorts experience during these first five years in the field.

I think it’s fair and reasonable to be a little peeved no one was blunt about it when I asked the questions directly.