I made my therapist cry - feel a bit guilty?

[feelabitguilty]

I was talking to her/explaining an event in my childhood and I could tell she was quite emotional/tearful by what I’d said . I feel a bit bad now ... what I had told her was upsetting but I already knew those things - to me it’s like writing a story about a fictional character - and so it doesn’t tend to bother me in the same way although perhaps they should . I can see that others would be upset by it .

I remember I had similar experiences when I worked directly with clients/patients that sometimes a story or a particular person would stick with you and I did feel tearful at times - and did express that to a couple of patients ... I think it’s a very healthy thing and an important part of showing empathy when it’s well judged . So I’m not sure why I feel a bit wobbly when the shoe is on the other foot; so to speak!

I haven’t done anything awful by bringing her to tears have I? She’s a lovely kind, gentle person .

It does make me realise that actually my feelings are right and OK (in terms of feeling trauma) - I remember similar when my
GP disclosed to me years ago when I told her I was scared of something, and she said she was also a bit nervous - it made me feel a bit better, that I wasn’t being stupid or silly (I was much younger in that example) .

Just wondering if anyone else has similar experience - from either side - this is OK isn’t it?

Even if for you specifically, you get off on making people cry.

What the actual fuck? You don’t know me, don’t know my history, don’t know the context of my therapy, or the issues I needed support with. A client who finds an emotional response from a therapist isn’t “getting off on making someone cry”. You may have a discomfort with tears, and that’s ok but to extrapolate that to a whole country, and to attack me for challenging you on that is wholly disproportionate.

I make everyone cry. I'm famous for it. They love it really.

@Jellycatspyjamas

As soon as we become emotional to that extent we move the focus onto ourselves.

I think it depends, it’s possible to have an emotion response without being overcome by it, and to be tearful without being overwhelmed. Different ways of working are based on different understandings of how people heal and recover and different therapists will offer different kinds of support.

In terms of trauma research shows people need to be able to process events cognitively and emotionally which can be very hard when the client for many reasons can’t access or express emotion. An open, empathic therapist who can model an emotional response can, as previous posters have said, really help in enabling them to touch their own emotions.

For some clients that can feel like an overstepping, for others it can be hugely facilitative. There’s a lot of debate and research in this area, with no right or wrong, just what works for the client.

Exactly this.

Those people who are saying 'change therapist' and 'she's making it all about her' are talking only from their own perspective and not from the OP's. It sounds like she felt validated but just a bit concerned she upset her therapist. It's exactly the kind of thing you should bring into therapy, and it will deepen the work.

OP I'm almost certain she will say that she empathised with you, feeling some of the emotion that you couldn't access but you don't need to protect her as she is not overwhelmed and can contain and process it herself.

Not all therapists work the same way. Not all clients want the same kind of therapist. I would not want to see a therapist who doesn't show their emotions because it helps me to feel okay about my own and trust that I can learn to contain and manage them, like she can contain hers. Other people clearly don't find that helpful but that means there should be a choice of therapists, not that we should make all therapists practise identically.

Chill, Jelly, it was light-hearted.

We're not talking about slightly glisteny eyes here, are we? What OP said was that the therapist cried, and was noticeably tearful and emotional.

"Even if for you specifically, you get off on making people cry."

WTF?

@FrankensteinIsTheMonster

Jelly, stereotypes are often based on a reality. The reality in this situation is that in mainstream British culture, it's considered polite to hold back your tears in most contexts. Therefore, allowing the tears to flow communicates something that the same action wouldn't communicate in a culture where conventions around crying are different.

Unless the therapist knows the individual client well enough to know that the client would benefit from the therapist acting outside the dominant cultural norms that the relationship operates within, then yeah, I think the therapist crying in session is inappropriate and potentially harmful. Even if for you specifically, you get off on making people cry.

Your response to Jelly was completely uncalled for and your opinions about British people crying are, frankly, bizarre. Your way is not the only way.

I only really made meaningful progress in therapy when I finally found a therapist who got tearful on a couple of occasions when I was talking through difficult stuff. I eventually reached a point where we both said I didn't need to go any more. I 'healed' more in 12 months with that one therapist than I had done in 4 years of frustrating attempts with others who followed models that just did not work for me.
The cold and distant therapists I saw previously were just a repeat of the cold and distant childhood I was trying to process.

Some of the posts on here seeming to condemn therapists having an emotional response to clients feel like they have utter disregard for clients like me who actually value this approach.
Therapy is such an individual process and we don't all want the clincial, detached approach.
@Jellycatspyjamas your contributions to this post seem to be the most understanding of both sides of the coin.

We're not talking about slightly glisteny eyes here, are we? What OP said was that the therapist cried, and was noticeably tearful and emotional.

The OP says her therapist looked tearful (if you read her subsequent posts) and that she found it helped her access her own emotion out of session. She wasn’t crying/sobbing and the OP didn’t think it was excessive.

Chill, Jelly, it was light-hearted.

More like you realised how utterly crass a comment it was. Or maybe we have very different views of “lighthearted”.

Your response to Jelly was completely uncalled for and your opinions about British people crying are, frankly, bizarre. Your way is not the only way

I agree Frenchie. Plus the uber-patronising instruction to 'chill'.

I have had a lot of therapy. The therapist I worked with for 3-4 years occasionally cried with me. And it was not an issue for me. She never once made it about her. It was always empathy for me as her client.

The therapists I did have a problem with made the sessions all about them. They sure as hell never cried with me. But they never truly ‘saw’ me and thus I was never truly validated by them. Whereas the therapist, who occasionally cried with me held a very safe space for me and we did amazing work together.

As others have said, it is very important that you discuss your feelings with her in the next session. Her feelings and emotions are not your concern. The fact that you have shown concern for your therapist even when sharing a very distressing experience shows that you aren’t currently fully focused on you and your needs. This is something to be acknowledged and worked together.

I so don’t agree with others that the therapist did anything wrong. If anything, you’ve had an emotional breakthrough: You went home and cried. And you can go and talk about the reasons why you’re still focusing on others needs even during a therapy session, which is all about you.

I've had a shitload of therapy. The important thing for me is knowing that i can say anything to one of my therapists, and they can respond in a helpful way to reframe my thinking and help me to get my emotion and disordered thinking out. If any of them have ever felt emotional they've done a very good job of hiding it and I'm glad. I'm a fixer and a people pleaser. One of the main traits of my mh is that i try not to upset people to my own detriment. If i saw my therapist cry over something id said, id get overwhelmed and think if someone with 20 years experience cries what i said then it must be really bad. I would spiral, and i would be really worried id affected them.

Just like the op is. You should never leave a therapy session wondering if you've affected your therapist in that way and wondering if you need to try and fix things next session. Empathy yes, definitely. Emotion no.

OP you did nothing wrong at all. There isn’t a right or wrong answer to what to do next except maybe if you want to continue explaining how you feel to the therapist. .

I have had therapy and counselling. I found emotion from one therapist very hard because it was not in response to me but about how it was very difficult understanding the new computers at work. (Was nhs I contacted the service who were happy to arrange a different person). However some controlled emotion has been helpful in other therapy.

My concern would not just be expressing emotion.

I’d be more concerned that the therapist did not realise that being tearful might worry, upset or trigger a client (or help them) and address that at the end of the session explaining that she has her own support and that you should feel safe to tell her anything, but if you reflect and want to discuss can do at start of next session. Also reiterated how to get support between sessions, or if you wanted a new therapist that would be fine and she would not be offended.

My therapist has occasionally teared up but never actually cried. Every now and again he will jump in to defend me from myself if he thinks I am being too harsh or shouldering too much of the blame for something and had a bit of an outburst once where he left me in no doubt that he cares a lot but generally doesn't express much emotionally.

The blank slate thing doesn't really work that well on me. I'm too exhausted to project much of anything. It's those rare moments when he forgets that he is supposed to be impartial that actually break through to me and make an impact.

If to you what happened is like something in someone else’s story, doesn’t her reaction show you your own hidden feelings about the event ( in a transferred form)?

@callmemaybee

I used to work in (NHS) mental health clinical services and think the therapist should refer you to one of her colleagues. It’s not great for either of you if eg you trigger her, or if she gets too emotionally attached. You didn’t do anything wrong, neither did she, but it’s whether you’re a good match together to achieve the end goal.

I’m a therapist (Clinical Psychologist). If the OP’s therapist simply had tears in her eyes, but no actual crying and it was a one off, it’s nothing to worry about. She may not have been ‘triggered’, but was simply empathising with the experience of the patient dealing with trauma as a vulnerable child. I have experienced that level of emotional response, but probably only 2 or 3 times over more than 30 years. Invariably, empathy is a strong feature of a good therapeutic relationship. It’s important for a therapist to maintain a healthy level of objectivity, but we are not machines and we do care about our patients.

To the OP, I agree with others that you should tell your therapist that you were concerned as you could see that she was emotionally moved by your account.

A counsellor I spoke to told me she’d been upset when hearing about an experience I’d had. It validated the feelings I’d had and for that I’m very grateful

I've been both a counsellor and client.
I think it's just not possible to say based on what the OP has said whether this was about the therapist being "triggered"/thinking about herself/a similar experience, or if this was about the therapist feeling something the client couldn't - but in effect feeling it for the client. Sometimes when the client is unable to feel something (yet), the therapist will feel it on their behalf. Obviously, the therapist will have had to have done a lot of work on themselves and their own stuff to be able to understand what is happening and to tell the difference between what belongs to them and what belongs to the client.

There's a difference between feeling sad and feeling sad for someone else, too.

I had counselling once. They were so devoid of emotion I never went back. It made me feel like nothing I was saying was in any way emotional and I was being ridiculous. I wouldn’t mind having my feelings validated by a therapist with a tear in their eye.

@callmemaybee

I can assure you that she went against her training here (although she’s only human)

Can you really? If she is a psychodynamic psychotherapist, then maybe. Otherwise, not at all, the therapist simply had tears in her eyes briefly, she wasn’t openly crying. What is your professional background that you feel it appropriate to make such a sweeping statement? You don’t know what kind of therapist she is! 🤷‍♀️

Find a new therapist.

That sounds very unprofessional. You shouldn't be worrying about her!

I made my counsellor tearful a few times with stories from my childhood but to be honest it gave me validation that I wasn't making a big deal out of nothing. I think it is ok for a therapist to show emotion but only you know if it makes you uncomfortable or you want to see someone else instead.

I'm surprised to see so many state that this 'went against her training' or 'time to find a new therapist'. Expressing empathy, reflecting emotion, showing a human response can all be extremely valid responses in therapy. Please be brave and talk to her about your feelings when it happened and how you thought about things afterwards. It's all really valuable information and lets her know where you're at.

She isn't going to be at all surprised that you're having reaction to her response. I'm a therapist and I don't often well up, but I do reflect compassion and empathy as a matter of course. With the population I work with it's essential and really important that it is genuine. That validation of trauma shouldn't be faked or supressed.

We brought our BACP accredited relate counsellor to tears. and we thought they were brilliant anyway. Don't worry about it-people are human, and whether they would have planned that reaction is irrelevant.