I'm sorry your last therapeutic relationship ended badly. I don't think every therapist can be turned into a bad one by a client at all, nor that there's inherent hypocrisy in seeing someone for help who can give it. The help isn't salvation, it's just two people working toward a goal, and they won't all be equally productive or positive pairings.

They're just people, trained people. They aren't always going to respond the way we want, or be perfect or handle everything ideally. But no, I certainly have not experienced and don't believe in that sweeping, pessimistic generalization.

I hope if you want one that you can have a corrective experience with someone new or find some other non-therapy process to get where you want to be, therapy can certainly be tough and disillusioning when it doesn't go well (and when it does!) but hopefully now that you understand therapists shouldn't be on a pedastal, idealized, it would be easier to maintain a relationship as an equal with one, if not every moment, in general.

I do think in part, this debate rests on how much power we have and credit ourselves with. I see myself as powerful. If we're talking about people who are impaired in some way, I see that differently. But I'm not at the mercy of my therapist, though her opinion may seem very important at times, I am really just placing myself in a situation to be helped and I have to be in charge of sticking with her, leaving her, changing our work together, etc. depending on how helpful I find the work and relationship to be. A bit like bdsm- I willingly submit, but it's always my perogative to stop. If my partner doesn't stop, they're not my partner, not within the role, they're a rapist. A therapist who is out of control isn't a bad therapist but a bad person if we're talking about extreme cases.