To me itīs not so much about payment or not payment, itīs the fact that the hug canīt be mutual as my counselor is in a professional role and Iīm in a private role.
Iīll always be the dependent one, at least emotionally, and even if my counselor hugs me back it wonīt be as comforting as if she gave me a spontaneous hug.
Degrading situation happens when I try to give her a hug and she is about to turn round to take a seat or when I for example wait for her to greet her with a hug. That doesnīt mean she dislikes the hug, itīs the lack of mutual initiative, that she sometimes hugs me first and sometimes I hug her first. That doesnīt happen and by that perhaps itīs better to just smile and say "hello" and just go inside the room and take a seat.
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Originally Posted by ruh roh
I don't know, Bud. I can't know how my therapist feels, and she is the only one I could even try to make a guess about. She's helped me a lot, so if she feels disgrace over getting paid for that, I would be bothered.
That said, I have seen others who should feel ashamed for having taken my money, but that's a separate issue and has more to do with who they were as people/professionals. But since the OP isn't paying this counselor, I'm not sure how any of this applies. I guess I tend to think that we bring our feelings about ourselves to therapy where they can be made worse, and (if the therapist isn't horrible) eventually worked through.
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