Provocation therapy/ Counsellor playing devils advocate

[abanico]

Does anyone have any experience of this? Would a counsellor tell you if that's what they were doing?

Right on cue, the defence....

Note I didn't slate the entire profession, I said I don't know if it's shit or if I just had a shit one.

I simply said to people it is totally fine to question it.

The irony is no longer lost on me.

"Did you actually have a conversation with her about how she was making you feel or challenge her at all? That's where the work actually is, especially within the psychodynamic approach! "

Yes, repeatedly.

Name Change fail but don't really care.

Yes, yes I did.

I qualified my last post with saying I am not warning people off therapy, just trying to encourage an informed choice, to learn from my mistakes. It's almost hilarious how a therapist will take that as a slating of the entire profession. I don't see how encouraging people to educate themselves would be so frowned upon.

Anyone interested in a balanced view from someone who can't be written off as a bitter client who refuses to take responsibility in the process, might be interested in reading the work of Yvonne Bates, herself a therapist actually interested in more than blaming clients for when things go wrong.

I see a place for therapy, and are sure there are good therapists. I just think more reflection on it will make it more useful for those who are very, very vulnerable and distressed (or "irritating" if you dare speak up) and more fulfilling for everyone involved if they actually thought about what they are doing.

I'm not denying there are some shitty therapists out there, or some that aren't just a bad fit. It happens. But there are also clients who are just never going to make any progress, no matter who they see (I'm not implying you are one, I wouldn't know).

Surely pointing people towards a blog called 'therapy is a con' is aimed at the whole profession?

I had an experience with a counsellor who suggested changing things in my life that I was actually happy with, then pushed & pushed about it until I found my current lady who I do get on well with. Remember this woman is just one person out of so many people in the world and many counsellors/therapists too! There's bound to be a more appropriate one out there for you x

I also pointed them to a book written by a therapy, suggested they read "everything" by David Smail, one of the most intelligent, calm and balanced voices of reason in the world of psychology. I suggested they get lay people's views from MN (which is what I did, and got responses varying from "she's a quack" to "give it a go, maybe it's a work in progress"...).

But you chose to jump on the therapy is a con one. Sounds a lot like the failure of self reflection that clients themselves are so often admonished for.

Sorry, book written by a therapist (typing on a bus!)

Thanks LorLorr, glad you found someone who was decent and worked well with you in the end!

Psychedelic if you haven't read it I recommend the Yvonne Bates book! It's interesting and any psychotherapist who is interested in more than an echo chamber of intellectual masturbation at the expense of their clients' wellbeing would find it food for thought.

To confirm once again, I'm not trying to warn people off therapy. I might even suggest it to some people. I just think"buyer beware" is a perfectly valid statement, the whole thing is so opaque that it's easy to get trapped in a damaging situation. If you're an ethical and fair therapist you would understand how that might happen to someone in a vulnerable position without scolding them for being an irritating victim.

What is it you actually need from therapy?

Two years would indicate that you have many issues within.

How about you start looking forward and stop looking back? Stop analysing everything- everyone has down days/days they wish they weren't here.

I agree with a pp that she sounded frustrated with you and had run out of ideas/suggestions to help you progress.

6 hours sleep in four days is quite dangerous is it not?

QuiteLikely, things have moved on a lot. I've had a lot of sleep since that sentence, it's all good.

If she were frustrated and had run out of ideas I'd suggest the ethical thing to do would be admit it to the client so that they can make an informed decision, rather than shut down the client's concerns about progress by banging on about "process" and needing to give psychodynamic therapy a chance to work. If the client is supposed to trust the therapist, the least the therapist can do is be honest rather than struggle on.

And believed me I raised concerns about progress. But she dismissed them. When you're vulnerable and mental health provision isn't exactly transparent or abundant in this country, you might have a tendancy to put trust in the person with BACP accreditation without the healthy dose of scepticism which you have in less vulnerable times.

And, (sorry for the multiple posts, I'm bored and keep having thoughts) I kept trying to talk about the present /future but she was obsessed with the past and some sort of mythical grieving process that she could never explain to me.

Yea one can get a grip and pull oneself together and look forward and all that, but at the time I was dealing with the aftermath of being raped, being in an abusive relationship, bereavement and having no one in real life to help me through it. So I turned to therapy. "Get counselling" is often trotted out to people facing any of those trials of life, without consideration of what that actually means, or the possible pitfalls.

In an ideal world you'd do all the research you can before you decide whether to do it and if so, what. But when you are in a crisis, and resources and options are scarce, you do what you think is best at the time and may be blind to charlatans.

I am just trying to tell my story so anyone in a similar position can maybe see it a little more transparently. I'm doing that because reading other people's stories has helped me so much, not because I have any sort of vendetta.

I'm glad you have made progress now, OP, and I do agree with you about the problem of having an unethical counsellor when you are in a vulnerable place.

Apparently the Chinese used to pay their doctors as long as they were well and cease to pay them when they fell sick. I do think privately-paid doctors/counsellors have a financial incentive in our being sick, though I am sure most are honest.

Thanks for your posts AbanicoDos - they have certainly helped me. I've also just had a similar experience to yours with my apparently very well qualified psychodynamic psychotherapist. It is good to know that its not just me!

I've just sent the terminating email to her now. Even before reading your thread, I was really beginning to feel that our therapist/patient dynamic felt pretty dysfunctional and well. There's always some excuse or that she didn't mean it like that, or whatever.

To top it off, she couldn't call my husband an 'abuser' [I'm suffering from EA] because she wasn't in the room when it happened, and for all she knows, I could be over-reacting. FFS!!! In the incident in question, I felt physically threatened (during a heated argument, my husband started getting aggressive and was punching his fist into the other hand again and again, and when burst into tears saying he was frightening me, claimed it was my fault for provoking him - classy).

I mentioned that I've just read Lundy Bancroft's book 'Why does he do that?' and she's never heard of Lundy Bandcroft. And she asked if there was a chapter on the type of women who go for abusive men. Why should there be a chapter for the type of woman? I was under the impression that while there may be risk factors (e.g. having been abused in childhood etc) that abuse cut through all sectors of society/types of people.

And anyway, abuse is always the fault of the perpetrator, not the victim- so what point would there be? There would be a fine line between finding commonality in victims and then victim blaming.