Jason Chastain, Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker

 What I Do

My passion is to empower the people that I work with, and free them from what is holding them back. I adapt proven counseling and therapy techniques to meet my individual clients’ needs. I offer counseling for a number of different mental and emotional challenges right here in the Tri-Cities area of Washington. I currently specialize in treating the full spectrum of PTSD disorders as well as grief and loss issues.

I believe with all my heart in how I practice and always strive to improve it. I believe I give an excellent service for a fair fee. I want to help people. I want you to get the help you need and to feel so good about your treatment that you could refer friends or family to me. My personal promise to you is that I will give 100% of my focus, skills and knowledge to you in order to help you achieve the health you crave and to keep you from losing it in the future.

My education and credentials

I am a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker. I received my Bachelor of Social Work degree from Eastern Washington University, graduating with honors. I received my Master of Social Work degree from the University of Michigan, the top-ranked clinical social work program in the nation.

Since graduating in 2005 I’ve become trained in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Motivational Interviewing (MI), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) and other counseling techniques. These allow me to provide you with the best clinical care available, all of which have proven results.

What do the letters after your name mean?

I have found that the license or the degree is much less important than the training, skills, and experience of the person who is practicing. There can be a dizzying array of letters after someone’s name, and some of them don’t take a lot of work to get. Always feel free to ask what it took to earn a specific credential!

Let me explain the letters after my name. The letters CCTP mean Certified Clinical Trauma Professional. This sounds great, but in reality it only takes a two-day training and a test in order to get. Two days does not qualify a therapist to be a competent provider for trauma or PTSD. After obtaining my CCTP I took 24 more hours of specialized training in complex trauma–passing four more tests along the way–before I obtained my CCTP-II credential. One assuring thing about certification is that the professional must continue to obtain specialized education to maintain it.

I am certified in EMDR. To get certified I had to complete the basic EMDR training program, have notarized documentation of at least 50 EMDR sessions with 25 clients, participate in at least 20 hours of consultation with an EMDRIA approved trainer, submit two letters of recommendation regarding my EMDR skills as well as ethics and professional character, and complete 12 more hours of formal EMDRIA continuing education credits. I also need to continue to complete 12 hours every two years. Click here to verify this.

I’ve also earned a Board Certified Diplomate (BCD), which is a national designation. It is the clinical social worker’s premier advanced-practice certification, the highest credential a clinical social worker may receive. I need to be licensed at the highest clinical level for at least five years, take a certain amount of continuing education hours each year, and be recommended by at least three of my peers who rate my competency as an advanced practitioner over the course of a year. You may see my listing by following this link.

Most recently I received the Certified Grief Counselor credential. This involved 75 hours of training and taking three tests over a period of about six months. You may see my listing by following this link. I plan on pursuing the most advanced credential, the Grief Support Practitioner, which takes four more years and another dozen tests to achieve.

Why do I bother? It is because I want to be able to deliver the kind of high-quality treatment that I myself would want, pure and simple. It is also because trauma is a very deep field, and few clinical practitioners really understand it. I want to be one of them.

Think we might be a good fit? Please email or call my office today at 509-531-6698 to learn more about my counseling practice in the Tri-Cities area (Richland, Kennewick, Pasco) of Washington state.