After waiting for therapy for 7 months it’s online

[InstantDestiny]

I am so pissed off that after waiting for trauma therapy for 7 months, I have my first appt tomorrow and it’s online.

IMHO this is just not good enough ☹️

It's shit. Especially for trauma, where I imagine early help could make such a difference. I also imagine building trust online must be so difficult - how can they think that is useful or appropriate?! I'm so sorry that's the best you're being offered.

Different area, but DS has been pushed from pillar to post awaiting ASD assessment- maybe it's speech problems, maybe it's occ therapy needs etc. Every time one service discharged us, it was back to start of the waiting list. He was flagged up at nursery and is now 10 and has an EHCP. Finally got onto the home straight heading to Neurodevelopment team, 18 month wait. 12 months later we get a letter saying they've decided telephone assessments aren't appropriate (who'd have thought, and it's the first I heard it would be via phone anyway.) So back to the start of the waiting list which now stands at FOUR YEARS!! Flagged up at 3, might be assessed at 14!!!

Is this first appointment for therapy, or for trauma stabilisation prior to therapy? I only ask, as I had this, and it turned out to be workshops teaching coping techniques, prior to starting actual in-person therapy (there was a gap before this happened). Tbh, I didn't find the workshops amazingly useful, but they were fairly short and were mandatory. The therapy itself has been amazing.

We run online service (we do have an option of in-person appointments but in the last two years only two of my patients wanted to take it up). Our clients love the option - we cover three counties and it removes the need to travel, some people find it much easier to take an extended lunch break to log in rather than a whole day off to travel to the clinic and we don't need to do any physical obs so there is really not very much we would do differently during the in-person appointment. Transitioning to the online service two years ago also allowed us to see people who are significantly more affected by the condition as previously they would simply be unable to leave the house to come to our sessions and groups.
I am sure there will be an in-person option if you ask for one. It may or may not affect where you are on the waiting list.