It’s certainly great that you had a good experience with therapy.

That’s the only view that is popularized in the media or by the profession. I’ve not tried to file a complaint myself, although I have considered it, but people here have reported their experience with trying to file complaints, which is usually not a positive one, either. This forum does provide us a place to discuss our experiences. I believe the views and experiences expressed here should be taken into account, somehow and somewhere, by a profession that is licensed by our states and professes to have as its goal to “help” people. And I believe that consumers should have access to information about the potential for both the positive and the negative. There is plenty of the positive provided by the profession and by general attitudes in society.

For instance, doing a search on “how does psychotherapy work” I found the following from the American Psychological Association’s official website:

http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/unders...hotherapy.aspx

No mention of any potential negative effects. Yet, from my personal experience and what I have read from others with what seem to be similar experiences, many of us have ended up feeling more powerless, more damaged, more stigmatized, and more ineffective after therapy than before. We ended up with additional problems, while the ones we went to therapy with still remain. I believe that we need a place, somewhere, to try to recover our voices so that, maybe, eventually, we can lobby for the changes to the licensing, complaint, and informed consent practices that are needed to prevent or minimize bad experiences like we have had.