Relate

[Thomasina79]

Without writing anything personally Ito my situation, I am interested iin peoples experience with Relate and if they found it worthwhile?

A number of years ago, my former wife and I attended. I am not sure if it helped.

I went with my ex a long time ago. It was spectacularly crap. Instead of feeling understood and supported as a young couple trying to do their best but struggling with the pressures of a baby and a toddler, we were both made to feel like horrible people that had no hope of a successful relationship with anyone. It was like being told off by our mothers. We stopped counselling, separated and went on to co parent successfully and happily until our dc were adults.

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Horrendous, I was suffering from dv , my partner and I went together to Relate , I told the (male) counsellor about the violence, he minimised it and actually ended up going out socially with my (now ex) .

I thought it was a load of crap.

Later we stumped up for a proper therapist, who was quite effective.

But, probably comes down to the individuals involved and if you get lucky with a good counsellor/therapist.

Absolutely awful. The counsellor actually took sides. I would never use them again.

A Relate counsellor said to me that my ex wouldn’t be so nasty to me (looking back it was most definitely abusive behaviour) if I had better self esteem. I would never, ever, use them again.

Thanks, that’s interesting. Will see what happens!

We didn't find it particularly useful (deep down, I'd already decided the relationship was over, part of my reason for going to relate together was to have a supervised debrief to explain to my ex why). Counsellor got totally focussed on issues that my ex was raising about me, but brushed off anything I raised. All seemed very one sided, but my ex was capable of putting on an incredibly believable front. It took most people (myself included) a good while to see through their act, so it would be optimistic to expect a counsellor to figure them out in a couple of sessions. But they did seem very amateur at what they were doing.

This is exactly what happened to me!!

Who regulates this shit?

They should have a supervisor. I don’t think their training is very good.

3 experiences; one useless, one helpful, another not very useful. You need to find the right therapist and you need to be in the right place yourself to make it work.

Shit, this has some close similarities to my experience if not as extreme.
we went years ago , around 2001. My ex ( yep he is now),had an un diagnosed psychotic illness. Pretty clear he was unwell and was behaving very unreasonably towards me (coercive control, pathological jealously ), but no gp had diagnosed him despite us both asking for help.
the marriage guidance was recommended by GP. started ok for first few sessions. Then she started to twig some of issues with my ex re mental illness behaviours. At that point she should have stopped the sessions, and told him to go back to GP , maybe we ven, with his qgre ment, written a few notes to GP.
But instead, She started to focus Purely on him, ignored it was relationship counselling, ignored me… she was obviously delighted to be exploring the inner recesses of my ex’s weird delusions. She was play acting with these weird “psychiatrist”, or “psychologist” questions with him as her personal patient
I stopped going as I was literally not doing anything but listening to pair of them. I asked him to stop as it was costing us ( it ain’t free and ex wasnt working and short of money). He refused.
It got worst as at one point when he was on a paranoid jealously rage with me, he said she told him almost certainly I was having an affair as people don’t become paranoid without a reason.
she literally created a safeguarding risk for me by reinforcing his delusions.

i eventually told my ex that until he was earning money again, I wasn’t going to pay for him to spend 1 hour a week, indefinitely, for him to become more obsessed with delusions.
he’d bee n seeing her on his own for 16 weeks by then. Christ knows what she talked about with him. I was not old enough or wise enough to see the potential damage she did and put in a complaint
The woman was a counsellor- minimum training, out of her depth and brief , but obviously getting a kick out of pretending she could “ cure” my ex
i have stayed clear of ANY and ALL counsellors since - wouldn’t trust someone without at very least psychology degree foundation.

The 'counsellor' we saw was so dangerous in my opinion and fuelled my ex's anger, jealousy and violence.

That’s really disturbing. I hope the woman was sacked.

Could be still working for all I know - as I said didn’t really.ly twig till months later the damage it’d done
i wondered a lot more at time that she was taking advantage of him as an income generator - he was very susceptible to suggestions and wanted to talk to anyone who’d listen about his delusional narratives

Dear god, I thought we’d found the one duff counsellor. Reading this it appears that this is a common experience. Relates training and even screening appears to be shot at best, and bloody dangerous in cases of abuse
does anyone on here know how they operate now and how this should be controlled?

Thing is relate counsellors are counsellors NOT therapists - big, big difference

Op, literally one person on this thread has said 1of 3 different relate people were helpful. The rest crap or actually dangerous
dont ignore and say “ I’ll see what happens”…
At very least ask to see counsellors qualifications and experience . All approved therapist put their qualifications and specialist area on open view on internet. If relate refuse to do that still, go to a therapist who has recognised qualifications, please.

Deliberate on my part…

Not a good experience at all. No safeguarding risks, just silly and unprofessional.

Thanks everyone. We have An initial zoom (!) meeting tomorrow morning. Rather dreading it!

Be very careful, if you're not comfortable with any aspect of it, then don't go again.

I had individual counseling with someone from Relate and it was a good experience. I had good rapport with the counselor and while she didn't push me to a particular decision, it was helpful in building my confidence enough to leave my shitty marriage.

We'd tried couples counseling before that with a different Relate counselor. I hated it, felt like she was subtly taking my now ex's side, didn't seem clued in about abuse at all.

I have seen two Relate Counsellors (same relationship, a year or so apart). I found both completely professional, helpful, and empathic.