T's ethics

Is socializing with your T after therapy has ended ethical? I know that sex is a violation of the code of conduct but what about a friendly relationship that does not involves sex?

It's my understanding that it is unethical to socialize with your therapist while in therapy is unethical.

In BC a therapist needs to wait 6 yrs before socializing with a past client.

I've heard it is OK in the US after you've not been in therapy for 2 or more years.... then you can be friends.

fins

I assume one's T would be able to answer that. I don't think my T would particularly want to see me socially (or me, her!).

Mine wouldnt give me a time period just said it was in appropriate and against her ethics but that we would have been good friends IRL... Then decided to move to a "classier" facility, to do the same damn job, where I cant afford to go (part of the same parent center that services us poor folk) and just abandoned me completely right after she hospitalized me for suspected suicidal concerns she had about me.

No new t set up, no "plan" for what I am to do or any real help (mostly due to me refusing to go through the h*** I went through to trust her to begin with again as I have extreme closeness/abandonment fears we hadnt even begun to work through). She left me a packet of phone numbers and names and a letter with a few more resources I could use if I so choose.

Also have to quit my meds because I cant afford them and the lady whose number she gave me to help get my meds free/cheap tells me that even with assistance it'll cost me about $30 for all my meds and that the pdoc is the only one that can decide whether I can come off them or not. I'm like I have no choice, cant afford them...

To h*** with it, I am self-destructing...

Wow - I've never been aware of this. Wonder what the laws are in South Africa? Time to do some research

I think the research part is good sugahorse. It sounds like ethics are different in different parts of the world.

In a city or big centre I don't think socializing would be so much of problem because there are so many people in the area. However, I use to live in a small town and ran in the same circles as most of the therapists in town. That is when ethics can be sketchy.

In the U.S., different professional organizations have different guidelines, with different lengths of time required. So the American Psychological Association may have one set of guideliness and the Family Therapists professional association another. (There are at least a half dozen of these organizations. I looked at the guidelines of quite a few on a similar question, and the guidelines vary a lot.) I recommend looking at the guidelines for the associations your T aligns with.

I have a friend who has a shamanistic T, and she told me that part of how that therapy works is that you do include socializing outside of therapy (while therapy is still going on). So she and her T have dinner together every month or so. Usually they cook for one another at their homes, but sometimes they go out.