What is the thing that put you off your counsellor?

[Springchickenhatching]

I am just wondering. I’ve been having some counselling about a family issue. Talking about family member who is autistic, she insisted that ‘most ND are bisexual ‘. The person concerned is definitely heterosexual and she wouldn’t accept that. It had nothing to do with the issue anyway! Just so odd.

Talked about herself for most of the sessions. Said she didn’t believe in “labels”as in the things I had been diagnosed with by a consultant psychiatrist.
Told me to call her at home any time of day or night. No thanks.
Told me at our third session that she was actually a part qualified student and our sessions were being overseen by a qualified counsellor.
Told me she had trained and worked as a midwife for years and helped so many women with pnd that she decided to make that her full time career. Later let slip that she had retrained as a midwife in her forties and had dropped out of the course half way through.

I've got a very good psychotherapist now but before her I had a taster session with someone else who wouldn't let me finish a sentence, kept cutting in and speaking over me and talked so fast it made me dizzy. Awful. Both are BACP accredited.

I fired a BACP accredited therapist for using motivational quotes. I hate them, but she was convinced she'd find "mine'. and was relentless about it. So she was not for me

I was recommended a counsellor by my health visitor, shortly after being diagnosed with postnatal depression.

She seemed nice enough, but the start of the sessions were always really off putting. We would have the usual niceties as I entered the room/took my coat off etc, but once I was sat down and we were ready to start, she would sit silently, just staring at me. It was as she was waiting for me to start the session off, but I just didn’t know what to say. I needed her to start it off for me, but she never did.

I don’t know if this is a method used in counselling, as a way of the client controlling the direction of the chat from the outset, but I couldn’t continue with her for much longer, as it was too uncomfortable for me.

'I don’t know if this is a method used in counselling, as a way of the client controlling the direction of the chat from the outset'

It is, but I agree it can feel very awkward and strange!

Out of interest, how would you have wanted her to start the session?

It is…its your space that you are paying for to talk so you start. If counsellers start the therapy then what is their mind is coming in the room instead of the clients.

rather than leave it would have been better to say you found it uncomfortable and then thats what you talk about.

its a shame because that would be showing up in other areas of your life so you would have gained talking about it.

counsellers on the whole dont give advice, are not their to fix you, and avoid doing the work for you. They provide a safe space which you use to explore and do the work on yourself, with them alongside

its definitely not just active listening, far more than that

'counsellers on the whole dont give advice, are not their to fix you, and avoid doing the work for you. They provide a safe space which you use to explore and do the work on yourself, with them alongside'

I heard therapy described as aiming to help you to build up your own toolkit, so that you can build the house, or fix the fence or whatever, rather than doing it for you. It means that when you start building the house (coz it's an ongoing process!), and have something to show, you can stand back and say 'I did that!'

Agree that it should be so much more than active listening. The therapist shouldn't be sharing anything about themselves with you, other than relevant professional details. Also, there's a place for advice but therapy is not it.

Thank you Louielooiloveyou & Lottapianos.
It’s interesting to hear that this is a method used in counselling.

For me, I wanted her to ease me in to a conversation. I wanted her to maybe ask “how has your week been?” or “how have things been since we last met?”. Maybe she could have even said “is there anything specifically you would like to discuss this week?”.

If it were to happen today, I would like to think that I could say something, but I was in a very dark place when I was seeing this lady, and I had lost all my confidence.

My first experience of counselling was in my early 20s back in the early 90s, provided by the NHS for 6 weeks. She asked a question then listened to my answer but I never really gelled with her because.............................she had an enormous wart on her upper lip and looked almost identical to the witch Grotbags on ITV at the time! I'm sure she was a lovely lady but 20 year old me couldn't stop staring at this bloody wart and got nothing out of the sessions

Second counsellor was when I was late 30s, again on the NHS but it was held in a GP surgery, she sat at the desk facing her computer, side on to me just as I had been during the GP consult when I was advised counselling would help with my depression. Never went back.

I had one counsellor who told me to go on Bumble to find a boyfriend. Thought it was very bad advice. I wasn't even talking to her about wanting a relationship or loneliness or anything similar, so not sure how she came up with the idea.

And by the way, I'm ND and straight.

I agree it can feel a bit mystic, i think it would be useful to know how its supposed to work first!

yes and i agree saying hows your week could have helped

@AnneDanty and @blackheartsgirl - I am so sorry for your experiences. I wish you had been treated more kindly and had more support.

Terrible take and completely incorrect.

You can do some Level 2 courses online but they count for nothing. You would have to do Level, 2, Level 3, and Level 4 (diploma) all three face-to-face, with a huge amount of contact hours (100s) in order to qualify as a counsellor.

Also “been in the industry from the beginning” is nonsense. Counselling and psychotherapy is really not a subject that people study at uni straight from leaving school (and who would want a 21yr as their counsellor anyway?). Many counselling courses have a 25+ age limit. Many people come the subject in later life, having accrued experience in other caring professions.

Just a total garbage take all around. Not to mention misogynistic.

NHS talking therapy and it was 3 months after my partner had ended the relationship completely out of the blue and left. This was also my first (and a genuinely extremely good that's why it was such a shock and difficult) relationship after my husband died. Each session was her questioning whether he was gay, autistic, narcissistic etc each session was a different one. She also questioned why when he told me he didn't want me I wanted him and why I was bothered, why couldn't I just remember the good times and get on with it. She asked why I wasn't already out dating (which is the state I was in I wasn't exactly going to attract the best people) and said I didn't owe men anything if I went on dates with them but I should be dating soon after the relationship ended and sleeping with other men. I've never in my life been someone who lots of men want to date so that was never going to work. It doesn't help particularly to tell someone they should just get over something when they've come to you because they can't just get over it. Believe me I wouldn't choose to feel that way. If it was as simple as just wishing it I'd have been over it in a heartbeat instead it's a year later and it's still hard but I'm wary of trying therapy again.

She told me off for being too early

I was standing outside her office

She said that she preferred if people would wait downstairs in the building

It was my first time being there

She made me feel so crap before the session started

I don't like the waffling on, earnest head nodding and sympathetic virtue signalling. I've seen a few over the years, but they didn't really help. I dont want to talk about how I feel or my hot thoughts. I just want practical advice, facts and potential solutions. Too much over analysis can turn anything into an issue.

The worst person is a former friend who trained as a grief counsellor she is so annoying I swear the only reason she became a counsellor is to poke her nose into other people's business. She doesn't actually give a shit.

I’ve saw a psychotherapist for two sessions a decade ago and then cancelled. She had been recommended as wonderful by a friend but just wasn’t what I was expecting.

She was very sweet, softly spoken and sympathetic and I immediately thought she was fake, but maybe that’s just me.

I was really expecting/hoping for someone who seemed more authoritative - think Emma Thompson in Bridget Jones.

Exactly. Literally no one wants a 21 year old counsellor, and no reputable programme would take on someone that young, anyway. The people I know who’ve trained later on have done so with serious life experience — a policeman I know trained PT around his job, practices PT and when he retires, which is early, is going to specialise in therapy for first responders and people who’ve experienced trauma. I know a former teacher who now specialises in child and adolescent MH, a former dancer who trained in somatic therapy. My sister is an addiction therapist for the local health authority, and her colleagues have an array of experience like nursing, teaching, prison service etc.

And qualifying via the route most people I know have done takes a lot of commitment, and work on yourself. Out of my sister’s cohort only two people worked straight through to qualification — the other were advised to have more therapy before proceeding.

Yes this!

I’d look for a counselling psychologist rather than a counsellor. Counselling psychologists will have a first degree in psychology and a doctorate in counselling psychology, both from approved institutions, so they will have a strong understanding of the theoretical as well as the practical knowledge needed. They’ll also be HCP and BPS registered and their title is protected.

Well, yes exactly. This is what I was trying to say earlier.

I think it’s exactly as you described, stating something as a known fact when it didn’t fit my lived experience of it. I think there is a place for therapists challenging your assumptions about your experience, not just blurting out what they think.

I had a fantastic therapist who was just wonderful, but I saw another for a short time who was convinced my mum is a narcissist. My mum is all sorts of dysfunctional, but narcissistic personality disorder is one thing she does not have. The spouting of pop psychology nonsense annoyed me, especially when the things I described didn’t fit what she was trying to assert.

Fwiw, I think most people are bisexual to a degree that we don’t really feel comfortable admitting, but it’s a weird thing to come out with in a session.

Some of these are really shocking but don’t surprise me at all. I am about to give up on mine but I know she’ll be upset and want and ending session. I don’t want to have to explain how her comment completely put me off. I don’t feel she’s helped me at all.

She can want all she likes, you're not obliged to have a last session. Let's face it, she's in the right profession to be able to cope without closure... If you're feeling kind you could provide the feedback in writing - in our last session when you said x it made me feel y, but you're in no way obliged to do so, or to continue, or have a final session with her.

I’m a counsellor and you absolutely cannot qualify by doing an online course 🤣