What to do about my counselling - counsellor's suggestive comment

[helpmeplease]

Sorry to wimp out and change my name. If you recognise me, I'm glad, cos you know me well enough to help.

I've been having counselling for some months now. Thought I had PND, but it turned out to be all sorts of issues that had surfaced because of becoming a mother myself.

Basically I have found out a lot of things about my relationship with my mother in particular, and everything makes a lot of sense. I feel pretty satisfied that we have found the cause of my problems.

My counsellor is not so sure and thinks that there is another, much bigger issue that I am either hiding from him, or from myself. Last session he very clumsily suggested that there was some sexual abuse in my past that I have repressed.

This blundering suggestion has made me really very very angry. I think its because I feel he has really insulted my intelligence by the suggestive questioning he used. If he thinks I was abused, why not just say it? Why make innuendo laiden comments instead?

What do you think? Anyone else experienced anything like this? Should I stop going to him?

Well, instead of just vanishing, it might be wiser to say to him what you've just said here. That you assume he's hinting at sexual abuse and not only is he wrong, but you think it would have been better to ask you straight out.
I'm not sure though quite why you are so very angry. After all, he's not accusing you of anything, merely raising a possibility - and I do wonder why this upsets you. Maybe he didn't ask you directly because that can make people very defensive or rush to deny it, and by suggesting it he is kind of leaving it to you to raise or not - or to mull over in private before deciding whether to raise it.
You say you feel you have made progress with this counsellor - that's great. So why turn on him now?
When I saw the title of this thread I assumed you'd had a counsellor actually come on to you in a sexual way, and was going to say, get out and report him, but this is surely a legitimate issue to raise in counselling, even if it is a red herring.

Yes - I think he is only doing his job - of ot hasnt happened then fine - if it may have , surely its his job to venture that as a possibility....

LOl ks

Ks, well, suggesting it at a picnic is a bit different - and well out of order!

I've read about this - namely that the suggestion of regressed memories of sexual abuse used to be quite a 'fashionable suggestion' put forward by counsellors...however it has largely been discredited now. In fact some people - who 'believed' the counsellor initially, but subsequently realised that they had been 'lead' when in a vulnerable position, are now suing counsellors for 'planting' this suggestion in their head and damaging their relationship with a parent(s)

I meant to say 'repressed' not 'regressed'!

Thank you everyone. I think you've hit the nail on the head to an extent, aloha, by questioning why it upset me so much - and I don't really have an answer to that, except to make it as an observation.

He was very upfront with me about his qualifications when I started seeing him, he is currently training, having completed a PhD. He works in my GP surgery, which gives him some credence too. I have wondered whether he was so awkward in his approach because he is not that experienced.

lol ks - I'm glad I haven't had to talk about orgasms ... yet.

If he's helpful and approachable, why not say to him what you are saying here?
I do agree that not all counsellors are good (my dh's crazy ex is one!) but some are brilliant and really have helped people I know.

No offence taken ks. I'm glad (and not glad) that you said anyone would be offended by that question. Glad because it kind of makes me stop worrying about all the reasons why his question upset me so much. Not glad because a recurring theme that has come up in counselling is that I can't recognise my own feelings and have to ask others to check that I am feeling what I should. So not much progress there ...

And I need to think about whether he is approachable. I kind of can predict how he will respond and it gets very boring going round the same Catch 22 argument. I guess I have to focus on talking to him about how it made me feel, rather than the logic and effectiveness of his approach.

I care a lot about whether my response is "the right one" or not. However many times I'm told that if I respond in a certain way then it is right for me, I still worry about it.

well, I think I can see what it was that causes me to behave and feel the way I do, but what I still want to find is what I should do about it. Apart from feeling angry that I was child no. 2 (or 3) in her eyes, and not treating my kids the same, I don't yet know what the way forward is.

Helpmeplease,
Soory, no advice, but I am in a similar situation to what you experienced a few months ago regarding PND and issues with my mum.
Things have come to a head recently and I am going to the Doctors this week. Not looking forward to having to pour out my feelings to him to get referred for counselling but after a really good heart to heart with my sister (and her MIL, bizarrely enough, of all people to talk to!) have decided that this is what I need before things get much worse.
Would you mind if I e-mailed you to chat?
No offence taken if not.

Helpmeplease... I was sexually molested, but I honestly feel it wasn't a big part of problems I have had in later life. And yet counsellors often just want to focus on the sexual abuse as though the rest just couldn't possibly be as important -- well, they're wrong. It has made me very angry if a counsellor just isn't listening to me and my real needs.

So i think you may have a right to be annoyed.

About the false memories being implanted by suggestions, maybe it happens. But for people who rediscover real, horrible memories that they originally buried in order to emotionally survive, it is very painful to have other folk insinuating the possibility that you just made it up. I just have to say that, for anybody who has ever been there. A friend put it this way, "Ok, maybe everybody else is making it up or letting suggestions make them think it happen. But I KNOW it happend to me. I still get flashbacks. And it drives me mental when people try to say it didn't happen."

elena2 please do, but be quick before I change my name back!

Thanks changedmynametoo, I had also been wondering if I did have a repressed memory, what purpose it would serve finding it - it is interesting that you do not consider it to be a big part of your problems.

elena2 - thanks for the e-mail, I've e-mailed back.

I agree that he is only doing his job however if you are not comfortable proceeding with this line of questioning then you must tell him. I saw counsellors on and off for over 8 years, mainly for my PND but they also helped with past issues I had. I had both male and females and if they continued with something I wasnt comfortable with then I was asked to tell them so, which I did.

DOnt stop going, particularly as you seem to have found it so helpful. Hope you sort this out. Take care. x