Sometimes just trying something - even if you’re weary or afraid of it - may turn out to be something good and something you were truly meant to do.
That was what happened with Rachael Cloud, Counselor and Group Facilitator at Frontline Foundations.
Her career path started with the transfer from Indiana Wesleyan to Purdue Northwest, where she graduated with a degree in English. Her plan was to either teach or do something with languages, since she was always fascinated with learning new languages and cultures.
After graduation, she felt herself being drawn to the counseling and therapy field. She applied herself and got her Masters Degree at Grace College and Theological Seminary in Winona Lake.
“I felt the tug. My faith brought me to go to the counseling field and I was like 'Yeah, I don’t think that is really going to happen,’” she remembered saying to herself. “I am introverted so I don’t like sitting and talking to people, but I ended up saying, 'Okay, fine I will apply to some programs and see what happens.’ I got into Grace and fell in love with it and actually liked it a lot more than I thought I was going to.”
Then, after the program she returned to the region and didn’t even apply to counseling jobs, because again, she thought she was not a good fit. She was in the middle of being hired at another job, when her pastor called her saying there was an opening at a place “right up her alley.”
“He said, ‘You’ve got a counseling degree, I think you should check this out. I think you’d really like it,’” she said. “I was like, 'I already a have a job, I’ll think about it’ and I was already struggling with the idea of if I could even be effective. But I called my pastor and was like, ‘Okay, what’s the number?’ Then, I met Amber (Hensell-Hicks, the Director of Clinical Services) and it was perfect. I just felt at peace.”
“This is exactly what I wanted to do,” she said.
Cloud started working in 2012 and has found a home in the unique, creative arts therapy rehabilitation center. She works in the Chesterton clinic along with the other clinic is in La Porte.
“Frontline is unique. It is a faith-based facility - which I think is super awesome - but we don’t force our beliefs on anybody,” she said.
Cloud works with clients who use creative art to express themselves through their recovery. Around the building and in Cloud’s office the different styles of artwork hang on the walls.
“I have sat with so many people who have said, ‘I can’t draw, I am not good at it,’ which I say, ‘Just give it a try,’” she said. “People express themselves in whatever way they try: mold, paint things, splatter paint, draw, chalk, and graffiti.”
There are also music and a science programs that clients can use to express themselves rather than drawing art, she said.
As the client’s journey through their recovery, Cloud has been on her own journey.
“The clients that walk through the door, not everyone, – I’m not going to get emotional – this isn’t their fist place to come. They don’t want to admit they have a problem,” Cloud said. “They are vulnerable and to see their fight is an inspiration. It is hard and there are definitely bumps along the way. I am understanding that life is not to be taken for granted and something you’re not supposed to do alone.”
Cloud has learned to be appreciative of relationships and how they come into your life. Her relationships with her own family, friends, pastor, and now husband and kids, have led her into the life she has now.
She grew up in Northwest Indiana and after school, came straight back to the area to raise her two children Kendall, 2, and Micah, 1, with her husband Nathan.
Raised in an Army family, Cloud moved around a lot, thus making her realize how much she enjoys living here in Chesterton.
“I can honestly tell you you’re not going to find another access to water, to be able to go to a big city to do something, yet you are out in the country and have some sort of privacy in the midst of these things,” she explained. "There’s ice skating, the Dunes, etc. There is so much to do here.”
Though much of her out-of-work life is spent caring for family, Cloud enjoys being outside, playing softball, and reading.
She states her life is boring, that being a therapist means her love for self-help books, passion for learning new languages, and daily studying of sign language makes her boring. But, she’s wrong.
Those loves are what makes her creative, unique, and the perfect fit for a counselor working with clients who need those creative, unique passions themselves.
For more information on Frontline Foundations' programs and services, click here.