Age and Honesty

When my mother reached her 70's she said that she felt that she was now entitled to be totally honest with people. She would never be mean or nasty as that is not in her nature. She just felt that with age, came honesty. Since I am now in my 60's, I see her point. If I feel it, I express it, but always in a nice way. I was talking to a potential new patient yesterday and after I told her the fees for our services, she said that we do not care about people and that we are money hungry. Years ago I would have let that go by. Yesterday I did not. I did not care that we could lose a potential patient. The integrity of my doctors was more important. In a nice tone I told the woman that she insulted not only me but 10 other people when she inferred that we only do this for money. I said that my doctors need to pay rent, buy food, pay electric, malpractice insurance and gas for their cars. They are like the rest of the world and to say that they should provide a service for minimal payment is highly disrespectful. I said that they are so committed to their patients well being that they are literally on call 24 hours a day and that they are the kindest people I know. I told her that if this was a heart surgeon's office and she was charged $50,000 for open heart surgery, she would never say that the fee was too high. For some reason psychology practices have to validate why they charge for therapy and not give it away. I also informed her that it was her choice to come here and she could have called an in network provider instead. After a minute she apologized to me and booked an appointment. I told my boss exactly what I said and she agreed.