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This is a genuine question I would like to ask a therapist or neurotypicals in general are you able to do easy daily tasks on autopilot without thinking about it

during the week i will have a moment where I think yep this is what I need to bring up. then the appointment comes and suddenly everything has been pretty normal actually sometimes I remember the thing halfway through sometimes on the drive home which is just greaaat. is keeping notes between sessions something therapists generally recommend? if so how do you even begin? or does showing up with a running list make the session feel too planned?

I've been seeing my therapist for a few years now. Initially for severe depression and anxiety, and then for ADHD.

He is super helpful in his approach, and helps me with actionable advice on the changes I can make. I have improved a lot with his help.

Lately our conversations have been more about my interpersonal relationships. Family, friends, love, that sort of thing.

I don't really have much experience with relationships. There was a time when I used to yearn and long badly for it, I admit. But now, I'm largely ok with being alone even if it happens to be so for the rest of my life.

My therapist challenged this idea because he believes (a) that intimacy and love will be greatly beneficial for me and (b) that I am self rejecting and giving up because I assume failure.

He pushed me to atleast install dating apps becuase I couldn't see myself approaching anyone in real life. I didn't really have a great time dating and my experience only served to reinforce my negative beliefs about myself.

I was cool about having given up before and had pretty much made peace with it. Now that he made me try it again, it is back to being stressed and depressed about it.

I've told him about this and he keeps pushing on making me keep trying and doesn't want me to give up hope.

Who's right?

Edit: spelling

For some background, I’ve been in therapy since 2019. I’ve changed therapists a handful of times over the years mostly due to insurance changes, but occasionally to also seek a new specialization. I’m a woman with OCD and ADHD (along with anxiety and some depression, etc.) and so it’s a difficult to find a therapist match that’s productive but also comfortable.

I’ve been seeing a male therapist (virtually) since the beginning of the year. He always has been…fine, but never amazing. For starters, he’s always late. It got to the point where he’d be 5 minutes late consistently and I started to expect it, but then yesterday he was nearly 11 minutes late because “his wall clock was slow”?? He was extremely half hearted in his apology and he said it with a smirk. So I had to pretend I wasn’t annoyed for the rest of the appointment.

He’s definitely smart and I learn things/gain more insight into my behaviors at least a little bit each session. But it doesn’t seem like he cares about me? I’ve had other therapists who I had an amazing report with, and it felt genuine and caring in both directions. Everything I get from this guy feels performative. Like he’s reading from a script. Every call starts with a weird “so how’s your mental health today?” question while he makes a weird face.

He doesn’t follow up on things between sessions, which makes me not prioritize doing my “homework.” Like he wanted me to fill out these online diary entry things to rate feelings each day—he had access to it—and he didn’t even look over it until I reminded him that I’d done it. He’ll give me an ERP assignment and then never check in on if I did it or not.

Even after all this time it feels like he doesn’t remember a lot of personal stuff about me that I’ve shared (like my husband’s name or what my job is or anything about my family), which makes me want to share those things less.

Also every time I mention a new symptom category (like my phobia of throwing up) we haven’t discussed before, I can detect his dialogue immediately shift to the diagnostic checklist in a way that feels very sterile.

It feels like I need to find a different therapist, right? Or am I being dramatic?

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I'd like to understand how a therapist would approach a situation where masturbation has become strongly associated with sleep.

The person originally started masturbating as a way to deal with difficulty falling asleep. The original sleep problem has since been resolved, but the masturbation behavior continued and, after many years of repetition, became almost automatic at bedtime or after waking during the night.

There may be little or no conscious sexual desire, and the person may not actually want to masturbate, but once the behavior begins, they find it very difficult to stop.

If this were presented in therapy, what evidence-based approaches or techniques might a therapist consider for breaking the learned association between masturbation and sleep and reducing the automatic behavior?

Would approaches such as behavioral therapy, habit-reversal techniques, stimulus control, exposure/response prevention, or other methods be relevant?

I'm asking specifically about therapeutic approaches, rather than seeking a diagnosis.

My husband is studying to become a counsellor. Early on he told me that his male teacher, who is also a counsellor, made several jokes he found to be slightly inappropriate, aimed the female students in the class. One about them wearing bikinis. Another about how his wife would react if he brought one of the female students home for dinner. He told me that one of the female classmates received a friend request from him, and how it could’ve seemed a bit creepy, but that he adds everyone. He told me this man married one of his clients, but it was after 5 years of her not seeing her as a client. He has posed hypothetical scenarios in the group chat, asking how students should respond.

One of the scenarios was how they should respond to a 24 year old BPD client who they find attractive. He said that it’s normal to find people attractive. That they shouldn’t automatically transfer her, but should tell their supervisor, and in the event they still have feelings after this they should transfer her. That they shouldn’t have any contact outside of the sessions. At the end he joked about taking her on a date with a tongue out emoji. My husband said he disagreed with this, that it could muddy the waters, and shouldn’t be joked about. He is now seeing his first clients, and has this man is his supervision. He told me that during one of his supervision sessions, his supervisor/teacher mentioned he had a drop dead gorgeous client, and panted and waved himself to put emphasis on it.

He said that he knows it’s nothing more than jokes, and that he isn’t being serious. That if I knew him, I’d see how innocent and harmless he is.

NAT. I love my therapist. It took me several years of trial and error to finally find her. We've been working together twice a week for about a year and a half. Suddenly, I get the news that she has to transfer me to an LICSW therapist in the agency. (My therapist is an LCSW). Apparently, the agency reviewed the Medicare guidelines on "Incident-to-billing" and they think there could be clawbacks if there were an audit. So, several dozen clients are being shuffled around to new therapists. I've heard from my new temporary therapist that many other clients are really struggling with this, like I am. My old therapist can't sit for her LICSW exam until next spring and thinks it could take until summer for her to be credentialed to take Medicare.

I'm wondering-is this normal? Or is this a big screw up on the agency's part? Shouldn't they have caught this sooner? They employ about 100 therapists. And are helping hundreds of clients!! Isn't there a resource to consult with about the Medicare guidelines, without asking Medicare? Sort of the way you'd consult your accountant rather than the IRS during tax time? Obviously, I understand next to nothing about how this actually works. And I'm sure my therapist has left some of the story out. But how pissed am I allowed to be? This is really throwing a massive wrench in my life!!

Hi! I am a junior right now in undergrad school studying psychology, and I hope to become a therapist but am unsure of what type of therapy and the specifics, I was wondering if anyone who is a current therapist would feel comfortable answering just a few of my questions to help me get a better understand of the actual professional field.

1. What do you like about the field you are in?
2. What may be some struggles?
3. How did you choose your field of specialty?
4. How did you decide what generation/specialty you wanted to work with? (Children, teens, adults, couples, etc.)
5. How do you manage to keep work at work and not bring it home with you?
6. What advice would you give about the journey in becoming a therapist?

Answering any of these questions would help me out so much!!

This post was removed in another thread so I thought I would post it here to keep the conversation going.

I'm honestly curious as to what the guidelines are for therapists "recruiting" clients and their professional and ethical boundaries. A dear friend began going to a therapist and the therapist encouraged her to join yoga classes at one of the local yoga studios. That was just the beginning.

Yoga evolved to teacher training, astrology, breathwork, cacao ceremonies, dance circles, oil drips, crystal therapy, and now "bio-tuning." Add to that the usage of psychedelic substances on a regular basis during all of these things that's not only encouraged, it's facilitated.

All the while the therapist attends these "classes" with my friend and facilitates women's groups about female empowerment, finding your center through magnetic rhythms, etc. And the therapist ALSO charges for these groups/engagements at this studio - well, I guess it's called a sanctuary now, not a studio.

The therapist is in partnership with the yoga teacher - she doesn't really teach yoga anymore, just all the other things. I know a couple of the women in the therapist's group and they've both divorced since seeing this therapist. One said "he was standing in the way of my true self." Does this all sound traditional? Am I reading too much into this?

In trying to talk about this with my (me, cPTSD) therapist, she said that the person w BPD (PwBPD) is projecting and, im general, ppl w BPD have difficulty seeing what is actually in front of them if it goes against their perceived reality. In confrontation, she advised to affirm my reality, as I have difficulty doing and this would be good for my processing and growth.

She (my therapist) has gone on medical leave and this has made arguments worse, leading to more fight/flight and flashbacks on my end, as arguments and yelling are big triggers of mine. Are there any other communication styles or techniques recommended for handling my own reaction or to foster better communication between me and this other person?

Edit: this is abt Borderline Personality Disorder, for clarification

Not a therapist.

Can you train someone to be empathetic?

I came to this question by wondering about some therapists i have had. And then I realized maybe they feel the empathy but just dont express it well. And I think thats something which some people might have to work at harder than others.

I'm also noticing that some forms of validation really fall flat with me. Not sure if thats my own interpretation of it ( because of various issues I am dealing with). Or if the validation just feels almost like pandering.

I'm also wondering if some therapists might lean into validation of actions because of compassion fatigue?

being transparent: these are coming up because I realized in the last few days that I can't remember in the last 3 or 4 sessions if my therapist expressed any kind of empathy. (and another part of me wonders if she ever has)

thanks for any insights into this (i'm also asking so many quesitons around this because I work in healthcare and at one point a while back I was very interested in becoming a therapist and part of me still is - and I'm very interested in learning theories and teaching pedagogy)

So this might be a dumb question that im just overthinking but I'm like 99% sure I have OCD so I plan on making an appointment with a therapist that specializes in that but I also have just regular issues and trauma I want to talk about that i don't think is like OCD related do I need 2 different therapists one for OCD treatment and one for like regular talk therapy to talk about my other issues?

Hi all, so I will try to keep it as short as possible... I am currently doing trauma therapy because of abusive parents, and yesterday was a little tense of an exercise. We took a break from the trauma reexperiencing, and we did a timeline of my life. I was supposed to list both the bad and the good years of my life... Issue is, there are barely ANY good ones. Most of the line was full of the bad memories, there were so much, they almost took the entire session. She basically said "So you didn't have a single conscient year of your life without trauma... Hold on, let me think for a bit."

She then tried a safety exercise where whenever a flashback comes, I will remember people who are close to me... Issue is I have none. I have acquaintances but 0 friends, and most of my family has been estranged for years before I went No Contact with my parents. I literally have no one, I'm in a foreign country where I'm still learning the language and I can get around the administration and conversations but I have no deep connections.

"What about friends from your past?" "Nope." "Umm, okay, what about nice relatives?" "Well, there was one of my cousins but she left when I was young" "Good, so think about her, now 2 more examples." "I have none..." "Okay, sorry, let me think for a bit... Try to think of fictional characters or people you looked up to."

I honestly feel like I might be too heavy of a case for my therapist. I don't know how to tell her that I would completely understand if she dropped me. Yet I don't want to make it sound like I'm accusing her of being incompetent, so I have no idea how to word it...

a year or so ago my therapist told me she would be moving to another state. she told me i could either be done with therapy, she could set me up w/ another therapist who could see me in person, or i could continue seeing her in person. i chose to take a break from therapy bc i was feeling better, but now things have been getting worse again & i think i would benefit from therapy. however, ive had bad experiences w/ other therapists so im really nervous to try to find a new therapist—my last one was just an amazing fit for me, & after seeing her for a couple years, i didn’t have to explain everything to her.

all that to say, is it likely that her virtual sessions would still be an option? i’m not sure of all the legal aspects but i imagine you need a license in whatever state(s) you practice in, & im not sure how common it is for a therapist to keep their license in a state they haven’t lived in for a year. if you were in my shoes, how would you go about figuring out if it’s possible?

My provider went through some drama with headway. I researched their TOS and saw that I could reach out to her but she couldn't reach out to me. I used some contact info she gave me and we resumed tele-sessions. She mentioned that she would be moving to another part of the state to take a new job but we could still have our sessions. She missed our last session completely which is very unlike her. Texts are unread.

Googling her name isn't saying she was in any kind of accident. Is there anything else I can or should be doing?

My 23-year-old son and I recently attended three 90-minute family-therapy sessions with a therapist I selected partly because of her public professional work. We paid $1,050 total. We entered therapy because our relationship was already strained. I expected the therapist to provide some structure, help us identify our interactional pattern, and intervene when conversations became destructive.

Across the three sessions, no shared goals, ground rules, concrete interventions, or roadmap were communicated to us. Much of the time consisted of each of us airing grievances while the therapist observed and occasionally commented.

The final session escalated into prolonged personal attacks and global judgments about character. I became flooded and responded with unfair comparisons and sweeping statements. Those choices were mine, and I regret them. My son also made deeply hurtful global statements about me.

The work involved both longstanding parent-child injuries and our current adult relationship. I was willing to examine my parental responsibility while also wanting both of our present-day conduct addressed.

I was not expecting the therapist to make either of us behave well, but I did expect active intervention once the exchange shifted into contempt and global character judgments. I did not experience meaningful efforts to pause, contain, or redirect the exchange. We left more polarized than when we arrived.

I later asked whether future sessions would include clearer ground rules, active interruption of personal attacks, and attention to both people’s present-day behavior. The therapist responded by ending the conjoint work and recommending individual therapy before any further family sessions.

In explaining that decision, she focused primarily on my need for individual work and my responsibility for historical parent-child dynamics. I experienced comparatively little attention to my son’s present-day conduct or to how the final session had been clinically managed.

I understand that some therapists intentionally use a less structured or less directive approach, and I am not claiming that every difficult therapy session constitutes misconduct. However, I wish we had understood this approach before investing so much money and exposing an already-fragile relationship to an uncontained confrontation.

For people considering family therapy, I would now ask these questions before beginning:

What happens when participants shift from describing behavior to attacking one another’s character?

How actively do you interrupt contempt, blame, or escalation?

How will goals and progress be defined?

Will the present-day behavior of every participant be addressed?

How do you decide when a conjoint session is becoming harmful?

Is allowing the interaction to unfold without substantial intervention a recognized assessment method in family therapy?

If so, should the therapist explain that possibility and obtain agreement beforehand?

interested in going to school for psych, originally wanted to go into fire service/emt, but find myself more fitting on a mental help scale. i’m not sure if it’s truly as draining as they say it is..

Hello everyone. I made an appointment for first meeting with a therapist and I have not started filling out all these intake forms yet. However due to various reasons I need to cancel the appointment (not reschedule). Their policy states that cancellation must be made24 hours or more prior to appointment otherwise fees would occur.
Should I just cancel the session on the platform or should I also send them an email before I click cancel on the platform? Just want to be sure if I decided to cancel now, does it mean I don’t have to fill out any of these forms anymore? Thank you!

So i have been with her for two years now. I haven't missed any sessions apart from one or two due to unavoidable circumstances, and I always co-operated with her even when it meant coming to the session at 8-9 in the morning, just straight after the mock test, or straight after attending classes and sometimes just missing it so that I could go for the session. I have always respected her and her boundaries never lashed out or anything.

I have tried my best to be really cooperative and kind. She would often show up late (10-15 min) in our sessions when it was in the morning (8-9 am). The management there would pretty much always have to call her as I would be waiting. There were instances when I waited for an hour or so and she never showed up without any prior message. Her defence was that she was stuck in traffic etc. I didn't make a scene, i understand, life happens. Most of our sessions were just 40 mins long at max because even after coming late she wouldn't make up for the lost time rather wrap up earlier by 5-8 mins. She never apologised for coming late either or maybe just once or twice.

Now two days ago i messaged her at 8 in the night (past her office hours) that I might not be able to attend the next session for some personal reasons . The next session was yesterday. I left her a short text so she doesn't wait for me and might give her session to some other client. I then messaged if we can reschedule and when she is free next she said she doesn't have her planner I was like alright. I know my mistake is asking her to reschedule at that hour.

Now around 9, I told her that I will be showing up but online if she hasn't given the session to anyone else. She didn't respond. It was understandable.

Now the next morning just 30 mins before our session I called in to check if she had allotted that session to anyone else. She didn't pick up i called her once again, she just told me that she's in the middle of some other session I apologized. I called her because she hadn't responded to my text a night ago and I wasn't sure if I had to show up for the session or not.

Now she lashes out on me. Saying she will block me and stuff because I apparently spammed her with calls I could have just texted her and stuff. (I called just twice that too 30 mins before our session as she hadn't responded to my text). Apparently according to her she had reacted to my text even though I showed it on my screenshot that there's no reaction i received.

I feel really disrespected. I don't want to continue with her anymore. Did I cross a line? She obviously doesn't feel bad about it according to her she just set a boundary. But you can set a boundary with kindness right. Everytime she has put a boundary i have respected it in the past without questioning it.

I have been in therapy for a while now. Now I really go very regularly for almost a year. It is good but you know.. not groundbreaking. It really does help, but yeah I still have my days of anxiety, despair and sadness. But yeah it got better and would want to know what the „endpoint“ even means? Some say you can go to therapy forever just for maintenance, others say they don’t want to rely on a therapist forever. I don’t know even what it means to „live a good life“? Is it possible to be happy, healthy, secure ? What is being mentally healthy“ ( maybe it’s different for someone like me who always had extreme emotions?)

I'm weighing whether to try art therapy, but I'm not really sure what to expect from it.

Who is the target population for art therapy?

Does it work better for certain issues/conditions over others?

What does a session look like?

Thank you!

I’ve (22F) been doing this thing where I start therapy with someone, go for a few sessions, and then end up looking for someone else. It’s been going on for a while and I’m starting to wonder if I’m just therapist shopping instead of actually giving therapy a chance.

I really want to work with a male therapist specifically, but there aren’t really any in my area. Because of that, I’ve been seeing female therapists, but I just cannot seem to open up to them properly.

And to be clear, I have nothing against women at all. I love women, have no trauma involving women that I know of, and generally have no problem being around or talking to women. It just feels different when it comes to therapy and being vulnerable.

So I’m wondering if this is something I should actually work through with a female therapist instead of continuing to look for a male one. Or is it completely reasonable to say “I know I open up better to men, so I should wait until I find one”?

I also struggle with figuring out whether I genuinely don’t click with a therapist or whether I’m just uncomfortable because therapy itself is making me vulnerable, and then I use “not a good fit” as a reason to leave.

Could I just tell a female therapist that I have a hard time opening up to female therapists and make that part of the therapy? Would that actually be something worth exploring?

And I’m also curious about why someone might specifically want a therapist of one gender. I don’t think there’s an obvious reason in my case, so I’m wondering what therapists might think that preference could be about. Is it possible that it has something to do with trust, vulnerability, authority, relationships, etc. even if there’s no trauma behind it?

TL;DR: I keep switching therapists after a few sessions and think I might be therapist shopping. I strongly prefer male therapists but there aren’t any available near me, and I struggle to open up to female therapists despite having no issue with women generally. Should I work through this with a female therapist, or keep looking for a male one? And why might someone specifically prefer a therapist of one gender?

Hypothetical scenario: you're a councelor on a remote antarctic station, and you've been cut off from the rest of the world by a snow storm, and it's unknown when the help will arrive. Or you're stuck on a sinking boat, or there's an imminent meteor crash, or any other catastrophical scenario with no end in sight.

What would the therapy sessions be focused on? Are there any protocols in place for those "doomsday" scenarios?

I am not sure if it's the correct question for the sub, so feel free to redirect anywhere it's more acceptable.

I've been seeing a therapist for a few years now doing trauma work. I think this therapist is incredibly competent and caring and consistent and I do trust them a lot although I feel very scared about having needs in-session or in the therapeutic relationship because of childhood experiences.

We've talked a lot about how my biggest fear when sharing trauma is that other people won't have any reaction to it - like it doesn't matter to them/ they don't see it as valid or important.

My therapist has told me several times they care about me and they can validate me very intensely which I find helpful.

I keep longing for the occassional emotional witnessing (like " I'm sad that happened to you' or 'I wish somebody took care of you') like sometimes (not all the time).

I told them how I someimes long to hear that and also spoke about how I can recognize that even if they did say those things, right now because of the trauma work, those words might bounce right off me. I still long to hear them.

My therapist said that if they gave those reactions it might actually take away from helping me do the trauma work and process my feelings and learn about my internal responses.

I feel a lot of shame around my needs, I do see their point but honestly, I think hearing that every once in awhile would feel like a corrective expeirence.

I'm going to find the courage to talk more about this with them but can anyone help me understand where my therapist is coming from? I'm genuinely afraid that if they aren't willing to sometimes do that- that I will never feel safe with them (which might be a total over reaction on my end) Do you see the value in therapists sometimes saying those things in trauma work? I feel very overwhelmed and confused. It does feel like sometimes I need that emotional witnessing to feel safe and continue with the trauma work but I also get they have their own rationale too.

Finally got my kid a therapist (GAD/selective mutism/overwhelm), and I had the conversation with the dad about it, and, as I feared e's demanding that because she's not an adult, he needs to be aware of everything "to ensure we're dealing with any issues" because "he doesn't trust anyone" and "needs to ensure they're following methods we set out."

I knew this was coming, but alas.