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Alicia Roeder, LIMHP, LMHC, LPC, CEDS

@birchgrovecollaborative

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Care that fits you!
Trauma-informed, weight-inclusive, LGBTQIA+ affirming therapy 🏳️‍🌈, neurodiversity love.
IA · NE · IL · TX · SC · GA · CO

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Five years ago, I started Birch Grove Counseling with a vision: care that actually fits the person in front of you. Today, that vision is growing into something I couldn’t have imagined when I was just getting started.

I am so pleased to announce Birch Grove Counseling is now Birch Grove Collaborative.

The name change is intentional. It reflects where we’re headed as a true multidisciplinary team built on the same values that started this practice: weight-inclusive, trauma-informed, LGBTQIA+ affirming, and neurodivergent-friendly care. Real care. Real collaboration.

I am so proud to announce that Alyssa Coughennower, PMHNP is joining me as a partner. Having a psychiatric nurse practitioner who shares this practice’s values is something I have worked toward for a long time, and I could not have found a better person for this role.

I am also thrilled to welcome Jessica Compton, Beth Augspurger, and Abbey Shell to the team as therapists. These women are talented, values-aligned, and genuinely wonderful humans!! I will be sharing more about each of them later today.

This has been five years of hard work, late nights, big dreams, and a whole lot of heart. I am so grateful for every client, every colleague, and every person who has cheered this little practice on.

The grove is growing!!! And we are just getting started.
BOOM 💥 😀

Stay tuned for more introductions today, and if you or someone you know has been waiting for the right fit, now might be the perfect time to reach out.

Alicia@birchgrovecounseling.com
515-676-0745 call or text by @birchgrovecollaborative

Five years ago, I took a leap of faith. Today, I am just... grateful.

Grateful to my clients, who let me walk alongside them in some of the most vulnerable moments of their lives. It is the greatest honor, and I mean it. To those new, and those I've been able to treasure for years; thank you.

Grateful to my incredible team: Whitney, my admin extraordinaire, and Aimée, my brilliant biller, who help make this work possible every single day. You both keep me sane and I adore you. And to the new folks coming aboard, you know who you are, I am so excited to partner in this beautiful space! ;)

Grateful for the therapists who paved the way before me in client care and business. Those who taught me the ropes, helped me find balance, and shaped me into the best clinician I can be.

Grateful for my own mental health/self care team. To Rande and Kelsey; you mean so much to me, thank you for letting me entrust you with my "stuff". And so much love to the dieticians along the way!

Grateful to my family for their endless love and support. Not enough love on the planet for my daughters, sons, and parents. For all the hours helping with the boys through sickness, surgeries, crisis, and everything in between. For listening to my self-doubts and my successes. I cherish you.

And to my husband: thank you for believing in me before I fully believed in myself. You gave me the push I needed to follow my dreams, and I love you for that.

Can't forget my little scoochies, my grandbabies! I hope one day one of you will keep this dream alive! You inspire me to be a better nana each day.

Thank you for listening to my Oscar's speech! Here is to five years of Birch Grove. And to many more. 🌿 by @birchgrovecollaborative

I’ve always loved stuffed animals. Maybe it’s a sensory thing, I’m not sure. But I’ve always felt safer and calmer with one in bed. Right now we have a giant stuffed dog named Jimmie. 😄

I used to think it was juvenile and silly, but I’m learning to extend myself some compassion. It’s okay to be a sensory seeker, and it’s okay to do what helps me feel at ease. 🧸 -Alicia by @birchgrovecollaborative

Hi all! Meet Amanda Randolph, our newest therapist at Birch Grove Collaborative!
We are so happy to welcome Amanda to the team. She's down to earth, compassionate, non-judgmental, and genuinely fun to work with, on top of being a wonderful therapist. Amanda has a big heart and a real gift for helping people through life transitions and patterns that are ready to be untangled.
If you're navigating a mood or personality disorder, Amanda is someone I highly recommend. She also has a real passion for working with folks experiencing suicidal ideation and brings a lot of steadiness and care to that work.

Amanda sees clients ages 12 and up, tele-health only, and has immediate openings. She has experience in both inpatient and outpatient environments. She practices under the clinical supervision of Alicia Roeder, LMHC, LIMHP.

Want to connect directly with Amanda? Reach her at amanda@birchgrovecollaborative.com

Questions first, or want me to make the connection? I'm at alicia@birchgrovecollaborative.com, or you can call or text me at 515-676-0745. I'm the founder and a therapist here at Birch Grove Collaborative, and I'm always happy to help match you with the right fit. https://www.birchgrovecollaborative.com/providers

*Accepts most insurance plans including IA and NE medicaid* Please inquire for a free benefits check by @birchgrovecollaborative

My scoochie:) by @birchgrovecollaborative

Halllllpppp. Interior design assistance needed. by @birchgrovecollaborative

Lindsay Clancy sobbed so hard in court today that testimony had to stop. The judge called recess after recess. At one point she put her head down on the table and said, “I can’t do it.” This is a woman living through the worst thing a human being can survive, in public, on camera, while people scroll past and call her a monster.

I want to be honest. I’ve hesitated to say anything about this case. I kept thinking someone else would say it, someone with a bigger platform, someone braver. I’m not proud of that hesitation. Mental illness is not for the weak, and neither is speaking up about it. So here I am, later than I wanted to be.

Here is what the record shows so far. Before the deaths of her three children, Clancy had been raising concerns about worsening symptoms and medication side effects to the people treating her. A psychiatric nurse has testified to this. Her diary entries about the crushing weight of new motherhood and postpartum struggles were read aloud in the courtroom. Her defense is that she was overmedicated and in the grip of postpartum psychosis when it happened. She has pleaded not guilty by reason of lack of criminal responsibility. None of that undoes what her children lost. And none of it should let us look away from the fact that a mother said she was drowning, more than once, to more than one provider, and the system around her did not catch her.

That is the part I cannot stop thinking about. Not whether she’s guilty. Whether she was heard.

Postpartum psychosis is a psychiatric emergency, not a phase and not a personality flaw. Onset is typically abrupt, often within the first two weeks postpartum, sometimes within days. It is a different animal from postpartum depression or the baby blues. It can include delusions, hallucinations, severe confusion, rapid mood swings, and a break from reality that the person experiencing it often cannot recognize as illness while it’s happening. Risk factors include a personal or family history of bipolar disorder, a prior psychotic episode, and sleep deprivation severe enough to destabilize the brain’s ability to regulate mood and perception. It is treatable. It is also, without fast and correct 1/2 by @birchgrovecollaborative

Try It Tuesday: Pick up the book. 📚
Swipe through and you'll catch three of us doing one of our favorite things. Reading isn't just a hobby in this field, it's how we keep growing as clinicians and as humans.

For me, it's personal too. Books were a lifeline in my own eating disorder recovery. Anti-Diet by Christy Harrison and Body Kindness by Rebecca Scritchfield helped me unlearn so much of what diet culture taught me and gave me language for what healing could actually look like. Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch and The Body Is Not an Apology by Sonya Renee Taylor still sit close on my shelf. :)

The right book at the right time can shift something in you. It can make you feel less alone, hand you a new way of seeing yourself, or simply remind you that recovery is possible.

Or it can just be a fun escape! A way to stay grounded, and feel enjoyment within.

So here's your challenge this week: if you're not a regular reader, pick up that book you've been meaning to get to. No pressure to finish it. Just start. One chapter, one page, one paragraph counts.

Already a reader? Drop your most life-changing book in the comments. We're always adding to our lists. 👇 I would LOVE to hear any and all book recommendations! by @birchgrovecollaborative

I used to think of disordered eating as pure dysfunction. Something to white-knuckle away through willpower and rules.

But in my work with clients, I've noticed something else: eating patterns are often *communication*. Your body and mind are trying to tell you something about what you need, what you value, or what feels out of alignment.

Restriction might be about control when everything else feels chaotic. Bingeing might be about soothing when you're not allowed to rest. Obsession with food rules might be about safety when the world feels unsafe.

None of that makes the eating disorder "good." But it changes everything about how we approach healing-from shame and punishment to curiosity and translation.

What do you think your eating patterns have been trying to tell you?

I'd love to hear what lands for you in the comments. And if you're ready to explore what's underneath, I'm here.

#MentalHealthMatters #EatingDisorderRecovery #TherapyWorks #MentalWellness by @birchgrovecollaborative

I started Birch Grove because I know that moment, when you finally say 'yes, I need help' and how real that relief is, even before we begin.

Your story matters. What did reaching out feel like for you? Share in the comments and let's honor the courage in each other. #MentalHealthMatters #TherapyWorks #YouAreNotAlone by @birchgrovecollaborative

Big news! 🎉 Jessica Compton, LIMHP, LPC just added Iowa to her license list!! She's now seeing clients in CO, IA, and NE.

If you've been waiting for the right therapist, she's taking new folks and we'd love to connect you. Learn more about Jessica at the link in our bio, or reach out directly-call/text 712-227-3518 or email jessica@birchgrovecollaborative.com 💙

https://www.birchgrovecollaborative.com/providers by @birchgrovecollaborative

Happy Wednesday! I made a stop at the new 7 Brew this morning-no line, so I went for it.

Ten years ago, that sentence wouldn't have existed. A new coffee shop would have sent my nervous system into overdrive.

Not because of the drive-thru or the crowds. Because I didn't have it memorized.

I knew the numbers at Dunkin' by heart. I could navigate that menu on autopilot and stay "safe." A new place meant unknown territory-flavors I hadn't calculated, choices I couldn't pre-approve, cravings I wasn't allowed to just... follow.
Wanting something because it sounded good wasn't enough of a reason. Not back then.

Today I pulled up to the kisok thing and ordered what sounded good to me.
That's it. That's the whole win.

Recovery doesn't always look dramatic. Sometimes it looks like a Wednesday morning coffee run to a place you've never been, and realizing you didn't think twice about it until you were already halfway through your drink.

If you're in a place where menus feel like minefields, I see you. It doesn't stay that way forever. ❤️

#birchgrovecollaborative
#7brew
#youcanrecovertoo by @birchgrovecollaborative