Having Lunch at Therapy Sessions

I am scheduled to have my first session with my new Therapist on Wednesday at Noon and since it is at Noon (i.e. lunchtime) it got me wondering if anyone on here has ever had lunch with their Therapist at Therapy sessions (or had lunch at session but maybe not with their Therapist having lunch at the same time), obviously I mean while in the Therapy room and not outside of it. I can remember when I saw a Therapist while I was in Junior and Senior High School she used to get me at lunchtime and I would have lunch (in a separate private room away from everyone else) during the session. I also was thinking that the reason why some Therapists have a session at Noon (rather than being on lunch at that time) is because some people who work during the day in the area may stop in once a week for a Therapy session at that time and have lunch during session. This probably isn't something that I would mention at the first session but sometime down the line I might mention it to her, and since I will have to eat out somewhere in the area anyways those days why not bring it to the session to eat.

I have had lunch sessions with my therapist. I eat, sometimes she eats. It works ok.

I've mentioned on here before that my T will sometimes schedule me during her planned lunch time. She always lets me know ahead of time that she will be eating lunch during our session and also says that it's fine if I want to bring my own lunch. I've never actually brought my lunch with me...but I might, some day. It would probably be good for me, as I kinda have issues with eating in front of other people. So, while I never have had lunch during a session, I know it's an option that I have.

I had lunch once with my psychologist but that was part of my eating disorder treatment.

My new psychologist, always has my sessions around lunch time but doesn't eat lunch during session. I would find it really off putting to be honest plus with the type of work we are doing us having lunch in session wouldn't work x

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My t invites me to eat in my session to.

T and i have eaten together many, many times. We have also gone out to lunch/ gone out for pizza/ gone out for ice cream/ etc.

I would not eat with a therapist. But I usually throw up before going or am very anxious while there. Even if I did not have that sort of reaction to the therapist, I still would not eat while trying to talk to the woman.
The only reason I can think of to eat at an appointment is if the client has to rush back to work or something. Otherwise, if it were me, I would simply eat after. I don't find, for me, it matters much if I eat at noon or 1 or 1:30 or whenever. It might matter if I were taking some sort of medication or had diabetes or something like that. I would not eat at an appointment with my accountant or other professional meeting either.
When the therapist eats is not my problem.

For some reason I think this borders on boundary lines.

Well if I was to ask her about it (which I am not planning on at the first session unless we are talking about something related to it), and if we were to do something along those lines it would only be maybe once a month, maybe the first Wednesday (provided that is the day that I see her) of each month is a Lunch Session.

This also happened when I was younger in Group Therapy (which we used to call Collage) we had snacks towards the end of every session.

It's not that I would care if I ate after Therapy (which would be around 1) its just that the Therapy Session comes at a good time for lunch so why not take advantage of it (and as I stated above it would not be every session so for the sessions that we don't have lunch I would eat afterwards).

I'm glad you have a healing relationship with your T, but I often think that you should preface your comments with "I have a highly unorthodox relationship with my therapist which basically breaks every normal therapeutic boundary rule."



Sorry if that sounds harsh. I've tried rewording it, but I'm not sure how else to say it.

I agree with Stopdog in that I wouldn't eat at my doctors office, or any other professional appointment, so I wouldn't eat in therapy. That said, if it was my lunch break and my only time to eat and I was starving, I might eat something small (like a muffin). Otherwise, I'd just eat in the car before or after the appointment.

RT- Not for Starry

My T several times has had snacks in front of me and offers me. However she does this on purpose to see how well I am doing around food.

Why does Starry's Therapist have loose boundaries.

I can see this with younger people, especially if you're in a school environment where the dynamic might be a little different.

But as an adult, l would never consider eating during therapy. Even if I go during my lunch break at work, which I have a few times, I'll usually just eat in my car while in transit. An extra early (say 6:30 am) appointment might warrent bringing coffee, but food seems out of place in any office.

It really does. This is very unorthodox, and really makes it a dual relationship.

I think it depends on what rules the therapist has about food in their office and what boundaries they have about eating in a session. There may be times when it is therapeutic to eat lunch in there but if they have an expensive carpet or whatever they may have a NO food boundary. I would ask the therapist ahead of time and, if they don't want food in their office, eat it after the session.

True and I definitely will ahead of time I just think that it might enhance the Therapy a bit (and it would come at a convenient time for us).

LCM T would eat with me. She'd eat in front of me when I wasn't eating, she'd cook in front of me. Once she gave me some bacon. I jokingly insulted her cooking and sat down and ate with her. She liked that and wanted me to do it again with my ED problems but I didn't.

Because of Starry's dx her therapist has to a different relationship to help her then most have with our therapists. Her therapist has been away for years and coming home soon for at least a little. She is very lucky to have a therapist like her current one and I don't believe that either have crossed boundaries of their therapeutic relationships.

RT--It seems like this whole idea is yet another way to try to control some aspect of the relationship/environment and is a distraction from the work.

For someone with ED, there could be very valid reasons for eating as a part of the therapy work in session.

I see it more as I do with my classes: I teach a class late in the day when all of us have been working without a break for 6 hours due to scheduling. I've told the students they are free to bring something to eat to class. But they generally bring something small, not a full course meal, and I usually refrain from eating more than a granola bar while setting up. Practicality rules in this case. But to twist a situation to include an activity that isn't necessary seems contrived.

feralkittymom- no I wasn't going for that at all in this post I just thought that it might be a useful tool given the time scheduled for the session and I have had lunch with Therapists in the past, so I know it is not unrealistic in the slightest. I do admit that some threads I start just to show that I want to push boundaries but this was not one of them.

So she goes away for long periods of time without seeing her at all and Starry doesn't see another Therapist in the time in-between.

Why is it necessary for her to add a disclaimer before discussing her therapeutic relationship? No one else has to...

Everyone has different therapeutic needs. Some people require strict boundaries; whereas others need a lack of boundaries in order to build trust and open up. There are also some situations where a client may have social anxiety or an ED, so the therapist crosses boundaries to help the client face those problems.

People get to choose who helps them and how. It is not up to others, in my opinion, to decide what works for someone else.
I don't understand why the op here would want to eat lunch with a therapist. It seems more trouble than it is worth to get food and carry it in to the office and eat while talking as well as being an inappropriate thing to do with a professional one is hiring under most circumstances to me.But, if op finds it useful, then he can see if the therapist minds and have at it if the therapist does not. Not the therapy I would engage in, but it could be useful to someone else. Who am I to say it is not good for op just because I would not want it?

Exactly stopdog, it is not something that I absolutely need to do but it is something in the back of my mind and if I do decide to bring it up I will spend a good amount of time deciding on if its the right thing to do or not (that's not to say that it might not just come out if we are talking about something along those lines) and if it is only going to be maybe once a month than I don't see any harm in it (and think that it could help enhance a relationship).