Therapy

[Martsem]

My partner has had some very traumatic things happen to close family members which affected the family and destroyed some of their lives. The toxic people that caused all this carry on like nothing happened continuing to be toxic to others. My partner is distraught as some of the close family members who were severely impacted have passed away and were not able to enjoy their life. He struggles to move on knowing they were so sad which is understandable.

For some reason he kept being put forward for counselling and one counsellor said we don’t talk about the past - one of the issues was about his job which the bullying and discrimination which affected him but he was told not to talk about it. Then the counsellor he has now just paraphrases back what he says. I know counsellors can’t respond but why talk to a brick wall.

I want him to get help and I am a good listener and understand why he is traumatised. I have advised him to cherish the memories of his family and move forward by living a positive life where possible and avoid toxic people as they will destroy his peace. I can’t change the past about what happened to his close relatives. Would therapy help?

He struggles to confide in people as they judge and he is worried a professional would judge even though he has done absolutely nothing wrong.

It sounds like therapy would help. Counselling and therapy are quite different.

Therapy is not just about talking about the past (which is a common misconception).It’s also about what’s keeping the difficulties going and how to live a life more in line with your values.

That said, understanding where some of our thoughts/feelings/relational patterns come from (especially the ones that keep us stuck) is very important as it can help us to both understand ourselves more and make changes.

Therapy and counselling are the same thing but there are different modalities of counselling.

I am an integrative counsellor and what you described above is a million miles from how I work. I pride myself in being non-judgemental and empathetic and place great importance on building a safe and trusting therapeutic relationship where we work collaboratively. I would look for a trauma informed counsellor/therapist.

Thank you both for your helpful replies.

You're welcome and I hope your husband finds someone/something that's provides him with some support and closure x

Therapy and counselling are not the same thing, https://www.priorygroup.com/our-services/types-of-therapy/therapist-vs-counsellor gives a good overview of the differences.

OP - I would recommend you look for either a clinical or counselling psychologist or a BACP registered therapist.

Legally, anyone in the uk can call themselves a psychologist, therapist or counsellor. Only registered professionals can use the above titles, though.

You’ll find lots of people with different ‘accreditations’ on their websites, but these can range from legit courses to one day online training sessions.

@pinkbird78yes, I agree with ensuring that you find a legitimate professional with the relevant qualifications and professional body and this is a helpful article. However, as the article states that the terms are often used in an interchangeable way. I do think there are also some misconceptions about counselling...that it is "less than" and that the counsellor just sits and nods. For example the article states counselling is usually short term. I am a counsellor and provide long term therapy. I am fully qualified and registered with the BACP and am fully qualified to work with trauma. I don't want to get into an argument and this is a a debate that I see regularly within the therapeutic world. The long and short is do your research and find the person that is right for you x

But the article also states that “Ultimately, both types of professionals are there to help people work through their mental health problems and aid mental health recovery. However, there are some individual features of counselling and therapy, that may be considered to be differences between the two.”

I completely understand the frustration of feeling counselling is considered less than. That’s absolutely not okay and I hope everyone who works in mental health services recognises it’s not true.

However, I would argue that if you’re providing long term therapy (having trained in a specific evidenced based model), you would be classed as a therapist and not a counsellor.

Some forms of therapy are very focused on the here and now, things like CBT, DBT, solution focussed therapy don’t really look at the underlying reasons for distress so much as giving tools to manage that distress.

Look for someone trained in relational therapies eg person centred or psychodynamic therapies - the right person will make all the difference regardless of modality. And don’t get too caught up on the difference between counselling and psychotherapy - there’s huge ongoing debate which doesn’t actually matter in the long run, the relationship with whoever your partner works with will be the single biggest determinant in how effective the therapy is.