About Bessie’s Creek Counseling
What You Already Know About Your Own Life
I come at this work from a person-centered perspective, which means I believe you’re the expert on your own life.
And I know how that lands from where you’re sitting: “Lady, if I were an expert, I wouldn’t be here!”
Being the expert doesn’t mean having the answers. You’ve lived through everything that’s happened to you, and you know what today feels like. Somewhere inside, you already have an idea of what you want your life to look like instead.
My job is to help you make sense of the pieces.
What You’ll Do in Session
In the first session, I’ll tell you where we’re headed, and it comes down to three things:
- Past. Understand what happened to you.
- Present. See how it’s shaping your days right now.
- Forward. Build toward what you want instead.
A thought you keep turning over without ever getting it out of your head keeps growing, like cotton candy in the vat. The longer it spins, the bigger it gets, and none of that size is real.
So we get it onto paper, on a template I made for exactly this: a bubble in the middle for the thought, and branches for what you can do about it and what was never yours to control. On paper, it goes back to being a thought, and a thought is a manageable size.
What Changes When You Stop Auditing Yourself
The first changes are small enough that other people don’t notice them.
You sleep. Someone’s mood shifts across the room, and you register it without reorganizing your whole evening around it. There’s a pause between what somebody says and what you say back, and you get to decide what goes in it.
Arguments end instead of going in circles. When you say what you want, you notice you didn’t assemble a case for it first.
None of it happens on a schedule, and I won’t pretend otherwise.
Expect Me to Ask, Listen, and Push a Little
Sessions are collaborative. You won’t sit in a chair while I tell you what to do with your life.
Some people need to feel understood before anything else. Plenty of others, men especially, want the mechanics explained and something practical to try before the next session. Both are the work.
Together, we’ll look at what you’ve been through, how it’s still showing up, and what’s been keeping you where you are. I ask questions, I listen closely, and I say out loud what I’m noticing between your experiences, your thoughts, and the way your relationships run.
Every so often I’ll challenge you to look at something from a different angle, not because I think you’re wrong, but because sometimes seeing something differently can open the door to change.
Therapy Won’t Turn You Into Someone Else
The work is understanding yourself more deeply, breaking patterns that stopped serving you a long time ago, and getting more confident in the person you already are.
Trauma-informed CBT does most of the heavy lifting, along with plain explanations of what’s actually happening and exercises you can use between sessions. No two people have the same story, so I don’t believe therapy should be one-size-fits-all.
You turn something down and don’t spend the next three days apologizing for it. You catch a pattern in week two instead of year two. The thought that tells you you’re not good enough finally gets an argument back.
Over time, that adds up to trusting yourself again.
About Traci Wagner, LPC-S
I’m a Licensed Professional Counselor Supervisor in Texas and an Advanced Certified Trauma Practitioner, certified through Starr Commonwealth. My training started with a psychology degree from Texas A&M and a master’s from Lamar University, and it’s only half of where this work comes from.
The other half is personal. I’m a survivor of narcissistic and physical abuse and addiction, and I know firsthand what it feels like to question yourself, to struggle with self-defeating thoughts, to be in difficult relationships, and to wonder how to break patterns that keep repeating.
Those experiences shaped the therapist I am today. My history doesn’t take up room in your hour. It’s simply the reason very little of what you tell me is going to sound foreign to me.
Healing doesn’t require you to forget what happened to you. It means understanding what happened, recognizing how it shaped you, and building the confidence to decide what happens next.
Come Meet the Pigs, the Cows, and the Tortoise
When I’m not sitting in the therapist’s chair, there’s a good chance I’m somewhere surrounded by animals.
I’m a BIG animal lover and the founder of Bessie’s Creek Farm Animal Sanctuary & Rescue, a nonprofit farm animal rescue that shares its name with this practice for a reason. Our sanctuary is home to an ever-growing collection of wonderful personalities: pigs, horses, cows, ducks, a turkey, and a sulcata tortoise.
Caring for them is a huge part of my life and one of the things that keeps me grounded outside of my work as a therapist.
If you’d like to meet some of our residents, visit www.bessiescreekfarm.org or follow along on Instagram at www.instagram.com/bessiescreekfarm.
You Just Have to Be Willing to Take the First Step
You don’t have to have everything figured out before you begin.
Send me a message through my Psychology Today profile, or email me directly at traci@bessiescreekcounseling.com.
I’ll meet you there.
Find the Relief You Deserve
If you recognized yourself anywhere on this page, that recognition counts for more than it feels like it does. It's what comes before anything else moves.
Email me at traci@bessiescreekcounseling.com, or send a message through my Psychology Today profile, and tell me a little about what brought you here. I'd be glad to do this part with you.
Find the relief you deserve by requesting an appointment today.
Request an Appointment
Online sessions for adults anywhere in Texas.