Hey. When I was working with psychologists at community mental health they were under considerable pressure to keep therapy within the 6-12 weeks timeframe. So initially... We would do this little assessment listing the symptoms I wanted help with (as targets for treatment) and then we would assess progress every 6 weeks. The therapists told me not to worry about termination - they could keep extending it for one, two, three years... They just needed to say that yes there had been some benefit and that I would profit from more time. I'm just telling you this to convey the notion that bookkeeping for third parties (community mental health, insurance companies) is one thing and what happens in therapy can be quite another. Do talk to him about this if you think he might feel pressured into terminating you, though. I'm fairly sure he isn't going to (he was happy about your changing insurance plans). But still, would be nice to check what he envisages...

Regarding the 'mental health is as important as physical health' thing I guess a couple of factors come into play... Is therapy for depression more like treatment for heart failure or treatment for a funny nose that one finds distressing or treatment for fertility... I just mean to say that it is jolly hard to find the comparisons and it is jolly hard to place therapy on the 'necessesary for survival' vs 'elective' continuum... Part of what comes into play (I'm fairly sure) is how objectively affective therapy has been shown to be. Then you weigh the cost of that effective therapy with the cost of effective treatments for conditions that are more clearly on the 'necessary' end of the spectrum and... Well... It is sad :-( But when you have a limited amount of resources and you have to decide how to allocate them across conditions... I can see why it is that health insurance companies are more keen on a quick visit to p-doc and some medication than they are keen on open ended therapy visits. It is hard... But... I can see it from both sides is all.