The first therapist I had through BetterHelp was supposed to be helping me through losing my best friend, someone I loved wholeheartedly. Any time I started to cry or break down, she would say "Oh, you're getting emotional. Let's move on to something else." 3 therapists later, I found the right one for me.
The therapist essentially pushing porn on their client needs to have his or her license revoked. He sounds dangerous. Imagine what other ill advice he's giving!
Also a victim of assault and my first therapist made me go through every detail of the assault "until it didn't bug me anymore" it took another 9 years for me to actually start healing from it
Our marriage therapist agreed my husband ‘did a number on me’ (cheating, verbal, emotional and physical abuse) but being ‘faith’ based told me I needed to be willing to be hurt more for ME to heal. Ultimate forgiveness. I’m not Jesus and no longer with that therapist. I’ve now got a trauma and narc informed therapist. Adequate vetting by me would have prevented this but I was unaware at the time what I was dealing with. Keep learning y’all. It really does get better.
Yeah the faith based therapists are shit. I saw one and had that same experience. That yes, my ex was horrible to me, but I should just forgive cause, Jesus.
I haven't even watched this yet, but I want to vent. After the election, I went to my therapist to get some help with my feelings of hopelessness about it. I told her I didn't want to discuss politics--just deal with my emotions and make a plan. She spent the next 40 minutes defending djt and I left feeling worse than before. I never went back.
This happened to me with my psychiatrist. A lot of my loved ones are immigrants and she's an immigrant too and kept saying as long as they're not criminals they'll be fine. She thought she was helping but it sucks to always be told you're overreacting and then the executive orders and Supreme Court rulings come and it turns out you weren't.
@@cobaltpterodactyl I feel like I'm standing in a burning building, but, if I mention that we might want to move to safety, I get dog-piled by dumb people. I have a guy looking for a counselor who isn't too religious or a trumper. Meanwhile, I'm hanging on. I understand and wish only the best for you.
When my loved ones were worried about back when my eating disorder started and encouraged me to bring it up with my therapist at the time. He told me "you know you can't have an eating disorder if you're older than 15 right?" (The doctor in the same team told me "you look better now that you lost weight, when you reach *this* weight, we can worry")
Oh my gosh. I literally told my therapist in my first session with her that I don’t want medications and I wanted to instead work on healthy coping mechanisms for my ptsd. And she said I should consider going on them because my depression test and anxiety test scores high. But the catch is, I was a newly postpartum mom and half the questions are “do you get adequate sleep” do you worry often?” And other questions that are all super normal for new moms to experience.
This happened to me too! And they questions are all SUPER vague and hard to answer anyway and then I’m sleep deprived and haven’t showered in however many days and you want me to just be smiley and normal??? Like no, but also I just need my baby to get older so I can start sleeping and in the meantime can I work on my thoughts and emotions around all of this? Cuz there’s a lot of feelings that I didn’t expect but that doesn’t mean jump strait to meds
My therapist always says "Oh, that's terrible" and "What could be done about this?" and never actually says anything else. It's more like a self-talk I pay for. Anyone else have this experience?
Genuine question: what does your therapist do that you can't do for yourself? My advice would be to look into getting a new & much more engaged therapist, but in the meantime I'm sure you can ask yourself those questions. If they aren't helping then don't waste your energy on those sessions, especially as I'm sure the lack of help is frustrating so going might even put you in a worse place than your were before.
@catT5236 That's a question I ask myself, too. At first I just hoped she was leaving space for me to work out what I could by myself, but at times I'd like some and I need some input. Of course I can look up thousands of tips on the internet but I was hoping for support in areas I don't see or know much about myself. I have only been there a few times and have kind of taken it to be a "designates hour to work on my mental health" but I do work on that at home in many ways anyways, so I don't really get anything out of it. What I hoped to get was an outside, professional opinion and suggestions. Finding someone else has proven very difficult, where I live you usually have to wait for 12-18 months. So, yeah, maybe I'll just take your advice if nothing changes next time; I'll talk to her about the issue. Thanks!
@@lioba628 have you actually brought it up? Maybe say what you just said to me about what you were hoping for & how you feel this isn't fulfilling what you need from these sessions.
One of my anthropology professors worked at a mental health care facility. He noted that there were multiple times in which medication was prescribed because the patients had certain symptoms but there was no interest in the patients as individuals. So there would be conflicts between therapists and people trying to prescribe these medicines. With the case that stuck the most to my memory was when a patient who had symptoms associated with ocd was prescribed medication for the symptoms and told that was all he needed. And this caused conflict because a therapist or someone else said that approach is ignoring all of the things in that person’s life. That person witnessed his family be murdered by an authoritarian government when he was a kid, he spent years in a refugee camp with no family or friends before going to the USA nor knowing a word of English. The problem wasn’t a question of medicine yes or no. It was this person needed care to process everything but all that was offered was the medicine. I don’t doubt that medication can be helpful in certain instances but it can’t be the end all be all of treatment.
In a very long and in many ways unhelpful therapy, my therapist told me, that I / my soul chose my parents and my childhood before I was born. So I never should consider to go no contact. In fact she said that she would not continue treatment, if I considered breaking some bridges connecting me to my family. This could never be healthy, at least in her eyes. She didn't tell me that this is an opinion routed deeply in anthroposophical thinking, despite me telling her before that anthroposophy is not my worldview and that I didn't want that mixed up with my treatment. I came into this therapy because of neglect, emotional and sexual abuse in childhood and actually, quite a lot of this violence was still going on then. So basically she told me, I / my soul wanted or needed to experience all of that and that I had to work it out with my perpetrators. This was only one of many really problematic situations there. I didn't realize then, that this was destructive and one completely subjective opinion of her with no basis in evidence based psychotherapy. I didn't fire her. But I should have done so. I am from Germany, where CBT and Psychodynamic therapy is covered to some extent by health insurance for everybody. As long as the treatment is limited to evidence based technique and interventions and there is a valid diagnosis and matching treatment plan. I trusted my therapist and I trusted the system because I didn't know better and because I was very much in need of help at the time. I thought, what she offered had to be science based and "all right enough", because of health insurance paying for it and her being properly educated, even woking as a supervisor for young therapists in training herself. Her treatment left some demage I am still working on today. When I became a Psychotherapist myself years later, I realised that almost nothing she did in our work together could be labeled a CBT or trauma focused therapy approach. And actually she said again and again, she considered CBT manuals too narrow minded and oversimplified. Yes, maybe. But this doesn't justify to not use anything from the proper technique and call it CBT anyhow. Especially not, when almost no symptom improvement happens over a timespan of years. Therapy can go terribly wrong and I appreciate it very much, that you talk about this topic. Thank you for your work. And sorry for my English, which is rather in need of improvement. If you want to respond to this comment/ this experience, I would appreciate it, but if you consider it not suitable this is, of course, also completely fine.
The concept that a soul chooses the life, the circumstances, the family, etc., may be a helpful narrative for someone -- I find it so myself. However, it's only a story, which may or may not have any validity. I choose to use it as a way to contain my pain and distress, and to help motivate me to keep taking the high road wherever possible. On the other hand, it also makes me feel guilty and hopeless, and includes self-talk that goes, "Well, you deserve to be hated and rejected. You must have been a monster in your past life! You should die horribly (and almost certainly will). At the very least, you should continue to suffer the emotional agony in order to finally learn your lesson." Again, I'm not sure how helpful the construct is for anyone. All that being said, it's appalling and abusive for your therapist to threaten to abandon you should you find that you need to go no-contact for your own safety. I'm not sure from your post where you are now in the process of healing. Hopefully, becoming a (professional?) psychotherapist included ongoing healing of the traumas that you've experienced.
@IsobelleVictoria thank you for sharing this and fo your kindness. The guilt part happened to me too, unfortunately. I hope, you find a solution for yourself in this that is not harmful or produces more emotional stress. I can totally appreciate and accept that these kinds of concepts can be helpful for some people! In my opinion spirituality and spiritual concepts can be enormously resourcful and healing. And they can be part of psychotherapy as well - as long as this is coming from the client! I don't consider it professional for a psychotherapist to implement his or her own spiritual concepts into therapy if this is not a transparent part of their therapeutic concept and / or if the patient didn't ask for spiritual advice, discussing spiritual beliefs etc. I think this should be clearly set apart from for example CBT. And I consider it especially problematic if the client has already mentioned that he or she is not dacor with the offered spiritual concepts. Transparency of what is happening here is highly necessary, I think. When a therapist tells a client something like "no contact is never a healthy solution" in a setting, that is labeled evidence based, it is not possible for the client to know, if this is simply common sense in the therapeutic community - or if this is just the spiritually based belief of the therapist as an individual. At least it was not possible for me. Thank you for asking, I am in a much better place today and on my way into a good life; still working on it and still / again in therapy myself, this time in very supportive, transparent therapeutic relationship. Today I am a clinical psychologist with a Masters degree, I finished my training as a Psychotherapist two years ago and work in ambulant practice with patients, which feels very fulfilling and suitable.
An alarming amount of woo-woo has crept into therapy. When I tell counselors I'm neither religious nor "spiritual" they have no idea what to do with me.
During a session with my therapist, I got really emotional about a bunch of rough stuff happening in my life all at once and mentioned that I've been having passive-suicidal thoughts. They knew that I've been feeling really down many times before but not like that, and having previously discussed that it's only my depression that is keeping me from unlockkng my potential - they started, in a way, shaming me for feeling these passive-suicidal thoughts and almost guildtripped me about it. At the end of the session, they confessed that they might have overstepped, but I wasn't having any of it. So, I quit seeing my therapist and haven't found the courage to seek help again. It's been almost 4 months since I quit Therapy 😢
I'm really sorry your therapist did that. I hope when you're ready to go back, you find someone who fits well with you. ♥ I promise once you click with a therapist, it's magical.
I am asexual. I've been with my husband for 19 years and it's never been an issue in our relationship. A therapist once said I should give my husband an open marriage so he won't be tempted to cheat on me. Another told me that asexuality doesn't really exist and I am probably just afraid to admit I am a lesbian.
Like the therapist who asked me if the problems in our marriage were "about my weight." I was a chonker then, but it was maybe the one thing that WASN'T a problem. She brought it up out of the blue.
When my mom told her therapist that she was ready to forgive her childhood abuser, the therapist told her that the only one who could forgive that person was God. Totally deflated any chance of self-empowerment.
When I was looking for a therapist (I was hurting myself , plus anxiety) the first one was waving away my every problem I was telling him and saying that I was imagining things, and that I just needed to entertain myself with something else, and the problems would disappear by themselves. Man, I've lived with this like 10 years already, entertained myself enough, I need a method, not a wave of an arm.
Unfortunately, if you live in a small town with hardly any therapists, in a country that doesn't really focus on mental health, and mental health costs an arm and a leg, you don't get much to choose from. My first therapist I went to in my last year of high school said I was depressed because I was stressing about finishing school and entering adulthood. Which was part of the problem, yes, but also ignoring the cause of anxiety which stemmed from an unstable childhood. Besides, I had been suffering from depression at that point since I was 15. It wasn't something I developed as I was finishing school. He was very dismissive, basically saying it'll get better once I finish my final exams. It didn't. I tried more after that, but never found the right one. Eventually just stopped trying to find someone to talk to and instead focused on my physical health, my friend group, establishing new hobbies, getting better sleep, etc. It definitely helped. I would still like to try therapy, but having been dismissed by so many (and costing me so much money) has kind of discouraged me. I started reading articles and books about mental health to try to form better habits, and follow youtube channels like this one to give me some perspective on things. We definitely still have a long way to go when it comes to making mental health more accessible and less biased.
8:09 This sounds very similar to my last therapist who was friends with my cousin who died in 2023. I was being abused due to my narcissistic mother's grief and my therapist didn't care all because my dead cousin has kids while this cousin was also an important part of my own support system. I love my cousin and miss her dearly. The therapist chose her side while entrusting her kid to my narcissistic mother and she just told me to "get over it and be positive", "who am I supposed to feel sorry for? These kids or you?" Therefore completely dismissing my situation entirely. I both recognize that I may need to talk to a professional, but I'm also distrusting of therapists after this ordeal.
I was SA by my brother and he ended up going to juvie for it. My therapist at the time thought it would be a good idea to have him call into our session (not sure the reason why) one day. So I had to sit there with my abuser on the phone (without my permission) for an hour being constantly triggered by his presence as a pre-teen.
When I was in treatment for alcoholism, my first therapist started out great and I quickly related to her as she shared her own journey in overcoming alcohol addiction. Then I started noticing inconsistencies. She had claimed she had been sober for 25 years, and then told a story of her own rock bottom in which she had crashed her car and passed out and a passerby had to place her finger on her phone to unlock it to call 911.... 25 years ago finger print unlocking didn't exist. I had to fire her. I'm pretty sure lying to your clients is unethical and definitely decimated any trust I had with her.
I had a therapist once tell me I had nothing to off people. When I told her how I had a date on the weekend. I never went back and was actually afraid to see a therapist again for five years.
I have always used therapists as a safe place to work through what I'm feeling and what I should do about it. I've been in a lot of therapy, and offered some myself when no one else was available. (I have a little bit of training.) That was mostly listening and reflecting what I heard. One of those clients kept saying 'I don't know how to talk to my wife.' So we worked on a few basic skills to talk about his feelings and listen to his wife. Once he'd learned them, he was fine. My point is that therapy is a bit of an art, and it being effective means doing what works for the client to better their life. If we approach things with a limited tool box and closed assumptions about what works, we will do more harm than good.
I don't think what you're doing is right with you offering therapy. If I'm reading this right, it doesn't sound like you have a license, so while the things you learned in your "little bit of training" may be helpful, you still are technically committing a crime, and no matter how close you are with the person, they can sue you and easily win. Don't call it therapy if you don't in fact have your license, just call yourself a friend offering advice. It could protect you from a world of legal trouble
@extrovertedintrovert2900 I didn't call it therapy and I made it clear I wasn't a trained therapist. I called it pastoral work. You're right calling it therapy would have been unethical. Thankfully the laws around that have been tightened up a lot. I should have made that clear in my post.
I need to watch the video a secound time, because first time i didnt listen and be just shocked about the stories in the comments. I am very sorry for all of them and hope they find the help they need.
My first (sadly) longtime therapist directly commented my lifechoices, telling me to not bother changing to a certain job "because its only something stay-at-home housewives do as a side hustle" or shaming me, assuming I dont want to take care of myself when I made the informed conscious choice not to undergo a medical procedure without taking in account that this could be a valid decision. I couldnt see this at the time (bc I was traumatized and used to dynamics like this) and while I do think a patient has the active responsibility to make the most of their therapyprocess, she created a unsafe environment for me to open up. It felt like she decided what was worthy of therapy and I was walking on eggshells around her. She always criticized me for not taking up enough space, for being too passive. But when I brought in topics that really mattered to me, oftentimes she would comment it with sth like "You just gotta do XYZ" "Or you just gotta see it like this". When I came back to those topics she went like "We already talked about this". That left me really confused. There were only a few topics that she accepted that always included something feminist or stuff about my relationships. Like I said, as a patient you are responsible for your therapy and you can be "too passive". But the problem can also be on the therapists side. After I changed therapist I got to understand what it really should feel like, having a beautiful, respectful non-jugdemental patient-therapist-relationship full of trust. He communicated directly with me, I was allowed so too, we even had a few misunderstandings and conflicts we worked through and our relationship just got an even sturdier foundation. Everything that I brought in was allowed to be there, even if it was "odd" or "difficult", he never gave me the feeling I needed to be ashamed. I am really grateful for him. There is the right therapist out there for you ❤
I 'fired' my last therapist this past October. I had mentioned that I get overwhelming anxiety right before sessions - on the verge of panic attacks and she regularly would cancel the day of. At first she was respectful, and gave at least two hours of notice, but then the last time she not only rescheduled my time, 8 minutes before we were to meet, she messaged me to say she's (again) accidentally put me down during the incorrect time. The worst part of all of this is that I don't know if she really was this flaky (if that's true, I'm really unsure how she has clients), OR was she doing it to provoke me into being assertive and standing up for myself? I have no idea because I texted her, "Due to scheduling conflicts I've decided to see someone new. Thanks for your help."
Kudos for you to set and hold a boundary with your therapist's inappropriate and unprofessional behaviour. I hope that you find someone much more capable and respectful of you and your time.
@IsobelleVictoria Thank you so much! Fortunately, I matched with a wonderful therapist who has made it a point to show up on time and assure me that if she were ever to reschedule I would know well in advance. ♥
Just fired my therapist last week. I was in a terrible state, feeling extra crappy and I admit I was really saying bs. But you know, sometimes you just tired fighting, you just need to vent all the crap you’re feeling and telling yourself. Who can you do this with but your therapist ? I didn’t attack her, I wasn’t insulting her but I felt so down, I told her I had too much to work on, too much to accept and didn’t feel up to it. She told me about one of her patients who is facing a degenerative desease, lost his job and his wife and he has to accept all of this. It immidiately sobbered me up, that’s for sure ! But the side effect was that I couldn’t work with her anymore. I already feel illegitimate to whine about my problems, I whine a lot and I’m not proud of it. I don’t need to be reminided that other people have it much worse. I don’t want to feel that my problems much reach a certain point to be worthy of her time.
Glennon Doyle talks about how when she told her therapist she wanted to leave her husband because she fell in love with her now wife, her therapist asked her "What if you just gave your husband blow jobs instead?"
When I was a teenager and was being bullied, the school therapist not only thought that the bullying was to be expected because I had a disability and therefore was an easy target, but also that the solution was to move away from home before the age of eighteen
When I was in the eighth grade, I had to meet with the school therapist a few times. I don't know how we even got on the subject of my crooked teeth. I told him I was going to get braces soon, and he said that after I got my braces off, I might even be pretty (which was a legitimate punch in the gut coming from an adult). *plot twist* I never got braces.
I went to a therapist because I had developed a really bad fear of the dark. Like night lights weren't light enough, I had to have the room's light on to fall asleep. The main reason for this was because I was having a lot of nightmares, where I would wake up and still see the monster of the night now in my room. One of the first things my therapist asked was if I had considered going to the church. I am not religious and did not believe that what I was seeing was real. I was so surprised that she tried to make my fears real. I didn't go back after the first session.
I had a similar experience to the person who was told to watch porn as part of exposure therapy. One of my exposures was to sit alone in a room with a male therapist and watch a fairly realistic SA scene. It looked like security camera footage. I was young and naive and finished out the program, but they never thought to try and assess me for symptoms of prior assault, which I'd blocked out.
Medication is entirely based on the needs of the person, I couldn’t agree more with you. My mother wasn’t sure about me being on meds and I wasn’t either at first but now I’m so glad I paired therapy with the right medication because it’s DRASTICALLY changed my life in the best ways. I’m able to be more intentional and present when I interact with people in a way my chemical brain wouldn’t allow without the meds. And now when I try things my therapist suggests, I can ACTUALLY implement them. I’m ADHD and can finally use a planner BECAUSE of my meds, because I have a stimulant helping me get to a good starting point to be productive. And that approach doesn’t work for EVERYONE. And that’s okay. ☺️
Not bad advice but I once had a therapist who obviously never listened to me. For example, I once shared something terrible and traumatic they just smiled and nodded and said, "That's good" in a very absent, conversational tone. I had three sessions with him and never went back.
I had a psychiatrist in a acute psych ward who I had seen in the past admissions at least six times by this point, tell me I “need to stop sinning” I have a Christian background and so did this psychiatrist, but it was said with conviction, but absolutely no emotional connection with me. He also overdiagnosed BPD to a lot of people who I kept up with Long after the hospitalization, who sure as hell didn’t have BPD (including me) (You shouldn’t diagnose personality disorders or anything axis 2 related unless you’ve seen a client consistently for over 2 months in my completely not professional opinion)
I have social anxiety and anxiety disorders, and I feel lile my therapists don't know how to help me. One keep pushing me to expose myself but I always ending quitting because I feel too much insecurity. She thinks I should take some meds but I'm not sure about it, I've had a bad experince once and, for now, I don't want it. Another told me to try playing a role at social gatherings but that feels off to me. Is it not dodging the problem? How being someone else will help me deeling with my emotions? I want to be reel and to feel safe. So I'm confused, I don't know what to do. I'm trying another therapist today, but I'm really losing hope🤞 (I'm french so forgive me if there is any mistakes 😊) Great video btw ☺️
70-80% of people have an insecure attachment. That makes for a lot of incompetent therapists (excluding those who have done the work and migrated to secure attachment)
I had a therapist that told me that I belong in prison because I have bipolar and had a huge mental breakdown (I'm not a violent person) she told me that I'm acting like an animal and I belong in a cage, like a dog.
Jono, do you have any content on how to deal with therapists who cross boundaries so severely that they lose their license? This happened to me and ever since then I can’t go to therapy even though I know I need it. The trust is just not there anymore.
Skye, Thank you for your question. We do not have any content regarding that specific situation currently, but there are a few videos within this series that may provide some insight for you. I am sorry to hear you had that experience, though. It had to be difficult to have that trust broken with your therapist. Do you have any trusted people you are able to share your experiences with?
@ There is a small handful of people who know about it, and they can offer sympathy but it remains a difficult situation for me to process even though it’s been a couple of years since it happened. I will check out the other videos in this series. Thank you for your response!
Hey there, Skye. I know I'm not Jono and I really don't want to hijack your comment either. I'm also not a therapist, but I just wanted to say I am so, so sorry you were harmed by that therapist. Nothing that happened was your fault. It completely makes sense that your trust has been broken, and it's totally understandable that you can't go to therapy after what happened. For the record, I am glad that the therapist(s) who harmed you lost their license. I too was harmed and abused by a therapist I deeply trusted, and as a result I now have Complex PTSD from the abuse he caused me. After the trauma I went through, I had sworn off therapy forever. I just couldn't do it, so in many ways I relate to that fear you expressed. And I want you to know your fear makes sense. Your boundaries were violated and your trust was broken in what should have been a safe space. It makes sense you don't feel like you can go to therapy again. And honestly, I don't blame you. I've been there. It can feel so paralyzing to consider going to therapy again, even when we know it might be beneficial. Terrifying, even. I just want to acknowledge how real, and how scary it feels to be in this boat. There is so much more I could say, as I've walked a similar path. But I've already written a novel, lol. I just wanted to let you know that you're not alone, as a fellow survivor. And that I see your bravery to even consider going to therapy again. That takes so much courage, and I hope you are able to find healing in a way that feels safe for you, whatever that looks like. You deserve it.
As an autistic person, I strongly disagree about dissociation. Yes, I try my best to plan my life in a way, using tools and all that, that I can cope to some degree. But I'm forced to live in a reality my brain is not equipped for. Dissociation is the reason I'm still here, and I will never again let a therapist make me feel bad about it. For me, that's good neurotypical advice, but I'm not🤷🏻♀️
The first therapist I had through BetterHelp was supposed to be helping me through losing my best friend, someone I loved wholeheartedly. Any time I started to cry or break down, she would say "Oh, you're getting emotional. Let's move on to something else."
3 therapists later, I found the right one for me.
I actually screamed when you said a THERAPIST recommended p*rn. Especially for Complex PTSD from sexual assault. That’s INSANE!
I second the encouragement to shop around for therapists! It's a difficult process, but it's magic when you find the therapist that works for you 💙.
The therapist essentially pushing porn on their client needs to have his or her license revoked. He sounds dangerous. Imagine what other ill advice he's giving!
Also a victim of assault and my first therapist made me go through every detail of the assault "until it didn't bug me anymore" it took another 9 years for me to actually start healing from it
Our marriage therapist agreed my husband ‘did a number on me’ (cheating, verbal, emotional and physical abuse) but being ‘faith’ based told me I needed to be willing to be hurt more for ME to heal. Ultimate forgiveness. I’m not Jesus and no longer with that therapist. I’ve now got a trauma and narc informed therapist. Adequate vetting by me would have prevented this but I was unaware at the time what I was dealing with. Keep learning y’all. It really does get better.
Yeah the faith based therapists are shit. I saw one and had that same experience. That yes, my ex was horrible to me, but I should just forgive cause, Jesus.
I haven't even watched this yet, but I want to vent. After the election, I went to my therapist to get some help with my feelings of hopelessness about it. I told her I didn't want to discuss politics--just deal with my emotions and make a plan. She spent the next 40 minutes defending djt and I left feeling worse than before. I never went back.
This happened to me with my psychiatrist. A lot of my loved ones are immigrants and she's an immigrant too and kept saying as long as they're not criminals they'll be fine. She thought she was helping but it sucks to always be told you're overreacting and then the executive orders and Supreme Court rulings come and it turns out you weren't.
@@cobaltpterodactyl I feel like I'm standing in a burning building, but, if I mention that we might want to move to safety, I get dog-piled by dumb people. I have a guy looking for a counselor who isn't too religious or a trumper. Meanwhile, I'm hanging on. I understand and wish only the best for you.
When my loved ones were worried about back when my eating disorder started and encouraged me to bring it up with my therapist at the time. He told me "you know you can't have an eating disorder if you're older than 15 right?" (The doctor in the same team told me "you look better now that you lost weight, when you reach *this* weight, we can worry")
Wow. That is heartbreaking. I'm sorry.
OMG the client whose therapist was related to her STALKER is quite the awful story! Wow, what a sad coincidence.
Oh my gosh. I literally told my therapist in my first session with her that I don’t want medications and I wanted to instead work on healthy coping mechanisms for my ptsd.
And she said I should consider going on them because my depression test and anxiety test scores high.
But the catch is, I was a newly postpartum mom and half the questions are “do you get adequate sleep” do you worry often?” And other questions that are all super normal for new moms to experience.
This happened to me too! And they questions are all SUPER vague and hard to answer anyway and then I’m sleep deprived and haven’t showered in however many days and you want me to just be smiley and normal??? Like no, but also I just need my baby to get older so I can start sleeping and in the meantime can I work on my thoughts and emotions around all of this? Cuz there’s a lot of feelings that I didn’t expect but that doesn’t mean jump strait to meds
Yes have to be careful about getting help from mental health when dealing with postpartum I learned that the hard way unfortunately
My therapist always says "Oh, that's terrible" and "What could be done about this?" and never actually says anything else. It's more like a self-talk I pay for. Anyone else have this experience?
Genuine question: what does your therapist do that you can't do for yourself? My advice would be to look into getting a new & much more engaged therapist, but in the meantime I'm sure you can ask yourself those questions. If they aren't helping then don't waste your energy on those sessions, especially as I'm sure the lack of help is frustrating so going might even put you in a worse place than your were before.
@catT5236 That's a question I ask myself, too. At first I just hoped she was leaving space for me to work out what I could by myself, but at times I'd like some and I need some input. Of course I can look up thousands of tips on the internet but I was hoping for support in areas I don't see or know much about myself. I have only been there a few times and have kind of taken it to be a "designates hour to work on my mental health" but I do work on that at home in many ways anyways, so I don't really get anything out of it. What I hoped to get was an outside, professional opinion and suggestions. Finding someone else has proven very difficult, where I live you usually have to wait for 12-18 months.
So, yeah, maybe I'll just take your advice if nothing changes next time; I'll talk to her about the issue. Thanks!
@@lioba628 have you actually brought it up? Maybe say what you just said to me about what you were hoping for & how you feel this isn't fulfilling what you need from these sessions.
@@catT5236Not yet, will do so in my next session, which is only next month...
One of my anthropology professors worked at a mental health care facility. He noted that there were multiple times in which medication was prescribed because the patients had certain symptoms but there was no interest in the patients as individuals. So there would be conflicts between therapists and people trying to prescribe these medicines. With the case that stuck the most to my memory was when a patient who had symptoms associated with ocd was prescribed medication for the symptoms and told that was all he needed. And this caused conflict because a therapist or someone else said that approach is ignoring all of the things in that person’s life. That person witnessed his family be murdered by an authoritarian government when he was a kid, he spent years in a refugee camp with no family or friends before going to the USA nor knowing a word of English. The problem wasn’t a question of medicine yes or no. It was this person needed care to process everything but all that was offered was the medicine. I don’t doubt that medication can be helpful in certain instances but it can’t be the end all be all of treatment.
Even for OCD by itself, the guidelines don't say that medication is all you need. Wtf was that psychiatrist smoking?
In a very long and in many ways unhelpful therapy, my therapist told me, that I / my soul chose my parents and my childhood before I was born. So I never should consider to go no contact. In fact she said that she would not continue treatment, if I considered breaking some bridges connecting me to my family. This could never be healthy, at least in her eyes. She didn't tell me that this is an opinion routed deeply in anthroposophical thinking, despite me telling her before that anthroposophy is not my worldview and that I didn't want that mixed up with my treatment. I came into this therapy because of neglect, emotional and sexual abuse in childhood and actually, quite a lot of this violence was still going on then. So basically she told me, I / my soul wanted or needed to experience all of that and that I had to work it out with my perpetrators. This was only one of many really problematic situations there.
I didn't realize then, that this was destructive and one completely subjective opinion of her with no basis in evidence based psychotherapy. I didn't fire her. But I should have done so. I am from Germany, where CBT and Psychodynamic therapy is covered to some extent by health insurance for everybody. As long as the treatment is limited to evidence based technique and interventions and there is a valid diagnosis and matching treatment plan. I trusted my therapist and I trusted the system because I didn't know better and because I was very much in need of help at the time. I thought, what she offered had to be science based and "all right enough", because of health insurance paying for it and her being properly educated, even woking as a supervisor for young therapists in training herself. Her treatment left some demage I am still working on today. When I became a Psychotherapist myself years later, I realised that almost nothing she did in our work together could be labeled a CBT or trauma focused therapy approach. And actually she said again and again, she considered CBT manuals too narrow minded and oversimplified. Yes, maybe. But this doesn't justify to not use anything from the proper technique and call it CBT anyhow. Especially not, when almost no symptom improvement happens over a timespan of years.
Therapy can go terribly wrong and I appreciate it very much, that you talk about this topic. Thank you for your work. And sorry for my English, which is rather in need of improvement. If you want to respond to this comment/ this experience, I would appreciate it, but if you consider it not suitable this is, of course, also completely fine.
The concept that a soul chooses the life, the circumstances, the family, etc., may be a helpful narrative for someone -- I find it so myself. However, it's only a story, which may or may not have any validity. I choose to use it as a way to contain my pain and distress, and to help motivate me to keep taking the high road wherever possible. On the other hand, it also makes me feel guilty and hopeless, and includes self-talk that goes, "Well, you deserve to be hated and rejected. You must have been a monster in your past life! You should die horribly (and almost certainly will). At the very least, you should continue to suffer the emotional agony in order to finally learn your lesson."
Again, I'm not sure how helpful the construct is for anyone. All that being said, it's appalling and abusive for your therapist to threaten to abandon you should you find that you need to go no-contact for your own safety. I'm not sure from your post where you are now in the process of healing. Hopefully, becoming a (professional?) psychotherapist included ongoing healing of the traumas that you've experienced.
@IsobelleVictoria thank you for sharing this and fo your kindness. The guilt part happened to me too, unfortunately. I hope, you find a solution for yourself in this that is not harmful or produces more emotional stress. I can totally appreciate and accept that these kinds of concepts can be helpful for some people! In my opinion spirituality and spiritual concepts can be enormously resourcful and healing. And they can be part of psychotherapy as well - as long as this is coming from the client! I don't consider it professional for a psychotherapist to implement his or her own spiritual concepts into therapy if this is not a transparent part of their therapeutic concept and / or if the patient didn't ask for spiritual advice, discussing spiritual beliefs etc. I think this should be clearly set apart from for example CBT. And I consider it especially problematic if the client has already mentioned that he or she is not dacor with the offered spiritual concepts. Transparency of what is happening here is highly necessary, I think. When a therapist tells a client something like "no contact is never a healthy solution" in a setting, that is labeled evidence based, it is not possible for the client to know, if this is simply common sense in the therapeutic community - or if this is just the spiritually based belief of the therapist as an individual. At least it was not possible for me.
Thank you for asking, I am in a much better place today and on my way into a good life; still working on it and still / again in therapy myself, this time in very supportive, transparent therapeutic relationship. Today I am a clinical psychologist with a Masters degree, I finished my training as a Psychotherapist two years ago and work in ambulant practice with patients, which feels very fulfilling and suitable.
An alarming amount of woo-woo has crept into therapy. When I tell counselors I'm neither religious nor "spiritual" they have no idea what to do with me.
During a session with my therapist, I got really emotional about a bunch of rough stuff happening in my life all at once and mentioned that I've been having passive-suicidal thoughts. They knew that I've been feeling really down many times before but not like that, and having previously discussed that it's only my depression that is keeping me from unlockkng my potential - they started, in a way, shaming me for feeling these passive-suicidal thoughts and almost guildtripped me about it. At the end of the session, they confessed that they might have overstepped, but I wasn't having any of it. So, I quit seeing my therapist and haven't found the courage to seek help again. It's been almost 4 months since I quit Therapy 😢
I'm really sorry your therapist did that. I hope when you're ready to go back, you find someone who fits well with you. ♥ I promise once you click with a therapist, it's magical.
You deserve better! When you're ready, you'll find a good fit. 🙏💜
It is so helpful to listen to huge red flags in therapy for those who is now considering starting therapy
I am asexual. I've been with my husband for 19 years and it's never been an issue in our relationship. A therapist once said I should give my husband an open marriage so he won't be tempted to cheat on me. Another told me that asexuality doesn't really exist and I am probably just afraid to admit I am a lesbian.
Like the therapist who asked me if the problems in our marriage were "about my weight." I was a chonker then, but it was maybe the one thing that WASN'T a problem. She brought it up out of the blue.
@@pixel9548 That's so horrible. I'm sorry she said that to you.
WHAT
When my mom told her therapist that she was ready to forgive her childhood abuser, the therapist told her that the only one who could forgive that person was God. Totally deflated any chance of self-empowerment.
When I was looking for a therapist (I was hurting myself , plus anxiety) the first one was waving away my every problem I was telling him and saying that I was imagining things, and that I just needed to entertain myself with something else, and the problems would disappear by themselves. Man, I've lived with this like 10 years already, entertained myself enough, I need a method, not a wave of an arm.
Unfortunately, if you live in a small town with hardly any therapists, in a country that doesn't really focus on mental health, and mental health costs an arm and a leg, you don't get much to choose from.
My first therapist I went to in my last year of high school said I was depressed because I was stressing about finishing school and entering adulthood. Which was part of the problem, yes, but also ignoring the cause of anxiety which stemmed from an unstable childhood.
Besides, I had been suffering from depression at that point since I was 15. It wasn't something I developed as I was finishing school. He was very dismissive, basically saying it'll get better once I finish my final exams. It didn't.
I tried more after that, but never found the right one. Eventually just stopped trying to find someone to talk to and instead focused on my physical health, my friend group, establishing new hobbies, getting better sleep, etc.
It definitely helped. I would still like to try therapy, but having been dismissed by so many (and costing me so much money) has kind of discouraged me. I started reading articles and books about mental health to try to form better habits, and follow youtube channels like this one to give me some perspective on things.
We definitely still have a long way to go when it comes to making mental health more accessible and less biased.
8:09 This sounds very similar to my last therapist who was friends with my cousin who died in 2023. I was being abused due to my narcissistic mother's grief and my therapist didn't care all because my dead cousin has kids while this cousin was also an important part of my own support system. I love my cousin and miss her dearly. The therapist chose her side while entrusting her kid to my narcissistic mother and she just told me to "get over it and be positive", "who am I supposed to feel sorry for? These kids or you?" Therefore completely dismissing my situation entirely. I both recognize that I may need to talk to a professional, but I'm also distrusting of therapists after this ordeal.
I was SA by my brother and he ended up going to juvie for it. My therapist at the time thought it would be a good idea to have him call into our session (not sure the reason why) one day. So I had to sit there with my abuser on the phone (without my permission) for an hour being constantly triggered by his presence as a pre-teen.
That is awful, I am so sorry this therapist put you through that. You didn't deserve that, and I hope you are able to find healing.
When I was in treatment for alcoholism, my first therapist started out great and I quickly related to her as she shared her own journey in overcoming alcohol addiction. Then I started noticing inconsistencies. She had claimed she had been sober for 25 years, and then told a story of her own rock bottom in which she had crashed her car and passed out and a passerby had to place her finger on her phone to unlock it to call 911.... 25 years ago finger print unlocking didn't exist. I had to fire her. I'm pretty sure lying to your clients is unethical and definitely decimated any trust I had with her.
I had a therapist once tell me I had nothing to off people. When I told her how I had a date on the weekend. I never went back and was actually afraid to see a therapist again for five years.
I have always used therapists as a safe place to work through what I'm feeling and what I should do about it. I've been in a lot of therapy, and offered some myself when no one else was available. (I have a little bit of training.) That was mostly listening and reflecting what I heard. One of those clients kept saying 'I don't know how to talk to my wife.' So we worked on a few basic skills to talk about his feelings and listen to his wife. Once he'd learned them, he was fine.
My point is that therapy is a bit of an art, and it being effective means doing what works for the client to better their life. If we approach things with a limited tool box and closed assumptions about what works, we will do more harm than good.
I don't think what you're doing is right with you offering therapy. If I'm reading this right, it doesn't sound like you have a license, so while the things you learned in your "little bit of training" may be helpful, you still are technically committing a crime, and no matter how close you are with the person, they can sue you and easily win. Don't call it therapy if you don't in fact have your license, just call yourself a friend offering advice. It could protect you from a world of legal trouble
@extrovertedintrovert2900 I didn't call it therapy and I made it clear I wasn't a trained therapist. I called it pastoral work. You're right calling it therapy would have been unethical. Thankfully the laws around that have been tightened up a lot. I should have made that clear in my post.
I need to watch the video a secound time, because first time i didnt listen and be just shocked about the stories in the comments. I am very sorry for all of them and hope they find the help they need.
My first (sadly) longtime therapist directly commented my lifechoices, telling me to not bother changing to a certain job "because its only something stay-at-home housewives do as a side hustle" or shaming me, assuming I dont want to take care of myself when I made the informed conscious choice not to undergo a medical procedure without taking in account that this could be a valid decision. I couldnt see this at the time (bc I was traumatized and used to dynamics like this) and while I do think a patient has the active responsibility to make the most of their therapyprocess, she created a unsafe environment for me to open up. It felt like she decided what was worthy of therapy and I was walking on eggshells around her. She always criticized me for not taking up enough space, for being too passive. But when I brought in topics that really mattered to me, oftentimes she would comment it with sth like "You just gotta do XYZ" "Or you just gotta see it like this". When I came back to those topics she went like "We already talked about this". That left me really confused. There were only a few topics that she accepted that always included something feminist or stuff about my relationships.
Like I said, as a patient you are responsible for your therapy and you can be "too passive". But the problem can also be on the therapists side. After I changed therapist I got to understand what it really should feel like, having a beautiful, respectful non-jugdemental patient-therapist-relationship full of trust. He communicated directly with me, I was allowed so too, we even had a few misunderstandings and conflicts we worked through and our relationship just got an even sturdier foundation. Everything that I brought in was allowed to be there, even if it was "odd" or "difficult", he never gave me the feeling I needed to be ashamed. I am really grateful for him.
There is the right therapist out there for you ❤
I 'fired' my last therapist this past October. I had mentioned that I get overwhelming anxiety right before sessions - on the verge of panic attacks and she regularly would cancel the day of. At first she was respectful, and gave at least two hours of notice, but then the last time she not only rescheduled my time, 8 minutes before we were to meet, she messaged me to say she's (again) accidentally put me down during the incorrect time. The worst part of all of this is that I don't know if she really was this flaky (if that's true, I'm really unsure how she has clients), OR was she doing it to provoke me into being assertive and standing up for myself? I have no idea because I texted her, "Due to scheduling conflicts I've decided to see someone new. Thanks for your help."
Kudos for you to set and hold a boundary with your therapist's inappropriate and unprofessional behaviour. I hope that you find someone much more capable and respectful of you and your time.
@IsobelleVictoria Thank you so much! Fortunately, I matched with a wonderful therapist who has made it a point to show up on time and assure me that if she were ever to reschedule I would know well in advance. ♥
Is there already a video about exposure therapy? That sounds like an interesting topic to touch upon.
Got retraumatized because of it
Just fired my therapist last week. I was in a terrible state, feeling extra crappy and I admit I was really saying bs. But you know, sometimes you just tired fighting, you just need to vent all the crap you’re feeling and telling yourself. Who can you do this with but your therapist ? I didn’t attack her, I wasn’t insulting her but I felt so down, I told her I had too much to work on, too much to accept and didn’t feel up to it. She told me about one of her patients who is facing a degenerative desease, lost his job and his wife and he has to accept all of this. It immidiately sobbered me up, that’s for sure ! But the side effect was that I couldn’t work with her anymore. I already feel illegitimate to whine about my problems, I whine a lot and I’m not proud of it. I don’t need to be reminided that other people have it much worse. I don’t want to feel that my problems much reach a certain point to be worthy of her time.
Glennon Doyle talks about how when she told her therapist she wanted to leave her husband because she fell in love with her now wife, her therapist asked her "What if you just gave your husband blow jobs instead?"
5:38 what the actual
When I was a teenager and was being bullied, the school therapist not only thought that the bullying was to be expected because I had a disability and therefore was an easy target, but also that the solution was to move away from home before the age of eighteen
I’ve missed this format. Thanks for your insights.
When I was in the eighth grade, I had to meet with the school therapist a few times. I don't know how we even got on the subject of my crooked teeth. I told him I was going to get braces soon, and he said that after I got my braces off, I might even be pretty (which was a legitimate punch in the gut coming from an adult).
*plot twist* I never got braces.
I went to a therapist because I had developed a really bad fear of the dark. Like night lights weren't light enough, I had to have the room's light on to fall asleep. The main reason for this was because I was having a lot of nightmares, where I would wake up and still see the monster of the night now in my room.
One of the first things my therapist asked was if I had considered going to the church. I am not religious and did not believe that what I was seeing was real. I was so surprised that she tried to make my fears real. I didn't go back after the first session.
Best video ever. Best I've seen in a while.
I had a similar experience to the person who was told to watch porn as part of exposure therapy. One of my exposures was to sit alone in a room with a male therapist and watch a fairly realistic SA scene. It looked like security camera footage. I was young and naive and finished out the program, but they never thought to try and assess me for symptoms of prior assault, which I'd blocked out.
Medication is entirely based on the needs of the person, I couldn’t agree more with you. My mother wasn’t sure about me being on meds and I wasn’t either at first but now I’m so glad I paired therapy with the right medication because it’s DRASTICALLY changed my life in the best ways. I’m able to be more intentional and present when I interact with people in a way my chemical brain wouldn’t allow without the meds. And now when I try things my therapist suggests, I can ACTUALLY implement them. I’m ADHD and can finally use a planner BECAUSE of my meds, because I have a stimulant helping me get to a good starting point to be productive.
And that approach doesn’t work for EVERYONE. And that’s okay. ☺️
Great episode.
My first therapist was also my brother’s therapist and she kept comparing us and telling me things that he said in sessions I left after 3 sessions
"No pun intended"😂😂😂
Not bad advice but I once had a therapist who obviously never listened to me. For example, I once shared something terrible and traumatic they just smiled and nodded and said, "That's good" in a very absent, conversational tone. I had three sessions with him and never went back.
I had a psychiatrist in a acute psych ward who I had seen in the past admissions at least six times by this point, tell me I “need to stop sinning” I have a Christian background and so did this psychiatrist, but it was said with conviction, but absolutely no emotional connection with me. He also overdiagnosed BPD to a lot of people who I kept up with Long after the hospitalization, who sure as hell didn’t have BPD (including me)
(You shouldn’t diagnose personality disorders or anything axis 2 related unless you’ve seen a client consistently for over 2 months in my completely not professional opinion)
Also it was also at a university hospital not a private practice or a Christian practice
I have social anxiety and anxiety disorders, and I feel lile my therapists don't know how to help me. One keep pushing me to expose myself but I always ending quitting because I feel too much insecurity. She thinks I should take some meds but I'm not sure about it, I've had a bad experince once and, for now, I don't want it. Another told me to try playing a role at social gatherings but that feels off to me. Is it not dodging the problem? How being someone else will help me deeling with my emotions? I want to be reel and to feel safe. So I'm confused, I don't know what to do. I'm trying another therapist today, but I'm really losing hope🤞
(I'm french so forgive me if there is any mistakes 😊)
Great video btw ☺️
70-80% of people have an insecure attachment. That makes for a lot of incompetent therapists (excluding those who have done the work and migrated to secure attachment)
I had a therapist that told me that I belong in prison because I have bipolar and had a huge mental breakdown (I'm not a violent person) she told me that I'm acting like an animal and I belong in a cage, like a dog.
I have the bipolar where mania is lower scale for 1 day
Well that's terrible! I'm so sorry.
Jono, do you have any content on how to deal with therapists who cross boundaries so severely that they lose their license? This happened to me and ever since then I can’t go to therapy even though I know I need it. The trust is just not there anymore.
Skye, Thank you for your question. We do not have any content regarding that specific situation currently, but there are a few videos within this series that may provide some insight for you. I am sorry to hear you had that experience, though. It had to be difficult to have that trust broken with your therapist. Do you have any trusted people you are able to share your experiences with?
@ There is a small handful of people who know about it, and they can offer sympathy but it remains a difficult situation for me to process even though it’s been a couple of years since it happened. I will check out the other videos in this series. Thank you for your response!
Hey there, Skye. I know I'm not Jono and I really don't want to hijack your comment either. I'm also not a therapist, but I just wanted to say I am so, so sorry you were harmed by that therapist. Nothing that happened was your fault. It completely makes sense that your trust has been broken, and it's totally understandable that you can't go to therapy after what happened. For the record, I am glad that the therapist(s) who harmed you lost their license.
I too was harmed and abused by a therapist I deeply trusted, and as a result I now have Complex PTSD from the abuse he caused me. After the trauma I went through, I had sworn off therapy forever. I just couldn't do it, so in many ways I relate to that fear you expressed. And I want you to know your fear makes sense. Your boundaries were violated and your trust was broken in what should have been a safe space. It makes sense you don't feel like you can go to therapy again. And honestly, I don't blame you. I've been there.
It can feel so paralyzing to consider going to therapy again, even when we know it might be beneficial. Terrifying, even. I just want to acknowledge how real, and how scary it feels to be in this boat.
There is so much more I could say, as I've walked a similar path. But I've already written a novel, lol. I just wanted to let you know that you're not alone, as a fellow survivor. And that I see your bravery to even consider going to therapy again. That takes so much courage, and I hope you are able to find healing in a way that feels safe for you, whatever that looks like. You deserve it.
As an autistic person, I strongly disagree about dissociation. Yes, I try my best to plan my life in a way, using tools and all that, that I can cope to some degree. But I'm forced to live in a reality my brain is not equipped for. Dissociation is the reason I'm still here, and I will never again let a therapist make me feel bad about it. For me, that's good neurotypical advice, but I'm not🤷🏻♀️