My therapist seems politically opposed to my feminist views

[idontknowhowtodreamyourdreams]

I didn't know where else to post this and could do with a sense check/ideas as to how to deal with this.

I've been seeing a therapist for about a year for a range of issues, including substance misuse and recovering from abuse during my childhood and teens (sexual, violence). We've spoken about some really difficult and personal things that I have never discussed before and I have felt that the therapy has been useful. I thought I trusted him and trust is not an easy thing for me.

I'm a GC feminist. I'm also a lawyer and so I tend to have a legal lens on some of the debates around issues of trans rights and the rights of women and girls. I have talked in therapy about how I have found the tone of the debate around trans rights increasingly upsetting and hostile (on one side) and I had been upset over the discussion re the Supreme Court and the Equality Act. I've talked about both this and how hard it can be to feel like there's no space for women to express certain views without being dismissed or labelled.

My error (I totally accept I shouldn't have looked, but he should have locked down his settings) - I looked and saw a pic on SM of him at a protest. I don't want to out myself or him but he was holding a banner basically slagging off the Supreme Court.

And now I feel . . . the trust has gone. Has he been quietly judging me while I shared some frankly painful stuff? Does he respect my perspective? As I don't know if I can work with someone who doesn't. It's not a difference in political views, I feel like my views on these issues are fundamentally part of who I am as a person.

I know I crossed a boundary and shouldn't have looked, but would appreciate any thoughts as to whether I am being overly sensitive and/or whether it's something I should bring up.

Or maybe I am just wrong to care? Thoughts welcome!

@Unrulyscrumptious

No.
The SC ruling is not similar for the OP.

Her therapist attended a protest waving a banner decrying the ruling.
What does that say about him to you?
Do you have publicly available social media showing yourself waving banners at protests that would be extremely upsetting (to say the least) to clients who have confided in you?

@Arran2024 your experience sounds truly awful, I'm so sorry. As in any profession, there will be bad therapists out there - unethical and/or just crap at their jobs, but therapists often work with really, really vulnerable people and the capacity for causing so much more damage is immense.

I don't consider myself to be vulnerable, but anyone can be when exploring difficult historic stuff on therapy.

I had no idea about the Ofsted registration requirement you mention, but that makes sense.

@TheLivelyViper your approach makes total sense to me. It's absolutely what I would/should have done if I had made a conscious decision to start therapy to address my past experiences of childhood sexual abuse, grooming and rape. I never thought I would go there as genuinely thought I had put that stuff firmly behind me. I rather naively thought I "just" wanted to address a few booze/relationship issues. It almost makes me fucking laugh looking back at it now.

My next session is in a few days and I definitely feel more relaxed about it after saying what I thought about the various issues last time. We'll see how things are between us this week.

Thanks v much @FrogFrogFrog.

@Unrulyscrumptious just realised I didn't answer your question re modality. Integrative!

Bollocks.

It's entirely natural for a client to want to know they can trust their therapist. The first thing to do would be to google them. A sensible professional working in a caring role would have their personal life locked down, not open to view.

I'd say OP is taking reasonable steps to ensure she could trust her therapist. She's trusted her instinct.

She has now bravely raised all the issues with him.

OP, wishing you all the very best going forward. There are plenty of other therapists out there. Trust your instincts. I'd say all of this process could be looked at as part of the therapeutic process. Learning how to stick up for yourself, what's important to you, learning boundaries. What you've done is consider and set out your reasonable boundaries and requirements (to yourself, as much as the therapist). Well done.

Thank you @ArabellaScott and yes, it has been a useful process for me in terms of thinking about what is important and why and knowing that I can articulate that. And now I know that it is a really important issue for me, on many levels, and one that I am bloody angry about!

Yes of course, I was the same, when through school and other services I got therapy (I knew none of this and had no choice on who I got then either). But during that, some therapists I had (had a few as some left, waitlists etc), harmed me directly through ignorance, some gaslighting me and others just not knowing anything. It wasn't the main reason why the services/professionals referred me but it did come up quite often and it impacted how helpful they were. So now I'm more informed going into it.

As an aside, when you say integrative therapy what key modalities is he putting together for that?

@TheLivelyViper humanistic, person centred, a bit of CBT. It's quite early days though, I am only just begining to talk about these things. It sounds mad, but I actually struggle to say the words out loud. Sometimes we have to start with a grounding exercise and naming where I feel what in my body.

I'm curious do therapist actually give their personal opinions?

@Arran2024 I never knew that Adoption counsellor are required to ofsted registered. I suspect this isn't common knowledge.

In my experience yes, ( I haven't always asked, espeically when I was younger and had no choice on picking a therapist). But more recently all of the ones I've done a 15 minute phone call and/or intake with have. However I now only look for therapists in speicifc modalities (the modalities tend to lean more towards the consensus of self disclosure and disclosure of political views when initially meeting a client or after depending on how it impact what they talk about). Different therpay modalities do disagree and lean more against this, so I'm guessing that those therapist's may decline - I however am not looking for those modalities (because I don't like how they work and the structure, having done some of them before). So that's my take, a lot of my friends have asked and gotten pretty fair and detailed summaries as well.

I assume the work context makes a difference. I know in my job we are quite restricted in what type of question we can answer. To be fair, it is very rare to be asked such questions.

Just for children. They did do it for anyone but in 2023 I think they removed it for adults as it was unworkable.

But for children it is still the case in England that you have to register with Ofsted.

This does make total sense to me tbh.

Ok well we disagree and I gave my reasoning for my opinion and advice from my perspective of what OP should do i.e. talk with her therapist. If you feel OP should end a relationship that's otherwise felt safe and beneficial for her, you're welcome to post so. I'm not interested in getting into a debate with you.

You are a strange one @Unrulyscrumptious .

It’s not about debate or opinion or advice.

You made a really silly comparison between your Jewish clients and the OP being ‘triggered’ by the FWS judgement which managed to blank the whole premise of the thread. I’m sure your Jewish clients would be distressed and questioning their trust in you if they had discovered pictures of you at a protest holding a banner they felt to be anti-semitic.

Your posts do read as though you haven’t read or understood the SC ruling. And what it means to protest against that.

Hello,

I thought it might be useful to hear my cursory thoughts on here. I am a therapist and have had the inverse experience recently. When the supreme court decision came out, quite unexpectedly, a few of my clients spoke about their heartache and disbelief about it, when in honestly I felt relief that finally people in power were speaking sense.

As I was caught almost wholly unawares by the first client, and then increasing wary as the week went on, I said very little. The point is to centre the person and hold the space for them. I didn't look at it politically (they would want to restrict my rights etc, and I know that doesn't work exactly as the power flows differently between client and therapist) but it was much like dealing with religion. I know that some of my religious clients must logically feel I am condemned to hell as I don't follow their religion as those teachings dictate that, I wouldn't ever take it personally, it is part of a belief system for them, I am completely non-judgemental. Your therapist was very probably trained that way, too.

About social media, I don't have any for that reason. I actually disclose some personal details to my clients as a way to enrich our therapeutic relationship (I have kids, I have a partner, I live close by). Politics has come up (Israel / Gaza for eg) and I just contribute what must be universally agreed (the civilians are all innocent and the world would be better off without wars). I actually have very pronounced views on it (I think Israel's actions are outrageous, it's a genocide driven by racism) but I would never disclose that and would never bring it into any part of therapy with a client.

Remember, we are trained to work with all sorts of people whose behaviours we might take a moral stance on outside of the therapeutic setting (people who cheat is incredibly common), I often have Tory supporters in my clinic and EVEN them I can hold unconditional regard for!!!!

So, this is really how you feel about him. IF you no longer trust him, you can end things with this therapist. I would likely do that in your situation as you appear to feel so strongly. However, there is likely something to be gained in you learning to work through and persevere with a relationship with someone who likely respects you and has a true level of care for you, but whom you vehemently disagree with - that might be one of the gains you make in therapy?

Sounds like pretending to be non judgemental, while secretly judging. Isn't it healthier for people to be honest?

It's not advised for women to have counselling with an abusive partner, is it? Because they can exploit the dynamic and vulnerability and use it to their advantage.

OPs therapist sounds like an abusive male to me. What kind of man protests against women's rights?

OP, I feel for you. What a shock to discover someone who seemed helpful and empathetic actually opposes women’s single-sex rights. Especially as these are mainly about protecting women and girls from male aggression.

It doesn’t sound as if he’s necessarily one of those creepy men who wants to get off on hearing about sexual abuse. (Although, how would I know?) It may be that he’s just going along with all his friends.

But I would not be able to discuss it with him, knowing that he not only supports men’s right of access to women’s spaces, but actually publicises this on social media.

I’m sorry you’ve been put in this position, OP. I would feel betrayed, possibly even violated. I hope this doesn’t set back the progress you’ve been making.

@Femtherapist yes, the crux of it now is how I feel about him and whether what I saw suggests a world view (and/or lazy approach to developing a world view) on key issues that I just can't work with, bearing in mind my personal history etc.

I think I will know this soon enough. It will take me a few sessions to figure out how I feel and see how those sessions go for me. I have developed trust with him and feel a sense of attunement, it's whether that has survived what I found out.

The other dimension to this, and one I spoke about with him a few days ago, is that when I was a child I desperately wanted to be a boy. Not because I thought I was one, but I thought not being a girl would protect me from things that happened. I hated being a girl and having a girl's body and would cut my hair, only wear shorts etc. And we were able to talk a bit about that in a way that felt safe for me and I felt heard.

Haven’t RTFT but any therapist so unprofessional as to not keep their social media private is probably worth avoiding. It goes against common sense and good practice. Find another therapist, one with more integrity.

Yes, and it seems an overt display of contempt for women.

A therapist might have all sorts of views that one may or may not agree with. Once they cross the line into being a public activist, I'd not be able to work with them, even if those were views that accorded wth my own.

The more I think about OP’s dilemma, the more I come back to a PP’s comment about an Oscar de la Renta quote to women, ‘Walk like you have three men walking behind you’. He means walking confidently, assertively and sexily?

What a perfect example of a man being utterly oblivious to the real world women live in. The thought of three men walking behind me gave me a burst of anxiety and fear.

OP’s therapist has a (to me) surprising lack of genuine empathy. He can clearly talk the talk, but has no understanding, or perhaps no interest in women’s real-life concerns.

@LeftieRightsHoarder oh I don't think he's creepy or anything remotely like that. I think he might be the kind of liberal left wing bloke who supports every single "progressive" cause that comes along, is bright and articulate enough to convince people like me that he's got depth, describes himself as a feminist (he does!) without ever really REALLY thinking about what that means in the real world, and is himself a member of the queer community (he's gay) so wants to be an "ally".

Sweeping generalisation and speculation on my part. But after a year of working with him (I) I definitely don't think there's anything remotely creepy and (II) he's reasonably bright, based on how he's engaged with me. But obvs there are some serious fucking blind spots there and my teenage son has demonstrated better critical thinking skills on the issue.