Amber Sampson is the owner of Sampson Family Therapy Services, LLC. Based in Des Moines, Sampson Family Therapy is a therapy practice dedicated to serving the relationships, mental health and wellbeing of families, couples, individuals and children.

What is your background?

I grew up in Mason City. I started school at a private college expecting to be a doctor of osteopathic medicine (DO) because I really liked the approach of treating people through a systemic, whole-person focus that focuses on the integration of parts and symptoms.

Then, I took a psychology class as an elective, absolutely fell in love with the topic and changed my major rather quickly. After seeing my excitement for psychology, my professor was candid with me and told me the college did not have the infrastructure to get me the experience necessary for grad school.

So, I transferred to the University of Northern Iowa and enrolled in their undergraduate psychology program. While at UNI, I had a chance to work on studies like how positive and negative feedback affects those experiencing schizophrenia. I also helped research about surrounding benefits and barriers to engaging in physical activity to promote wellbeing.

While at UNI, I attended a lecture from a professor promoting the marriage and family therapy program at Iowa State University. This professor’s lecture helped bring it all home for me, how a marriage and family approach to therapy is like the DO approach to care—treating the whole system and the advantages to seeing that “the sum is greater than the individual parts.”

After completing my master’s in marriage and family therapy at Iowa State University in 2008, I worked in an agency for four years before starting on my own in 2012. It wasn’t long before I missed supervising others and as I was receiving so many referrals, I decided to embark on hiring my first employee in 2014.

I have also had the opportunity since then to serve on the board for the Iowa Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. There, I ran conferences for close to a decade and held the position of president on the board. This experience also gave me first-hand access to changes in regulations, how the mental health care system works within the various factors dictating service delivery, and knowledge that helped me to shape my own practice.

What is your business?

I have been able to grow my practice by ensuring we have diversity among clinical approaches so we can address a variety of clients and populations. Our staff of 15 providers includes a social worker, mental health counselors, and marriage and family therapists, all of whom bring a unique approach and expertise.

I love making sure my business is a good place for new therapists to land by providing a consistent example of support and leadership. We run an internship program so graduate students can receive supervision and start seeing clients with support and guidance every step of the way. We have a “grow our own” philosophy and have hired several of our graduate interns after they complete graduate school.

One thing I am proud of is our strong foundation in seeing Medicaid and pro-bono clients. These are folks in our community who are struggling the most but can have very limited access to consistent services due to financial constraints. Pro-bono clients receive direct care from our interns with supervision from an experienced staff member. This way, low-income clients receive the same quality care and we can manage our costs internally while serving the greater good in the community.

I also see my practice as a true training site. I work very hard to make sure we are a place where people new to the practice can feel supported. From a training perspective, I approach supervision as modeling professionalism with a personal perspective. I acknowledge training and professional needs, but also personal needs and contributions to the profession.

What do you enjoy most about what you do?

I am most invigorated when I am doing both supervision and when I get to sit with clients. I am privileged to bear witness to my clients’ journeys in health and healing and how they want that to be. I enjoy being a leader in the company and make sure everyone has a place to be. First and foremost, I am a clinician and therapist. This core passion allows me to lead with purpose and guide those in my practice to find their own purpose and balance within their clinical identity.

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I always say I was never one that envisioned what my wedding looked like. Instead, when I pictured myself as a grown-up, I pictured myself in a pencil skirt and shoulder pads and very powerful (I grew up in the ‘80s!). I just didn’t know what industry I would be in yet. Going to school to become a therapist was how I could help people and make that vision happen.

If you had your own late-night talk show…  

My first guest would be Gene Roddenberry, the creator of “Star Trek.” I am a total nerd, and I love all the “Star Trek” series. “Voyager” was always on while I was babysitting in middle and high school.

I even wrote a high school paper on Roddenberry, about how his space adventures were revolutionary ways to discuss social issues. During shutdown last year, I finally watched “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” and was again reminded of the ways that the franchise really does highlight the various social challenges. I could see so many connections to our social unrest today, even though the series is more than 20 years old.  I think Roddenberry was a visionary.