I battle depression and anxiety, and I once had an excellent therapist, but she has since moved on and the agency she was with will not tell me what happened to her or where she is located now. I have even tried doing an internet search, to no avail.

Since then, I have had a few therapists who actually left me wondering how they got to be a therapist at all!
I had one who talked non-stop, put words into my mouth that I never said, and told me all about her personal life! I walked out of there feeling very cheated.

Then another therapist I had was extremely negative, she would project her personal viewpoints on to my situations and wasn't always available to me. She told me that I didn't need to see her often, and she cut my sessions down because she thought "I could handle things on my own". I had a breakdown one weekend, and ended up in the hospital for 9 days. When I got out and contacted her, she practically yelled at me and asked me how I could let myself go so far downhill that I had to be put in the hospital! Now is this just me, or does this therapist sound insensitive? I stopped seeing her.

Now I am mistrustful and scared to even look for another therapist, for fear of something like this happening again. I also wonder if therapy is even healthy for me, since I would usually feel worse after a session rather than better. Does anyone else feel this way? I had someone tell me that therapy keeps you stuck in the past, and that dwelling on problems actually does make you worse. Any thoughts on this?

Thanks,
Sujin

[Sabrina]

I am reluctant to post as I highly value therapy for anyone that it works for. It just never ever worked for me. Perhaps I never found the righ therapist ... I don't know. I just know that at the very thought of having to talk to anyone face to face, I fold my arms, cross my feet and almost cast an iron wall between us. I am so resistant.

And I have also experienced a non-stop talker. Actually - I am using her for my son at the moment. She is so good with kids ....

I also used to feel somewhat worse after therapy instead of better.... again I am posting this reluctantly - I really do not wish to step on anyone's toes that has had success from therapy.

I guess I am just trying to say that I do understand and relate sujin.

If you are in the USA this is normal that the therapy agency will not disclose a past therapists whereabouts and contact information.

One reason is that in the USA there is a mental health ethics law that the therapist cannot have contact with the client until a designated amount of time passes from the date of the last therapeutic session. Here where I am that time fram is one year. The time frame varies depending on the states mental health ethics rules, Some as little as 6 months and some as much as two years, a majority of the states its one year.

Here in the USA agencies also leave it up to the therapist to let their clients know if contact is ok after t he time frame ends. It is standard protocal that the agencies do not give out ex therapists locations. they are therapists and not all clients are non violent and so on. this is a safety measure. If the therapist does not talk about after therapy relationships, then that therapist does not want contact with the cleints after they are no longer a persons therapist. So basically you are going to know all that you already know and nothing more about that therapist. Since the therapist did not discuss things with you personally when she left You will most likely not know any thing about her regardless of your efforts.

Feeling worse after a session is normal and kind of is what should be happening. A therapist is there to make you stop avoiding your problems and look at them from all angles. and if it didn't hurt to do this all of us clients would not be ignoring and stuffing our problems. Bringing hard to deal with situations out in the open where you can see all sides of it is going to hurt, basically because you are no longer stuffing your feelings down. In the therapy world there is a saying - things get worse before they get better. this is not because the client is becoming more insane but due to the client allowing themselves to feel. as you get better with taking care of your problems taking care of them doesn't hurt so much.

Alot of therapists do believe in the tough love type of approach. it isn't because they don't like you and are against you and so on. They do this when they see someone beginning to become too dependant on them as in beginning to expect the therapist to fix everything. A therapist can not fix anyones problems all they can do is be the tool - someone to listen and pointout the things the client is avoiding and giving them pushes when they don't do what is needed to take care of themselves. Therapists are like a couch going into a very important sports game. They talk, they listen and kick butt when needed but most of all expect the players (clients) to look at the goals and accomplish them, If the client does not accomplish the goals well the therapist has a choice to make continue with that client raising the bar of expectations or send them on to some other therapist. A therapy agency has waiting lists so they have a set time frame in which to accomplish the goals of teaching the client better coping tools so that they can take care of their problems. Most of the time now insurance agencys set that time frame of number of times that therapist will get paid wor working with that client and as some here have found out when the money is gone the agencys and therapists have no choice but to move on to those that can pay. I know its not a great system but we're stuck with it.

therapy does not keep clients stuck in the past. Clients keep clients stuck in the past. Some people are afraid of change and getting well.

A therapist and the therapy program is only as good as what the client brings into it. The first few sessions of therapy in the USA is the therapist and client setting down goals and plans to meet those goals. It is the clients responsibility to meet those goals that they and the therapist agreed on. If you have a client that goes into therapy not talking, not willing to keep the jounals, and not willing to try any suggestions that client is basically sabotoging their own therapy time. but if you have a client that is willing to try the suggestions and willing to talk about things and brainstorm with the therapist on ways to solve their own problems that client will accomplish the goals and will not be stuck in the past issues over and over again.

If you want a good therapy experience and your problems solved sit down with paper and pen before attending therapy and set your goals and what you are willing to do to accomplish those goals, and then follow through by taking that information to the therapy sessions and follow through with those ways you came up with to solve your problems and report back to the therapist if the ideas worked ofr not and how they did and didnt. By doing this you and the therapist can workon those ideas and change themor try other ideas that nay help. That is what therapy is - setting your goals and accomplishing those goals with a neutral person who can point out areas you may be missing and give you those pushes in the right direction when needed and yes sometimes getting those verbal kicks in the rear to get you back on track and keep you there.

[(JD)]

I don't blame you for being skitterish about finding another T. It's tough enough to find one, without having had poor experiences. Perhaps you need to look in a different area, or way. IDK if you are USA or elsewhere... but going through the Psychological Association is probably the best for finding more even keeled therapists (imo.)

IMO you have already played out the "odds" of poor "therapists" and should be able to find someone who is truly empathic and expert. Good wishes!

[HelgaDE]

Wow we almost had the same experience with therapists!

I don’t think I’ve ever experience having a good therapist. I had therapists wanting to use me as a therapist and expressing their own personal life with me, which of course made me felt worse then I originally came into their office. I had therapists who didn’t show me any gratitude and didn’t have the passion to want to help me. They obviously just wanted to collect from my insurance company.

I had worse psychiatrists. All of them that I’ve ever encountered were pill pushers who didn’t know how else to treat me other then polluting my body with dangerous mind controlling drugs that I didn’t really need. All of the psychiatrists that I’ve seen didn’t want to hear my problems, most of them actually told me to take it up to my therapist. They even check their watches! I found that most offensive as I came to them for help and all they could do is look at their watches to see if the time is up. This one psychiatrist in particular that I was seeing supposedly was thrown out of a private psychiatric hospital. He opens up his own office, which he wasn’t getting other new patients. I was his patient since his new office for about a month; it was more like the long distance. Amazing currently he’s a professor at Department of Psychiatry College of Osteopathic Medicine Nova Southeastern University Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. This shrink also gave me very addictive tranquilizers, Xanax / Alparazolam

I’ve basically gave up on both psychology and psychiatry all together.

The best therapy that you can ever receive is in meeting. People who have a drinking problem usually go to an AA meeting to get tools (THE 12TH STEPS) and to use those tools to stay clean.

[Sabrina]

My last psychiatrist told me at my first appointment that she was not a therapist or counsellor and that she did not have the time to listen to my problems. She told me her primary function was to prescribe medication best suited to helping with "those problems". Needless to say, the last time I saw her was more than a year ago when she administered shock therapy because none of the medication she prescribed worked. The shock therapy didn't work either for that matter.

It will be a long, long time before I visit a psychiatrist again.

[HelgaDE]

Sabrina0805,
I could never understand the primary function of a psychiatrist other then to be a pill pusher. I do not understand how a psychiatrist can actually help people without having to have an hours worth of talk session. How can they diagnose people without allowing them to talk to them? It’s impossible! I strongly believe this is responsible for so many misdiagnoses.

IMO I feel that psychiatrists should be required to counsel their patients and to provide therapy in order for them to prescribe medication.

I’m with you Sabrina. It will be a very long time before I can trust psychiatrists and therapists.

Thanks to everyone who responded! I guess alot of us have had similiar experiences. As for Myself's advice, I am in the USA and I do understand the whole confidentiality policy. The problem was I was the one who terminated the therapy because at the time, I felt everything was going well and that I was moving out of the area. Then, about 2 years later when I tried to find her she was already gone.

I have to say that I have never really felt helped by any other therapist since then, and when I was in the hospital the other patients are the ones who were my support, certainly none of the staff. Also, I did do everything to connect with the other therapists, and I followed their advice, etc. I "did my homework" so to speak.

I just feel that with these other therapists I have had, they were insensitive and wanted to use me as their therapist, and when I say they were negative I mean they would tell me there was no way a certain situation would work out in my life, and when I proved them wrong they wouldn't know what to say! HA!

Also, the only coping skills I was given were things I already was doing, such as deep breathing, exercising, meditation, etc. (I did all these things in school as I was training to be a massage therapist)

Also, there is no excuse for my last therapist telling me that I didn't need to come in as often. She felt that because I was in school and getting good grades and in a good relationship that I didn't need therapy. I was never overly dependant on her, I just felt that I was in need of therapy.I was right, because things ended up falling apart and as I stated, I was admitted to the hospital. I didn't feel very comforted that she practically yelled at me for being in the hospital either.

As far as pyschiatrists go, I believe all they do is push medication, even when we are against it for one reason or another. I have heard many people complain about this, it seems the psychiatrists only function is to prescribe meds and not listen to your concerns or problems. I thought this used to be different, but I could be mistaken. Oh well, the journey of life is never easy all the time, but what I don't need are condescending mental health "professionals" making me feel worse. I always felt better with my first therapist, I stopped having nightmares, and I never felt worse after a session with her. So I do believe the other therapists were just not good at their jobs. Oh, and yes it is offensive when they are checking the clock constantly and acting distracted. Not professional at all.The "good" therapist I had would check the clock, but only when she felt it was nearing time to end the session. She always made me feel like I was her #1 priority. I wish her success wherever she is, she was not only professional, but a great person as well.

Sujin

[EJ711]

Sujin -

I just had an awful session with my p-doc. It was just a 25-min. medication monitoring session, but it resulted in about 7 of my childhood issues being triggered big-time.

I personally think that if you don't have a therapist that you connect with, you are better off not being in therapy.

EJ

[wisewoman]

Sorry EJ, hope you are finding some peace and solace.