The Heart Behind the Mic: A conversation with Melissa Correa and Catia Hernandez Holm

To connect with Catia and become a client, visit- catiaholm.com

Connect on Instagram, Facebook, and to leave an anonymous question for Catia call or text 956-249-7930

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Ever wondered about the person in the therapist's chair? In this intimate premiere episode of Couch Time with Cat, host Catia (Cat) pulls back the curtain on her own journey from hospitality manager to mental wellness advocate. With her best friend (and cousin) Melissa Correa asking the questions we all want answers to, Cat reveals the twists and turns that shaped her path to becoming a therapist, coach, and author.

Growing up Mexican-American in South Texas, Cat recalls a childhood where mental health wasn't part of the conversation. "My parents were migrants and they were so hardworking...there just wasn't a lot of space for mental wellness," she shares candidly. This cultural context frames her passionate belief that creating space for our emotional wellbeing is both a challenge and a necessity in our busy lives.

The conversation takes an especially powerful turn when Cat discusses her identity crisis after becoming a mother. With remarkable vulnerability, she describes her postpartum depression and how writing became her lifeline during those dark days. "I knew that I needed something, and I didn't know what," she reflects, a sentiment that will resonate with anyone who's ever felt lost while trying to find themselves again.

What makes this episode truly special is Cat's humility and wisdom. When comparing herself to giants in the mental health field like Dr. Brené Brown, she offers a beautiful metaphor: "She's like Niagara Falls... I may be your little local creek, but I can provide some respite and beauty to the person who can get to me." It's this perspective—that we all have something valuable to offer in our own way—that makes Couch Time with Cat feel like sitting with a trusted friend.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Couch Time with Kat
• 7:31 Meet Melissa Correa
• 11:20 Growing Up Mexican-American in South Texas
• 19:33 Hospitality Career and Finding Connection
• 28:39 Motherhood and Identity Crisis

Transcript

: 0:00

Welcome to Couch Time with Cat, your safe place for real conversation and a gentle check-in. KWVH presents Couch Time with Cat.

: 0:10

Welcome to Couch Time with Cat, mental wellness with a friendly voice. I'm your host, Cat, a therapist, coach, best-selling author and TEDx speaker. I've spent years supporting people around the world as they navigate healing, growth and everything in between. This show is a place for honest conversations. It's where we take a breath, sit down together and talk about the things that really matter Our struggles, our stories, our hopes and our capacity to change. We're coming to you from Wimberley Valley Radio, right here in the heart of Texas Hill Country. Whether you're deep in your healing or just starting to wonder what that even means, you are welcome here.

: 0:52

Today marks the beginning of this show, and before we dive into stories, guests and soul deep dialogue, I want to start with something personal. I believe if we're going to travel this journey together, you should know who you're writing with, so I've invited someone very special to me to help do just that. Melissa Correa is a veteran journalist, a seasoned speechwriter and one of the most respected storytellers in media. She spent nearly two decades asking the right questions and giving voice to stories that matter, and she's also my best friend, lucky me. Melissa has seen me through the messy middles and the breakthroughs. She knows my heart, my work and why I care so deeply about the people I serve. Today, she's flipping the script and taking the mic to interview me so you can get a feel for who I am, why this show exists and what you can expect from our time together. This is where our journey begins. Hi Hi Melzi how are you?

: 2:01

I'm well, how are you?

: 2:02

I'm good and this is such an exciting opportunity this radio show, couch Time with Cat. Maybe some days there might be a meow, maybe some days there might be something else. But I really loved listening to that intro because we hadn't really talked about the details of it, the definition of what you're trying to accomplish with this show, and went mental wellness with a friendly voice, and then I highlighted our struggles, our stories, our hopes and our capacity to change. And so I think this episode is really important because you are part of the hour, right, you are the part of the collective and so, no matter where this show goes, you are the part of the collective and so, no matter where this show goes, you're also going to be sharing your own experiences, right?

: 2:49

That's so true. I hadn't thought about it in that way, but yes, I feel like I'm on the journey with the listener too.

: 2:56

Yes, and it's important for the listener to know who they're talking to, who they're listening to, and I think there's something so impressive about being in the hill country recording this show today. But you and I are from the Rio Grande Valley and then I was thinking all the hills and valleys that life brings us. Okay, so you're not from the Wimberley area. Where are you from originally?

: 3:22

I'm from South Texas. I'm from the Rio Grande Valley. I'm a proud Mexican American. I grew up in a small city called Wesl aco and it's grown now, but when you and I were growing up there it had one high school. And I just love where I'm from. I love the people, I love the culture. It's primarily Mexican American. Lots of Spanish is spoken, lots of beautiful Mexican traditions, and I grew up really immersed in that culture.

: 3:55

And it's so interesting that you talk about your connection to your culture. Correct me if I'm wrong, though Mental health therapy, mental wellness Was that part of the conversation you had growing up in South Texas our parents.

: 4:27

One of my parents is an immigrant.

: 4:28

Both my parents were migrants and they were so hardworking and they still are to this day and they were trying to make a better life for their families and that requires a lot of hard work and there just wasn't a lot of space for mental wellness.

: 4:42

Not to say that I had an overly difficult time I think I had normal bullying and things like that but the culture wasn't focused on mental wellness. They were focused on things like higher education or making sure you have enough volunteer hours so you get into college yeah, working your way up, right, working our way up. And what my parents did provide for me is this level of safety where I was emotionally safe, physically safe. I was very loved and that has given me the luxury to now think about mental wellness, because I did get a higher education, I did pursue those goals and it's kind of higher education, I did pursue those goals and it's kind of like I have a little bit of a respite and I can take a deep breath and expand my view and really take mental wellness into the picture, when before I couldn't Is mental health prioritizing that.

: 5:38

Is that a luxury?

: 5:40

I think so. Why? I think being able to have margin and bandwidth to even think about it is a luxury. I think a lot of people are living paycheck to paycheck and they are trying to do their best to cook a good dinner for their kids and hug their kids after soccer practice and make sure they do their project at work correctly and they're taking care. They're checking those boxes and there isn't a lot of time or space for the rest. It has to be created. It's not just oh, from six to seven. I'm going to focus on my mental wellness. It's really something that you have to be deliberate about. It's really something that you have to be deliberate about.

: 6:24

Well, how special that this show exists now. Right, Because for people who may not have the time to dedicate to a full therapy session, they can, at their leisure, listen to this show and share space with you. And if it gives them five more minutes to kind of explore thoughts a little bit more deeply, then it's five minutes well spent.

: 6:47

I think so.

: 6:48

The other thing that's so interesting about growing up in South Texas because breaking news you and I are best friends, but we're also cousins, so I grew up in South Texas as well. Go to therapy or simply ask for help is because they don't have the language to describe what they're feeling, experiencing, needing, so you go to an expert who can help you identify those feelings and emotions. That being said, going back to your childhood, did you even have the language to know that a licensed family therapist was something that was attainable, something that you wanted to achieve later in life?

: 7:34

As you're asking me the question, I'm shaking my head pretty vigorously. No way, I didn't know. I didn't know what help existed out there. I didn't even know. I don't even know if it existed at the time. But I certainly didn't have the language for identifying what I was feeling during, let's say, puberty or as a young girl going to college. I really could identify with two or three main emotions Scared, angry, happy. That was it. Yeah, and we thought that was the gamut, yeah, and I was pretty proud of myself for being able to say I was scared. So as I've grown, I have had access and exposure to different types of emotions, how they feel in the body. What help is out there? I think even just an awareness that help is out there is huge.

: 8:28

And although I describe your trajectory to where you are today as a kind of a swivel or a swerve, I mean a squiggly line at best in some kindergarten classroom. But really, when you look at your life, as we'll explore in this episode, you really have just been unraveling the onion of working with people. So you graduated from Wesl aco High School, you went on to the University of Texas at Austin where you studied what Marketing, and you intended to fully go on to the University of Houston where you earned your master's degree. To do and accomplish what after that?

: 9:03

where you earned your master's degree to do and accomplish what after that? I was going to run hotels and bars and restaurants the rest of my life as a 21-year-old I think. I got a master's in hotel and restaurant management from U of H and I loved being in the hospitality industry. I loved serving people. I have a heart for service and I also loved the hustle and bustle of it, so I could serve with my heart and I could also serve with my head inside of a restaurant. It was a Tetris, a constant Tetris.

: 9:34

It is, and of people and personalities too, because you worked at some very well-known steakhouses. You worked for I love to brag about it ACL Live, which is an incredible concert venue in the area. You're dealing with VIPs, you're dealing with celebrities, you're dealing with bar backs, you're dealing with custodians, and you see how all of those dynamics play the power struggles, the egos. You're witnessing this in your 20s right and you're noticing what.

: 10:07

I'm noticing that when you really connect with somebody, things are better. Doesn't matter if it's a custodian or a VIP customer or a bar back or your boss. When we can actually connect, we all work better together, and part of the challenge was figuring out everybody's personality and connecting with them in a way that matters to them. It has to be sincere or else it won't work, and so knowing what's important to them, helping them accomplish their goals at the same time as we are all accomplishing the venue goal let's say, bruce Springsteen is going to come that day and everybody has to be in tip-top shape and so encouraging everybody and motivating them in ways that matter to them really helped us accomplish goals as a whole.

: 10:59

And then the interesting thing about it was you were discovering yourself. I mean, you were in your mid-20s at this point in your career, and so were the people that you're working with, and so the bartender didn't see that as their end game, right, they had the hopes and dreams and you were in a position as their manager to kind of hear their aspirations, and in a lot of ways you cultivated these careers so that people could continue to climb up, and I like to think that that's maybe your first example of what happens when you don't make decisions for other people but you give advice, you give guidance and you allow them to see more for themselves. Does any of that ring to you? Did I just like take that out of the park? Or does that sound like kind of truly the early stages, like what we all call like friend therapy, like why do I need a therapist when I can just call my best friend? Like this is literally how it all, I think, started for you.

: 12:01

Yes, and I would add to what you said believing in their own capabilities, yeah, so I've never been a fan of viewing people as projects or that they need to be fixed. Yeah Listen, I've done that a handful of times in my life and it has been the worst thing. I haven't done that. And believing that people should walk in their own autonomy and that they have the dignity to make their own choices and that they have the ability to decide whether they want to go left or right or whatever it is in their career is unspoken. And so when I was working with bartenders, et cetera, I believed that about them.

: 12:46

I never looked down on anybody or thought, oh, I'm your boss, so I'm better than you. It was more like this is the role I'm playing, this is the role you're playing, and sometimes I would get in there with them and bartend with them, and sometimes they would help me out when I needed. But we were all worthy, we were all important. And I wanted to say, as you were speaking, I think the other really integral part and you and I have joked about this off camera, no, off recording is that at a really young age, my dad knew that emotional intelligence was important. I don't think he knew how important it was or that it would be in my life, but he started giving me Dale Carnegie books how to win friends and influence.

: 13:36

I thought she read it at kindergarten and I thought that for a couple of weeks.

: 13:42

Celestine Prophecy, so a self-fulfilling prophecy. He gave me just towers of books and he said here these, and even though I was younger, they were planting seeds.

: 13:55

Yeah, and that leads me to my next question. Because you're providing so much optimism and encouragement for people in the restaurant and the service industry, my question to you is at a certain point did you start believing all of those messages for yourself? Because how does one go from late nights at a bar to you know a therapist during the day?

: 14:22

That's such a good question. I think I had to wear them like a coat, like a outfit in my youth and I pretended, but not out of insincerity, but just I was experimenting with those beliefs and as I grew into those beliefs, I then started to embody them yeah that has come with age. I don't think I was faking it, I think it was just a function of youth, and but I still led with them.

: 14:54

So what was the aha moment? Did you just turn in your you know your walking papers at ACL Live one day and say I'm going to go get my master's degree because I want to be a licensed therapist? Was it a flip of a switch?

: 15:06

as simple as that there were many, many bus stations in between. What were they? Well, I met my now husband and he said hey, I thought you said you wanted to be a writer. And at the time I said I do. And he said you know writers have to write. I thought rude, but I love you, rude, but let's get married. Yeah, and just I remember where we were walking across the street. It wasn't a big conversation. He just said writers have to write. He holds you accountable. He really held me accountable as we crossed that street and I thought, okay, and that was my signal. It was coming from him, but it was also coming from inside of me. I could have done entertainment my whole life and it's very, very fun, but I knew it wasn't using all parts of who I am. I really knew that I had an ability to stretch. I didn't know where or what, so I started writing.

: 16:11

And you had taken a respite right. You had met your husband, you all got married, a child was on the way about a year later, and at that time you really wanted to kind of hone in on your home and your family. I did, and so there was a time for you to pause and really reflect.

: 16:32

There was a year, one year that I did, and so there was a time for you to pause and really reflect.

: 16:36

There was a year one year that I paused. I think a lot of women can relate to that right. You either think at that point, this is the most I'm going to do, or I had these dreams. I really wanted to do it. I don't know if it's going to happen now. I think I and I might be speaking for some of your clients, but they but motherhood seems to be quite. Might be speaking for some of your clients, but they but motherhood seems to be quite the speed bump for a lot of women.

: 16:58

A speed bump is an understatement. Yeah, yes it once. I became a mother, completely reorganized my life and I had an identity crisis. I had always been very proud and I had hung my hat on the fact that I had a master's at such a young age and I had all these really big responsibilities in my 20s and I was proud and I was a little bit of a show off and a little bit you know. Look at me, I'm so fancy, my restaurant has this amount of revenue, or I host Jay-Z, or whatever it was.

: 17:38

It became your identity. It really became my identity and when I stepped away from that, I was very sad. It was very quiet and that change coupled with becoming a mother well, all the changes in pregnancy and then becoming a mother was a lot. It was just a tsunami of changes and I was drowning. And about two months after becoming a new mom, I sat down and I started writing. I didn't know what it was going to be, but I knew that I had to save myself. So I started writing my first book Longhand on loose leaf paper while my two-month-old was napping or sleeping.

: 18:28

And what was that like? Did it feel like you know equal attention? Was there any guilt related to that? Did you? What did you feel like wanting to cling to writing which was important to?

: 18:45

you postpartum depression and I knew that I didn't feel good and it was the first time in my life I had ever been depressed and I knew that I needed something and I didn't know what. And I was. I was confined to my baby. I was confined. I didn't work outside of the house and I was confined to her schedule. And a lot of people may hear the word confined and think, wow, she's a bad mom, but that's what it felt like, because I used to have this big life with a lot of freedom and all of a sudden, I was in a home all day responsible for this infant and my hormones were plummeting and I don't live around family and my husband did his absolute best. You know he was very, very involved, but I was still depressed and I knew that I needed. I needed something. I didn't't know what and I think I just it was God's talking to me that said. Start writing, chica.

: 19:55

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you leaned into your therapist at that point too, sandy, or no, did I? I don't know, I'm asking I don't remember. You would remember better, I do. Okay, I do remember better, but I don't remember that moment. I know it was a dark point for you, and your oldest daughter, alexandra, is now 11. Yeah, she's gonna be 11, yes, in August you wrote.

: 20:30

You started writing on loose leaf paper and I had. In retrospect I then had something to pour creative energy into. That was mine, that I could hang my hat on. I think it was the first book. I was really searching for something to hang my hat on again in terms of career, and I wanted to be impressive. I wanted to say look at, look at me, look at what I did. The second book wasn't like that, but the first book very much was, and that's okay. You know, I give myself a grace about that. I was a new mom trying to find my way, trying to find yourself, trying to find myself, this new woman with these new circumstances. And from the beginning to end it took three years to publish that book and I God gave me so many blessings during that time for that book. I mean, he just paved the way. In a lot of ways. I still had difficulties, of course, but the book was an amazing milestone for me.

: 21:40

What's it called?

: 21:41

The Courage to Become, Stories of Hope for Navigating Love, Marriage and Motherhood.

: 21:47

That book. For me, reading it was so pivotal because it's very different from your second book, which is called A Gentle Return Also great, both available at Book People. But the interesting thing about Courage to Become is you did a lot of research, of research you pulled from a lot of sources and for me I think looking at my friend write a book and going to other experts is what opened your mind to I could be more than just a writer. I could be in the mental health space as a licensed professional and slowly but surely you took some classes, you got some certifications I'll have you talk about these things and we've got to where you are. But it took a lot of research and essentially experimenting on yourself.

: 22:45

Oh yes, I went back and looked at some YouTube videos the other day when I was just starting to write a blog and I thought God bless me. I was so, so precious, like a little baby calf.

: 22:59

Why do you say that Because I was putting it out there. I didn't know anything about not that I do now, but I didn't know. I had no mental health training but I was really wanting to give what I had. You wanted to share it. I wanted to share. I wanted to share and show up for other people and people like Rob Bell or Brene Brown, dr Brene Brown, elizabeth Gilbert, dr Shefali, dr Shefali, elizabeth Gilbert, um, dr Shefali, dr Shefali, richard Rohr there were so many luminaries that I looked to to learn from. I've always been a fan of learning and growing and as I looked at their lives, they were, they were expansive, they, they tried many, many things.

: 23:52

Okay, but that's an interesting point, because I don't know if anybody else is thinking this as Katya is talking, but sometimes I tend to do this If I take stock of what's already out in the world and there's expert A, b, c and D, then kind of that shame little animal inside of my brain says then there's no need for you, melissa, to go out and do it. There's already exceptional work being done now. But you started learning from these trusted sources. What was the inner dialogue that said there's space for me too the inner dialogue.

: 24:33

That said, there's space for me too. I think of, let's just say, with Dr Brene Brown. She's like Niagara Falls. She is this huge, amazing creature. She's just. She does so much good in the world, but not everybody can get to Niagara Falls. I've never been to Niagara Falls. I've never been to Niagara Falls. For me, I may be your little local creek, but I can provide some respite and some beauty and something that's life-giving to the person who can get to me.

: 25:00

And they're not comparable. They're not the same.

: 25:03

No, but they're both natural beauties. Yes, in so many ways.

: 25:07

Enriched with so many just treasures. Yes, yes, and not everybody can get toriched with so many, just treasures.

: 25:10

Yes, yes, and not everybody can get to Niagara Falls, and that's okay. But how many little creeks do we all have around us, just ways that people can enrich our lives? And I think that of artists, painters, writers, musicians not everybody is. Who's a great musician these days? Chris Stapleton. But we can go to a singer-songwriter show here down the road at a local pub or restaurant, and that's going to be an amazing night for somebody. So I tried not to look, I tried not to compare myself, so I tried not to look, I tried not to compare myself and I tried to just say do what you can and provide beauty where you can.

: 25:56

So you're on the eve of your 42nd birthday yes and in this is a very cliff's notes version of reviewing kind of the trajectory of your life. But what are you? What are of? Your own story? Inspires you? Do you have any things that you wish you could go back and do better? Do changing any regrets? Like what's the review?

: 26:20

Wow, that's a great question. Something that I regret, I think I regret not creating a team or not working with other people sooner in this world. As an author, speaker, therapist, I was pretty lonely for a while.

: 26:43

Why didn't you seek help?

: 26:46

I didn't think I could afford it. I also didn't think I just I don't think I knew how to the model of business, how that would work, and I was primarily a mom I raised. I wanted to be home and raise my children and I knew that expanding my business would take me away from home. And I still want to be home. I love my kids and I want to hang out with them and I want to jump on the trampoline with them. And I think the whole time I've been in my career and a mom, it's been a balancing act and titrating a little bit here, a little bit there. And as my kids get older they're now almost 11 and eight and a half, don't forget the half there is more time and space. They don't need me at home as much. They can make their own breakfast and things like that, so I have more opportunities to do fun things like this when before I wouldn't have even entertained them because I wanted to be home, correct.

: 27:53

I mean well, not correct, but that makes sense. The interesting thing is too is you explored becoming a licensed therapist during the global COVID pandemic?

: 28:04

I did.

: 28:04

Where you did, I think, almost all schooling with the exception of a few classes online, all schooling with the exception of a few classes online. Navigating that experience for your children and your husband and your family, which was like also isolating.

: 28:19

It was actually backward. I did the first, I did the first year online and the last two years in person, so most of my classes were in person. So it was a real. That was a real undertaking.

: 28:35

Yeah. And so for the folks who might be listening, who say I relate to Catia in this way you know, my life is kind of ping-ponged and mentally I've gotten to where I'm at or the folks who think mental wellness is a luxury and they just don't have space for it now. And then they're hearing you who is a mother and loves being with her girls. When we look at your practice and the work that you're doing with people, what excites you? What encourages you to keep going?

: 29:11

The way I see that people are resilient, the way I have seen them grow and heal there is nothing like it. It is we are. I often say you know, we're just walking around, we're at Walmart or we're at Ace Hardware or we're going and getting ice cream with our friends or family and we all look like normal people, but we are so strong and so able and so resilient and that is what really inspires me that we can hold these hurts and heal and grow and move on and still show up for our nieces and nephews and children and spouses. And I just think that the human capacity to grow and heal and to be good is so big and that's what gives me hope.

: 30:04

It gives you hope and it gives you the encouragement to help others, and so I can't wait to talk to you about this in the next episode. But essentially, we're gonna take all of your own life experiences and talk about how you're pouring this into your sessions with folks. Let's see what we can take away from what you've learned.

: 30:23

Melissa, I love you. Thank you for being here. Thank you. If this conversation clarified something for you or helped you feel a little more seen, please share it with someone you care about. You can follow along for more grounded, soulful conversations and know that this space is here to support you. Thank you for being with us today.