I think this is one of those beliefs about therapy that many therapists also hold, but is becoming increasingly outdated. No, maintaining consistent, healthy boundarise does not necessarily mean a rigid 50 min session (or two) per week and nothing in between. Some clients have legitimate need for additional contact/support in order to benefit from therapy, and some therapists are willing and able to give that.

Not just 'some therapists' either. There are modalities developed to cover clients who aren't well served by the 'neutral'(=impersonal, distant) approach and/or rigid boundaries, such as DBT and Schema therapy for BPD (admittedly, I don't have first-hand experience, just read about them when researching my BPD diagnosis). Even the psychodinamic school is adapting and as far as I know even psychoanalysis has come a long way since Freud. So the intent to extend the limits of 'therapy' is there, even if the implementation is lagging behind.

As far as I know, treating clients outside the therapists competence is unethical, as is continuing treatment when it stops being beneficial to the client. It just seems that many therapists don't notice when those things happen.

That said, I think some degree of retraumatization is practically impossible to avoid, so I'd hesitate to call it unethical per se. I think where ethics (should, IMO, but do they?) come in is the precaustions taken to prevent it (or lack thereof), and the handling of it once it happened or possibly once the therapist becomes aware of it (or can be reasonably expected to).

Like, my xT was generally very conscientious, and I believe she did try very hard to stay professional and ethical when things started to go wrong, but she kept tripping in her counter-transference and insecurities, and ended up at least brushing against the limits of ethical behaviour, possiby straying outside, not sure. Fact is, the service she provided towards the end was far inferior to both what I needed and what she's capable of providing at her best. Which, OK, if she can't then she can't. BUT not recognising that? Leaving it to me to deduce that she doesn't have the skills to handle the situation and terminate the treatment? Fact 2, later she occasionally dropped admissions that 'it wasn't therapeutic' and 'retraumatised', then proceeded to gloss over the hurt this caused me and gave no sign of taking responsibility. As a fellow human being, I understand the defensiveness and cognitive dissonance, but as my therapist, this is outright betrayal. I do think therapists should be required to work on that, having the self-awareness to notice when they're doing harm and skills to mitigate the damage, or even turn things around before the relationship goes to hell.

Like your 'don't have the emotional resources' therapist - that's usually not something that comes as a sudden realisation, that tends to be a conclusion of a struggle - so why not do something before she reached her limit? Same goes for my T. Surely they had options beside trying to endure and then snapping when they couldn't anymore? That's the same stupid **** I do and my mother does. Surely there are healthy ways to communicate distress, and ways to de-escalate conflicts that clients are supposed to learn over the course of therapy? So why don't therapists learn them? Especially when they decide to work with traumatised / borderline clients, where anger and difficult countertransference issues are kind of common?