ever had a bad therapist?

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Parents want what is best for their kids. I know that is very true with my parents. Sometimes parents just can't help their kids on their own, they need to find professional help. I have a pretty good therapist now, but I have had my share of really bad therapists. This is a blog from wordpress.com about personality traits you should watch out for when you are finding a therapist for you or your Autistic child.



http://dwarren57.wordpress.com/2009/11/ ... therapist/

From my experience, a better question would be...ever have a good therapist? Good therapists are rare!

^Amen!


As a matter of fact, I've only had one GOOD therapist my entire life... and I've seen lots of them.



In middle school, my parents forced me to see the school counselor because they believed I "needed help." She was simply frightening. She treated me like I was some sort of deranged sick kid and was soooo patronizing. She kept trying to psychoanalyze me and twisted around everything I said so it led up to the conclusion that I was like, ill or something. I always felt worse after seeing her than before.


And -- no kidding -- she tried to lure children into her office with apples!

Last edited by Silverweed on 11 Nov 2009, 1:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I haven't found a good one! That is according to the criteria offered in the blog, so I don't think they were deliberately nasty. Mostly, they do come across as rather patronizing & haven't yet come up with much that helps, almost at all. The most helpful things that did get said, about confidence, most of the current ones want to take away! Incredible, build a house by digging up the foundation! Best not to get me going on this & I'm sure most have similar stories.

Like I said, there are people who try to push their clients to work hard on "social skills", but there are therapists who demonstrate behaviors that show a lack of "social skills".

I wish some therapist, etc, would 'push me to work on social skills', instead of all the other stuff they want to talk about!

Most of the therapists I've had were excellent. There was this one, though, who talked about herself more than I talked. She lasted two or three sessions.

I should have added "self centeredness" as one of the bad personality traits on the list.

Yeah. Some therapists get into the field to fix themselves.

I had a really good one once. I went to her when I was having really bad panic attacks and was so phobic I couldn't leave the house without my husband taking me, and going places was very hard. I had been to so many before, but I found her. She was a LBSW but she had had panic attacks and agoraphobia herself years ago. She understood completely and I could call her at home or on her cell anytime. She really got me over that. She was the one who ended up diagnosing my AS too. But, she had a relapse of panic disorder herself and started drinking and doing drugs. She called me once looking for Percocets even. She and I had gotten to be sort of friends by that point and would talk on the phone sometimes about once a week. I quit talking to her after this little stunt she pulled when I called her with a serious problem and she was drunk and I didn't know it and she called my family then called me back and said horrible things that she I guess thought they said.

I wonder whatever happened to her. I hope she got straightened out, she was a nice lady when she was sober.

PaganMom

Very true. I don't think that's inherently bad if they are able to differentiate their own issues from the clients', but most are too self-centered and/or not smart enough to do so.

My parents essentially made me go see a therapist after there was a suicide in the family and I was already depressed to begin with (I've only been truly deeply depressed twice in my life, and when I am it's very obvious), but they allowed me to do as much research as I wanted to find one that I would actually be comfortable seeing. The one I finally picked out was awesome. I am actually going through the necessary schooling to become a therapist myself (although I'm not in a clinical ph.d program yet), and most of my personal motivation for seeing a therapist was to see if I could find a template for my own practice. It's hard to explain why, but this guy was literally perfect. In our 3rd session he brought up antidepressants to me and I told him to never bring it up again, and that if he wanted to work with me he'd need to actually "work". I ended up seeing him for over 2 years, and he never once brought it up again and worked through the s**t with me and eventually got me to where I needed to be to proceed with my life.

I've only had good ones. Started with a psychologist, she was good. Now I'm at this centre for Asperger stuff, talked to several people there, they're good too.

I did.

Taken to a child psychologist as a kid. Guy was an idiot who didn't know that to counsel kids, you need to gain their trust. Of course, my parents only cared about my not getting good grades in school. They had no clue about the abuse issues I was dealing with....neither did the therapist.

Maybe if he worked to get my trust, I would have told him about it.

I had one who was very patronizing. She kept saying that she does this too or my brother is that way too, every time I brought a problem. She was an intern. She knew no more about psychology then I. Interns are the worst because they have little or no experience. You can not cross lines when you're getting counseling.
If It don't work, it's better to move on. But make sure that you tell the new therapist what you expect from him or her. And if they don't meet your expectations than maybe you should tell them goodbye.

I agree, I've had therapists in the past that have talked to me like I was a first grader. She was mainly focused on "fixing me for my behavior" instead of helping me learn social skills. Her attitude was pretty much "I will fix that f**kup if he continues to act like this. I am the boss and he does everything I say".

Not all therapists are good, not all therapists are bad, and not all good ones fit you. I've tried sooooooooo many therapists and I've had wonderful ones that just didn't fit my needs at the time. We didn't click. It happens. They all have different styles, methods, backgrounds, etc. that affect how they work with clients. Sometimes it takes forever to find one that fits, but when you do, it's fantastic.