In this episode of Finding Your Balance, Tiffani Fritzsche and Kirk Fasshauer are joined by Kelsey Thomas, LCSW, Director of Counseling and Wellness at Southeastern University, to explore the challenges students face as they transition into college life. From managing newfound independence and responsibilities to navigating relationships, academics, mental health, and finding support, this conversation offers an honest look at why this major life transition can feel overwhelming.

Whether you're a college student, a parent preparing for the transition, or someone supporting a young adult, this episode provides encouragement, practical insight, and helpful strategies for navigating change, building independence, and finding balance along the way.

00:00 Tiffani

Welcome to Finding Your Balance, a mental health podcast. My name is Tiffani Fritzsche. I'm a

00:04 Tiffani

licensed mental health counselor. I'm joined here with my friend, Kirk Fasshauer, licensed clinical

00:08 Tiffani

social worker. If you are joining us for the first time, welcome. Today, we have a very special

00:13 Tiffani

guest, Kelsey Thomas. In addition to being a licensed clinical social worker, she is the Director

00:17 Tiffani

of Counseling and Wellness at Southeastern University in Lakeland, Florida. Kelsey, thank you for

00:22 Tiffani

joining us today. Yes, thank you for having me. It's an honor. We've talked in previous podcasts

00:27 Tiffani

about the transition of adolescence to adulthood, especially for college kids.

00:32 Tiffani

And I thought you might have a unique perspective on just the types of things that kids go through

00:36 Tiffani

as they're coming to college campuses for the first time. Yeah. Yeah, it's huge. It's actually

00:41 Kelsey

probably one of the first, for most people, big transitions in life,

00:46 Kelsey

right? College, then often it's marriage, and then parenthood, right? Those are kind of the huge

00:53 Kelsey

transitions. So we see lots of students from all walks of life, from all places.

01:00 Kelsey

And it's not always an easy-peasy transition. So we see lots of things from,

01:07 Kelsey

like, as simple as doing laundry for the very first time in their lives to,

01:13 Kelsey

like, how do I time manage? And that can be really difficult for students when they don't have mom

01:20 Kelsey

or dad reminding them that they need to get their homework done or that they need to set an alarm

01:27 Kelsey

earlier. So some students do well. Some students struggle for a little bit.

01:33 Kelsey

And then some students, they need some assistance. And so that's where kind of our department steps

01:39 Tiffani

in. I remember Kirk and I have talked previously just our own personal experiences. And I'm

01:44 Tiffani

remembering now, I didn't mention this in the last episode, but I think one of the things for me

01:48 Tiffani

was during the semester, my glasses broke, which is such a silly thing. And I thought to myself,

01:54 Tiffani

I've never scheduled a doctor's appointment. Yeah. I've never found my own provider. And so I

02:00 Tiffani

literally had to look on the Internet and figure out where do I go? And that sounds like a simple

02:05 Tiffani

task. It's not always a simple task. No. No, it's not at all. And we see a lot of students,

02:10 Kelsey

right? We're located here in Lakeland, Florida, but tons of our students are coming from out of

02:14 Kelsey

state, right? So they, one, don't have parents or support systems to kind of direct them.

02:21 Kelsey

But then they're having to navigate these new things, right? Like find a doctor or a specialist or

02:27 Kelsey

a psychiatrist or an outside therapist. And they're met with,

02:32 Kelsey

we don't take your insurance. And then it's like, where do I go from there?

02:39 Kelsey

Yeah. And so navigating that can be extremely difficult. And even just like finding support to help

02:45 Kelsey

that is difficult. So that's why we do lots of outreach on our campus with students of like,

02:53 Kelsey

hey, this is going to be hard. We have people here who know how to do this and educate you.

02:58 Kirk

Do you do like freshman? meet and greets or things like this to learn about these services?

03:04 Kirk

Or how does a freshman know that you're available, your department is available to them?

03:10 Kelsey

Yes. So we've done a lot of work over the last three years of like promoting ourselves.

03:16 Kelsey

Okay. A ton. So every like freshman class I can get into,

03:21 Kelsey

I go and speak about health services and what we offer students. They have a whole welcome week.

03:29 Kelsey

And there's parent panels when parents are dropping their kids off and resources are given there.

03:36 Kelsey

We have student leadership is a huge thing at Southeastern, really developing leaders.

03:42 Kelsey

And so they start with students. And so every year they come in a few days before,

03:47 Kelsey

like the general population. And we have mental health trainings and like how they can then refer

03:53 Kelsey

resources to students they engage with. So lots of word of mouth. Good.

03:59 Kirk

Nice. But what are some of the typical things you see from students when they come to you?

04:06 Kirk

What is like the number one concern they have? Yeah, a lot of what we see is that adjustment

04:13 Kelsey

disorder, right? They're first time away from home, now experiencing some anxiety,

04:19 Kelsey

even some depression, and they're like, where is this coming from, right? This is all new. Those

04:23 Kelsey

things kind of tend to fade away as you get connected and build skills. But to be honest with you,

04:29 Kelsey

the past few years, we've seen a lot of students who... Due to the transition,

04:35 Kelsey

they're just now recognizing that they've been living in fight or flight and they've had some

04:40 Kelsey

serious trauma in their past. And you don't think that you're going to experience that sometimes

04:48 Kelsey

until you get away from home. Right. Because, you know, I find that the trauma that's unaddressed

04:55 Kirk

and you kind of learn to live with it. And then all of a sudden this major change, this major shift

05:00 Kirk

in somebody's life happens. Boom. There it is. Yeah. Where did this come from? Yeah.

05:06 Kelsey

Have to sit with somebody. Yeah. Or they meet new people. Right. From a different town, from a

05:11 Kelsey

different socioeconomic racial background. And they're like, wait, that's not normal behavior or

05:18 Kelsey

that's not what everyone's experienced. And that can be. While it's,

05:23 Kelsey

like, brilliant and beautiful to discover those things, it can also be really difficult and really

05:28 Kelsey

scary for someone who's called an adult but is 18 years old. Right. You know?

05:33 Kelsey

So that's kind of where we really like to step in. And we are a short-term model.

05:40 Kelsey

I don't know if you're familiar with how our program works, but in the counseling center, we're

05:44 Kelsey

short-term, solution-focused. So all traditional undergraduate students receive up to six free

05:50 Kelsey

sessions per semester with either a licensed therapist or supervised graduated intern. And we do a

05:58 Kelsey

lot of like coping skills, like how can we get you to the place where you're able to function well?

06:04 Kelsey

in a healthy way in this environment. But then we do a lot of referrals, like outsourcing a lot to

06:11 Kelsey

you guys, actually. And it's been so helpful because we do run into that problem this year in

06:19 Kelsey

particular with like students just can't afford services. And so they need something more intense,

06:25 Kelsey

more regulated and regular.

06:30 Kelsey

They either don't have insurance, they have out-of-state Medicaid, or some students, not all of

06:35 Kelsey

them, but some students, their families aren't very supportive in that journey. And so that's where

06:40 Kelsey

Peace River has been like such a blessing to us to step in and like help those students who it's

06:46 Kelsey

like. They don't have those financial resources, but they need something more in-depth, and they're

06:51 Kelsey

turned away everywhere else. Yeah, that's unfortunate because it takes a we've talked about this in

06:57 Kirk

previous podcasts about, you know, what is it like for somebody to come to that first session?

07:03 Kirk

And we got into all the stigma, the stereotype, all that that goes behind just all that courage it

07:11 Kirk

takes just to get to. That first session. And then to be, in some cases,

07:17 Kirk

met with, well, we've got to do all this administrative stuff first. But I'm here to talk about

07:21 Kirk

this emotional pain I'm going through. Yeah, but we've got to check about insurance. We've got to

07:25 Kirk

check about this. And then they leave kind of feeling a little deflated because that's not what

07:31 Kirk

they expected to get out of that first session.

07:35 Kirk

But, yeah, it takes a lot of courage for folks to just even walk in our doors lots of time and ask

07:41 Kirk

for that help. Yeah, absolutely. And we try to do things like outreach on campus as well to where

07:47 Kelsey

students are like, okay, these are not scary people, right? Like I already feel connected to them a

07:53 Kelsey

little bit. And it's a cool context we're in because it's such a small-knit community.

08:00 Kelsey

That while we're, you know, therapeutic providers, we also encounter them all the time, like in the

08:05 Kelsey

cafeteria, right? Right. Walking down El Prado, like it is a close community.

08:10 Kelsey

And so if they already know who we are. They're a lot more likely to be like, OK,

08:15 Kelsey

I kind of like trust this person. I see them a lot. Yeah, they're like, oh, I know who Kelsey is.

08:21 Kelsey

Yes, exactly. Like I've seen her around. I've heard her speak in a class. I've heard her speak, you

08:26 Kelsey

know, at a chapel or whatnot. And so we do monthly events called on-the-lawn events.

08:32 Kelsey

And so we're located in a really nice area of campus right in between two dorms. And there's a

08:37 Kelsey

beautiful lawn. And so once a month we come out, we set up tents. We do tons of food.

08:44 Kelsey

My wellness coordinator, she's like— Food brings people together. Yeah, she gets those donations.

08:49 Kelsey

She's like, listen, who's going to help? Good, good. She is. She is. So we have food,

08:55 Kelsey

and then we always have some sort of wellness activity. So even if it's just like we open up like

08:59 Kelsey

canvas painting or like gratitude letters, we've done that a lot before. They can write back to

09:05 Kelsey

someone they're thankful, and we'll mail it out. And things like that. And all my staff works that

09:10 Kelsey

whole event. So then as students come up, they're like, oh, you're one of the counselors? And we're

09:15 Kelsey

like, yes. Like, here's how you can get engaged. So we've seen that be really helpful, too. Nice.

09:20 Kirk

Now, have you seen people become more comfortable over the years with reaching out for help?

09:26 Kirk

Because, you know, many years ago, the stigma is huge. But I'm finding in…

09:33 Kirk

the various talks and areas I go to, that people are more open about it, which is great.

09:39 Kirk

It has a good and bad effect. It's like, great, great. We're having this conversation. Not so great

09:45 Kirk

if you're thinking you have everything. I do all of this. Am I crazy? Yes. Yeah.

09:51 Kelsey

So we have seen a lot more engagement. And I think we've overcome a lot of stigmas that just like

09:57 Kelsey

socially the helping profession has had to overcome. But especially in like within the Christian

10:02 Kelsey

context, because we are a Christian school. Unfortunately, that stigma for like mental health care

10:08 Kelsey

and just mental health in general, mental illness has been like even more of a barrier to overcome.

10:15 Kelsey

Yes. But we have. seen a shift and a trend, and I think that it's a result of giving quality care.

10:23 Kelsey

If a lot of people, all their experience is someone who is providing counseling that probably

10:29 Kelsey

shouldn't have been, right? When I first came on staff,

10:35 Kelsey

I had a lot of students who were like, oh, the counseling center, I need a therapist.

10:41 Kelsey

The counseling center isn't real counseling. And I was like, wait, wait, wait. Yes,

10:47 Kelsey

we are. Like, this is actually what we're staffed with. And a lot of students were like, oh, okay,

10:53 Kelsey

well, I'll come to you. Yeah, same. My experience has been the same. We've made referrals to the

10:59 Kirk

counseling center. Well, no, I want a real therapist. They are real therapists. Yes. I mean, you

11:04 Kirk

may get a registered intern, but they're still trained. They're advancing their careers,

11:09 Kirk

but you could get that at a community mental health center. Yeah. Yeah, so I think it's verbiage,

11:16 Kelsey

it's past experience, and it's just, you know, part of the job. But I think we've done a really

11:21 Kelsey

good job overcoming some of those barriers to entry. Nice. Good. Kelsey,

11:27 Tiffani

what are some things that you have found that help strengthen that resilience for students while

11:31 Tiffani

they're on campus? Honestly, getting connected with community.

11:38 Kelsey

You don't think like it's going to be difficult to make friends when you have a lot of friends at

11:42 Kelsey

home that you've grown up with since you were four or five years old. And then you get a new

11:46 Kelsey

context and it's like, OK, I'm feeling very uncomfortable. Right. Right. Like I don't know how to

11:53 Kelsey

ask someone to come to dinner with me. Right. I usually eat with my family, you know. And

11:59 Kelsey

Southeastern has lots of ways to get connected.

12:04 Kelsey

In those specific, you know, contexts. So whether it's a friend to eat a meal with, a community

12:10 Kelsey

group to get involved with, right, like house groups, going to chapel, like we encourage students

12:16 Kelsey

the after the week after ad drop is usually like club rush. That's what they call it. So out on El

12:22 Kelsey

Prado, which is like the main strip, student clubs will set up and like promote.

12:28 Kelsey

And I'm like, listen, guys, all my caseload. I'm like, listen, we're going to Club Rush.

12:34 Kelsey

Like if you have an interest, like this is where you get involved. And typically when students do

12:42 Kelsey

step out of their comfort zone to get involved in a group, they have a much easier time.

12:48 Kelsey

I don't see them for years. Right. Well, if you ascribe to Maslow's hierarchy of needs,

12:56 Kirk

that's one of the primary needs. Belonging.

13:01 Kelsey

Yeah. Yeah, it's cool. And the university also has like peer mentorship as well.

13:07 Kelsey

So students who like they just like they just can't take that step to get connected or they've

13:12 Kelsey

tried and it's been unsuccessful. There's like a lot of students on campus who want to step in

13:17 Kelsey

there and be a friend for someone who feels like they don't have. And that's a really beautiful

13:21 Kelsey

thing about our community. Like there are students who are like. I want to be your friend, right?

13:26 Kelsey

You just haven't found me yet. And so we have peer mentoring as well for students who find it

13:30 Kelsey

particularly difficult. Nice. And do the peer mentors help,

13:35 Kirk

like, with some studies as well? Because, you know, like the old tutor. Yeah, they're aware of,

13:42 Kelsey

like, all the resources on campus. They're like mini social workers. Right. I love it. They're

13:46 Kelsey

like, okay, this is what's going on. Look, we can get you connected here, and I'm going to go with

13:50 Kelsey

you. Right. I'm not just going to tell you, hey, make sure you go to Ace twice a week.

13:55 Kelsey

Like maybe let's meet there on Tuesday or whatnot. Nice. It's so important to have that sense of

14:00 Tiffani

connection and just knowing that you matter to somebody. What about over the holidays? Do you have

14:06 Tiffani

a lot of students who stay on campus or do most of the students go home? I'm sure some live

14:10 Tiffani

internationally or they're far away and they just can't make that happen. Yeah. So Thanksgiving

14:15 Kelsey

break, which we're coming up on next week, the dorms are open. So students have the opportunity to

14:21 Kelsey

stay here on campus. But over Christmas break, dorms close. There are certain circumstances in

14:27 Kelsey

which, say, a student doesn't have anywhere to go. They can pay a small fee and stay on campus. But

14:32 Kelsey

we try to stay away from that because it is really lonely. It's a long time.

14:38 Kelsey

Most people aren't even in their offices. So when students leave for home,

14:45 Kelsey

that can be really exciting or it can be really, really difficult. And so just like you guys, I'm

14:50 Kelsey

sure, in community mental health, you see those kind of upticks. I can't cope, right? I'm having

14:56 Kelsey

crisis, you know, right before someone's about to go home. And so we do,

15:02 Kelsey

yeah, we experience a lot of that. Southeastern partners with something called Timely Care. Okay.

15:07 Kelsey

I don't know if you guys have heard of it. No, I have not. So they only partner with universities,

15:10 Kelsey

but it's an online mental health platform. So all of our students, as the traditional students on

15:17 Kelsey

campus, right, can receive in person. But we actually have thousands of students who never even

15:22 Kelsey

come to Lakeland of Southeastern. They're at extension sites or they're online or they're grad

15:26 Kelsey

programs or whatnot. And so they all have access to something called TimelyCare in which the

15:32 Kelsey

university pays for them to have six sessions per year with a licensed therapist and

15:37 Kelsey

unlimited talk now resources. So those are the times where it's like, it's three o'clock in the

15:43 Kelsey

morning. Like I just experienced this. I don't have anyone to talk to, right? Or I don't feel

15:47 Kelsey

comfortable talking to anyone. I'm going to give this person a call and they'll get connected with

15:52 Kelsey

a master's level clinician within like seven minutes, I think is the average wait time. Wow. Yeah.

15:57 Kelsey

And their counseling session, the turnaround. is like 48 hours, which is huge.

16:03 Kelsey

Like you can't get an appointment anywhere. And so some students don't prefer that method and

16:10 Kelsey

that's okay. They want the face-to-face, but it's a great resource. They actually can use it all

16:16 Kelsey

year round. So they get access to that over summer breaks, Christmas breaks, all 50 states and a

16:21 Kelsey

lot of international locations as well. Oh, very nice. Very nice service. That's amazing.

16:28 Tiffani

What about for the parents who have college students that are like coming home for the holidays?

16:35 Tiffani

How can you support your kid when they're not really a kid anymore and they've developed this new

16:40 Tiffani

autonomy and identity? Those are some really blurry lines whenever you're trying to figure out,

16:45 Tiffani

well, what does this family look like now? Yeah. Yeah, you're exactly right. It's not just a change

16:50 Kelsey

for the student who comes away to college. It's a change for the entire family system, right?

16:55 Kelsey

Right. So they've spent, what, 16 weeks being like, I can do whatever I want,

17:01 Kelsey

right? Yeah.

17:04 Kelsey

Within hopefully some boundaries. But then they go back home, right? And sometimes parents are

17:08 Kelsey

like. Well, you need to tell me where you're going. You need to tell me who you're hanging out

17:11 Kelsey

with. You need to do the dishes. Yeah, right. And that's very jarring sometimes. And so I think for

17:17 Kelsey

parents, just like, one, like, you're still the parent, right? So, like, you have the authority to

17:23 Kelsey

expect certain things from your child. Even my mom. I'm a grown woman with a child. And if my mom

17:28 Kelsey

asks me to do something, I'm like, yes. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. I will, right? You're my mom. So,

17:34 Kelsey

like, there's a part of it there. But then there's also. A part of like our kids growing up that we

17:40 Kelsey

have to recognize like these this autonomy and like your child trying to set a boundary is actually

17:47 Kelsey

a good thing. It's not a threat to you. Right. Right. And so we see that all the time. I'm like,

17:52 Kelsey

OK, where are we going to set up boundaries right within the family? And students are like, I can't

17:58 Kelsey

do that with my mom or with my dad or with my grandma because I know how they'll react. Like they

18:02 Kelsey

won't take that well if I say, please don't say those things to me. Yeah. Right.

18:08 Kirk

And, you know, you're right. This is an opportunity for the whole family dynamic to kind of grow

18:15 Kirk

because the parents have done their job. And if they've done their job well, you're going to have

18:21 Kirk

those discussions. There's going to be some push about boundaries. And I'm going to set some of my

18:26 Kirk

own boundaries as an adult. And it is jarring. It is a parent. You're like,

18:31 Kirk

oh, wait, I've got to let this go and be OK with it. Because I've done my job to this point.

18:40 Kirk

Fly, be free. Yeah, yeah. So we work a lot with, at least in our setting,

18:46 Kelsey

like, okay, what actually is a boundary, right? There's a huge disconnect there culturally right now.

18:54 Kelsey

Like, oh, you upset me. You no longer can talk to me ever again. And I'm like, so that's not a

19:00 Kelsey

boundary. Right. Right. And then also a lot of like communication skills, like how do we interact

19:06 Kelsey

with our parents as adults now?

19:10 Kelsey

Showing them respect and love and empathy because this is also a difficult season for them. Right.

19:15 Kelsey

Right. I can't even I have a two year old and I'm like, she's not going to want to cuddle with me

19:21 Kelsey

one day. I can't like grab her and make her cuddle with me one day. Right. Those are not only

19:27 Kelsey

difficult for the child. That's hard for moms and dads. And so how do we communicate with our

19:32 Kelsey

parents with love while also recognizing that like. There were some things maybe in my childhood

19:38 Kelsey

that hurt me, and I'm trying to heal from that now, and it's now my responsibility to determine

19:44 Kelsey

what is said to me, right? What I accept in my life. Cool. Well,

19:49 Kirk

great, Kelsey. Thank you for sharing a lot of those insights with us. It will be beneficial for

19:55 Kirk

anybody who's listening on our podcast. And if you're not going to Southeastern University,

20:02 Kirk

you can... Look at these kinds of services on your campus. They're out there. They're available.

20:08 Kirk

And really, if you're just getting on campus as a freshman, look for these meet and greets and

20:14 Kirk

things like that. Sometimes they've got silly names to them. It's like, oh, that's not me.

20:20 Kirk

But overcome the silly name. Get out there and kind of make that connection.

20:26 Kirk

And you may find out maybe this isn't for me, which is okay. You already know something about

20:30 Kirk

yourself, right? This isn't necessarily for me, but finding those other connections, joining the

20:35 Kirk

clubs, joining a fraternity or sorority and things like that, that you might find of interest.

20:40 Kirk

So appreciate you being here. Thank you so much. Yeah, thank you so much, guys. Thanks.