Relate counselling advice......is this it?

[PlayingItSafe]

Had to Name change but posted on here several times :)

Long story short - H had affair, decided to stick with it after initial seperation, both agreed to attend counselling as part of healing process.
Been to 3 sessions now, first 1 introduction, 2nd one was all about THE event and MY feelings following discovery etc, thought it went very well, but perhaps thats just because we were discussing me .

Went last night and I left feeling very let-down (H felt it was very sucessful). I know they are not supposed to be judgemental, but surely they should be questioning H's decisions that led him to have the affair? She never questioned him or asked him to explain what was going on that led him to the affair, she just sat and nodded at him, as if this was alright. I honestly feel she had given H green light for affair - shouldn't they be getting H to face his actions and see that it is not OK to go outside the marriage and he should of tried to fix it with me... I don't feel we are being challenged at all, infact we are only saying what we say to each other at home with some strange nodding dog women watching us.
Am I expecting too much?...Might not be able to answer straight away, but I would realy appreciate your thoughts/experiences. Thanks :)

I am never going to understand what the fascination with porn is for men, but my counsellor suggested that maybe i should watch it with him to understand what he likes about it and then judging by my reaction she quickly rectified "not now, as its all too raw, but maybe when you are ready"

Is that normal advice? I even told her that I was open minded towards porn before, but now I am just disgusted by it, it completely removes the element of intimacy from sex! have to wait

till the new year for the next session - sorry accidentally clicked 'post' before

Taken I am pretty gobsmacked TBH at that experience; if you wanted to talk about the affair then your counsellor should have respected that.

I wonder if you insisted at the time and made plain that is what you wanted?

I suppose again TBH, that she was trying to take you into areas that might have paved the way for an affair ( sorry if this is not what you want to hear but I don't subscribe to the notion that affairs happen in "happy" marriages- happy for 1 partner, perhaps.)

But even so, if she was not working with you, then i think you should have called her to account and moved on to someone else.

I did challenge my counsellor about her appraoch and its relevance.

I also think that unless you are in London the fee you paid is too high. relate advertise their fees online as do most BACP counsellors and it's between £40-£50.

Ouch! Lonleybee ! The advice you had to watch porn actually made me spit out hot tea....not attractive! I am a counsellor and was horrified at this advice.....In fact a lot of what I have read in this thread makes me wonder what an earth is happening in counselling these days! I only joined Mumsnet today and stumbled upon this thread so I hope no one objects to me jumping in?