My individual T has never disclosed anything about her mental health, and she seems pretty mentally healthy. It was harder to trust her at first, since I just had this sense she had some perfect life.

My marriage counselor disclosed early on that he has an anxiety disorder, plus, later, some issues from childhood with his father being emotionally unavailable. His disclosing that made me trust him more and made me feel like he could understand me better (anxiety is one of my main issues) because it's not just from what he's learned, but from personal experience. I definitely do feel like he understands me better than T (I think I puzzle her sometimes, him less so). I'm not sure if it's because of the mental illness, general personality, learning/experience (though T has 15 years of that on him), but probably some mix of all of those.

Not a mental health condition, exactly, but I also did know he was grieving the loss of his wife earlier this year. He hadn't intended to tell us, and at the time I didn't understand that. But now, I get it, because there were a few things I was reluctant to bring up because of stuff he later told us about her health issues (once we'd learned she'd passed). It did help me understand why he seemed sort of different for a few months there--otherwise I would have assumed it was more to do with me. So I guess it was both good and bad.

So to me, learning about past or lifelong mental illness struggles--good. Learning about an a acute period going on during the course of therapy--maybe less good.