Hey,

Your post is really concerning, as it seems like this therapist is, as you say, unprofessional and unethical for a therapist. It may be acceptable to a mental health social worker or something who is out in the community and who is not a trained therapist.

Most always 5 or sometimes 10 mins late- this is not on. Therapists are supposed to be relieable, that is how they build up trust, through consistancy. Always being late can send out a message to clients that they aren't important enough and really she has no excuse whatsoever. It is unethical and harmful to clients. If she cannot make it to her appointments in time then she has to change something about her working day, she cannot impose this inconvience on clients. If your paying then this is even worse, however it is still not right even if your not paying.

Her cell phone is on a ringer that when someone calls it interrupts session - so she is not even fully "with you" in your session if she can be distracted by phonecalls. Therapy is about the therapist being there with you 100% during the time they spend with you. It sounds like she actually answers the phone when it rings, is this right? Either way further disruption to your session after her being late is not appropriate at all.

She acts in family sessions not sure what to do when im highly angry or emotional in family sessions , like she will make a face showing that to my mom during some sessions - I'm not sure I fully understand what you mean here but if you feel she doesn't know what she's doing or putting on an act then this really affects how much your going to have faith in her competency. If she is making faces to your mum this is also totally disrespectful as she is supposed to be there primarily for you, even in family sessions as you are her client so again very unprofessional and unethical.

A lot of the times she makes a lot of claims with my insurance company - What are these claims about? Is she trying to extort money from you or your insurance?

She does not wear professional clothes at times, kinda like a teenager fashion wanna be- Someones dress can impact on their clients e.g being dressed too professionally can be intimidating to some, whilst dressing too casually may cause people to assume the therapist is less professional, even if its not the case. Really the counsellor can wear what they want and if this was the only problem you had with her I wouldnt be worried as casual clothing doesnt mean someone is unethical or unprofessional. However this is an issue for you as you have mentioned it so it is still important.

Does not really explain things as well treatment wise - If you cannot understand her then there is an issue as you arent gaining what you could from therapy. Are you able to ask her to repeat herself? May I also ask if you have seen her qualifications to be a therapist as from what you are saying she seems very poorly trained or very unprofessional to say the least.

Believe she is getting her husband who is a psychiatrist to reach out to me because she thinks i would benefit from meeds ,when i refuse to take them - Completely unethical 100%, especially if her husband is not your psychiatrist? Even so having a therapist and psychiatrist (who are husband and wife) working together on 1 client seems unethical also. Plus the fact that she is getting her husband to "reach out to you" implies she is talking to him about your situation which breaks confidentiality which she could be repremanded for as it completely breaks the ethical code of therapy.


What should i do ? and is this right what she is doing ?should i change therapist or report her?

From what you have said she sounds like someone who is detremental to your health. She doesnt even sound like she is properly trained and if she is then she has obviously decided to discard following the ethical rules. You have a few different options here
1. take these points to the next session and get some straight answers from her. If you are not happy with her reponse, then you can leave.
2. Leave without returning and find a new therapist, however this may leave unfinished bussiness for yourself
3 Ask your family or mum what she thinks of her and tell her how you feel about your therapist
4. Ask to see her qualifications or if you know she is registered with a theraputic association and you have decided to not go back to her then I would definately report her. She seems highly unprofessional and dangerous to vulnerable clients

I am sorry you have had to put up with such behaviour from someone claiming to be a therapist!

I am currently studying counselling which is basically the uk/europe word for therapy and we have spoken a lot about ethics so i am basing my answer on this.

Dizgirl xxx