Therapist won’t let me cancel!

[Moocow1995]

Hi all

Bit of a strange one really. I have been going to talking therapy / CBT with a therapist for the last couple of years. It’s expensive- £75 per session.

I have had some very good sessions with her but some others where I have come away feeling that the advice wasn’t totally sound but that’s neither here nor there really. I started therapy due to a particularly difficult break up and having escaped an abusive boyfriend in 2019 and I do feel that I am in the most part ‘recovered’ from the damage caused by that situation and so the therapy is more of a nice to have than a complete essential now.

A couple of months ago, I explained to her that due to changes in my financial situation I would like to cut down to fortnightly sessions. This was met with a lot of disagreement and often half of my 50 minute session would be taken up with her telling me I would really benefit from weekly sessions. This was frustrating as I was paying more than I could afford for appointments in which I was making no progress and coming away feeling stressed. Nonetheless she eventually relented and I dropped down to fortnightly sessions.

She now spends almost my entire session moaning about me having dropped down to fortnightly. I am finding very little value in this now and am also expecting my first baby so have said I will be cancelling completely at the end of May.

She has taken this really badly and I feel like I am spending the whole session defending this decision and my financial situation to her. She has even suggested that I ask my partner or parents to continue paying.

It is probably worth mentioning that I am under no contractual agreement in this situation.

So, would I be unreasonable to just send an email to say ‘I will be ceasing all therapy sessions as of X date’ and refuse to engage any further? Previously she inundated me with calls and messages when I tried this approach when dropping down to fortnightly sessions.

If I ABU to take this approach, how would you get out of it?

It is causing me quite a lot of stress and financial pressure at a time I could do without it.

Thank you for taking the time to read if you got this far.

Also, the fact that you consider blocking her is such a red flag. It should not be neccessary with a decent therapist.

James Acaster is that you ?
https://youtube.com/shorts/_99vi-S2UgY?si=ybMRETN_2yFWEcBY

Sorry @Moocow1995 I missed where you said she is BACP registered. She is likely a counsellor and not CBT trained and supervised which she should be clear about. It doesn't sound like you've been receiving CBT.

I think you should complain to the BACP as they and every ethical counsellor who is registered with the BACP would want this kind of behaviour tackled. The BACP has a clear procedure for complaints on their website.

I voted YABU because you are letting someone who you are paying a service for bully you. Course she doesn't want you to cancel, you are giving her money.
Cancel any further sessions and block/ignore

You don't need to make excuses or give her reasons. Keep it simple. Send an email saying 'Please cancel all future appointments. Thank you'. Then ignore any responses, don't engage, get a new therapist and forget about her. Block her if you need to. No one can physically force you to go back.

Omg this is hilarious! Shall I just send her the link and move on 🤣😵‍💫

@Moocow1995
I really hope these posts help you find your voice!

Good luck

Oh my, that's very unprofessional. You should absolutely cease contact with her! I'm sure most therapists are excellent but I know one therapist who is the most mentally unstable person I've ever met. I even wondered if she's your therapist. It actually scares me that she's working with vulnerable people.

Another vote her for you owe her absolutely nothing. Not a second more of your energy or time, and not a penny of your money.

You've been paying her for a service, you've decided it's unsatisfactory, and in addition you can't afford it, and that is where it ends.

The fact that she's been helping you with your boundaries and then ridden roughshod all over them is laughable, and tells you everything you need to know about her. What an absolute LOON.

All you need to do is text her and say, I won't be attending my appointment on Tuesday Clare, and this will be the end of our ongoing arrangement. I do not wish to discuss futher. Thanks.

If she harrasses you tell her you'll report her to the the police if she doesn't get a grip of herself, and I'd be reporting her to the BACP anyway due to her behaviour thus far.

Just to add to all the above OP, I am a psychologist.. CBT therapy should not be taking 2 years unless you’ve both had in depth conversations about why the continuation or moved towards a different model. CBT is usually recommended for 12-17 sessions, not as a longer term psychotherapy. It is quite possible that you moved to a different way of working but if you are still doing ‘cbt’ it is time to talk about that with your therapist before continuing.

Do, If she responds to your cancellation e-mail trying to pull you back in

Hi OP, I worked as a therapist before. This is unprofessional behaviour and I would 100% raise your concerns with whatever professional body she is registered under. Therapy can end for what ever reason- and this can be explored in the session however, you should not be harassed.

Everyone saying YABU is wrong. This is black and white and a therapist, who does hold more power in this relationship with people seeking help, should not act like that. It's like taking advantage of someone vulnerable. OP clearly said they'd like to work on boundary setting and it is one reason why they are in therapy, so I do not feel it is reasonable to say they are being unreasonable when the therapist is likely to be manipulative.

That isn't normal at all for a therapist. I've "shopped around" a lot for therapists before I found the right fit, and the best ones (for me) were those who put no pressure on the timing/frequency of the appointments. And the worst ones were those who got overly involved / followed up / insisted on weekly etc. I've never met one who's as extreme as you're describing.

This is awful OP. If you want a new therapist recommendation dm me. Mine sees having less sessions as a sign that everything is working but also I’ve had to do similar to you before. She was so kind and really understanding. I’d recommend.

This is very unethical behaviour. I'd consider reporting her to her governing body. She needs to be keeping her countertransference in check, or whatever is at play here.

Hi, I am a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and I would agree with a previous poster, CBT does not normally take more than a few sessions. The fact that your therapist is BACP registered does not mean that she is not a therapist. Psychoanalytic people can register with BPC, UKCP or BACP and they may well choose to register with BACP (like I did), it’s largely a formality. You might have move on to psychoanalitic or integrative work, and the nature of psychoanalytic work is that you explore in most (if not all) sessions the relationship between you and the therapist because it reflects various aspects of your relationship between you and the world. A therapist would be negligent if they didn’t try to explore if there’s anything deeper that makes a patient feel dissatisfied with the session and reduce the number of sessions or cancel altogether. And such exploration can be uncomfortable, to say the least. But of course external reality (finances, work or family obligations) needs to be taken into account too. I wonder if you are able to explore with her your feelings about therapy and her - or do you feel that the rapport is lost? Also, there would be typically a notice period for ending the therapy. Informally, the longer the therapy is, the better is it to have a longer termination phase, to properly think what the ending means to you and to prepare yourself for the ending. The rule of thumb is a month per year of therapy. But in her initial letter or initial discussions she would tell you what the formal notice period is like, for example 4 weeks.

I agree with what everyone else is saying, let her know you’re not coming back, and then block her.

CBT shouldn't require to be conducted over a period of years.
She's a grifter. Cancel any planned sessions and block her.

I find what your therapist is doing really nasty. You’ve put your trust in her and now she’s using what she knows about you to make you doubt yourself and coerce you into staying. The benefit is for herself and not you. An ethical therapist would encourage you to explore other areas of therapy or come back to her if you ever need to. Please don’t be too hard on yourself for not standing up to her sooner, you’re doing it now!

I'm a therapist and that's definitely not okay. Due to financial pressures many of my clients are having forthrightly sessions and I'm fine with that. Continuity is important, especially early on, but unless the client is really struggling, seeing your therapist once every two weeks is fine. Don't let her bully you. She's not putting your interest first, but hers, it seems.

Also you might benefit more from a different approach at this stage - person-centred, psychodynamic...

It's your right to cancel. The only justification for her encouraging you to continue is if you are in the middle of a challenging piece of therapy work, or having a crisis, and it's therefore a bad time to stop. By the sound of it neither of these is true. Just send her an email saying you are stopping therapy as from now. But check what the cancellation period is for individual sessions so you don't get billed for the final one. Good luck.

Yes this! And obviously cancel all future appointments and find a decent therapist not one who guilt trips you into spending more money than you can afford. May I suggest you work on boundaries and self esteem with your future therapist? Because they must be quite low to put up your current "therapist". Wishing you well in your healing.

I agree. Shocking.