Do You Believe Them?

Okay, I'm kind of curious. Whether it be your Pdoc, therapist or other mental health professional.. Do you believe them when they say they want to help you?

If the answer is yes, why?
If the answer is no, why?

And if it's sort of or other, elaborate please.

Yes, whether she likes to or not it is her job to help me. Doesn't mean she cares or anything else. I think that now we have been working together for years she probably cares a bit as well, but I pay her to help me!

With therapists it is different. I have just started therapy so I don't trust her yet. But with psychiatrist hell no. They are psycho and just outright evil.

Do I believe 'them'. I can't speak for 'them' as a whole, but the therapist I have I believe. You can't fake this sort of stuff.

I'm lucky. I have neither a therapist nor a psychiatrist but a mental health specialist nurse. Which is actually way better then having a psychiatrist. I don't feel like he is trying to play mind games with me therefore I don't play them with him I think I have the best of both words to which I am grateful for. Although I choose 'no' in the poll because well, I don't yet. I'm sure I will when I get to know and trust him more because I like him a lot because I actually connect with him and he is kind and caring. It's what I need.

Yes, I believe my T when he says he wants to help me. My psychiatrist is also my therapist, and he is good at what he does. He never plays mind games, he is straight with me, he speaks my language, and he has helped me immensely. He's no saint and no mind reader, I'm sure he is not the one and only T who could ever have helped me, but he's a good match for me and I can work well with him. He clearly takes pride in doing his job well, and I frankly don't see why anybody would be working with broken sad desperate people all day long, and be constantly available to these people by txt message, if they did not want to help them. Especially since psychiatry, psychotherapy, and other mental health professions are badly paid compared to other medical professions (in my country, and especially in my county). Only a masochist or somebody with an overinflated ego would be interested in that, and my T is neither.

Seriously, why would anybody say that and lie about it?

Yes, for so many reasons.

If it weren't someone I could trust, I would not call that person my therapist.

In the particular case of my T, he has given me many strong reasons to trust him.

I also really relate to the desire to help the clients, so I believe them because of that also.

I also know many therapists personally and I trust them and I've seen them struggle with clients and care and do their best to help.

My "innocent until proven guilty" policy might also come into play here.

On the other hand, I do know therapists who are unethical, unprofessional, say they care but don't act like it, or don't even bother pretending that they care. So to me it's no question about trusting therapists generally. It's a question of trusting certain ones who have proven their trustworthiness.

I do believe my T when he says he wants to help me, but I think he wants to help me because it is his job. He decided to be a T to help people in general. I don't think he wants to help ME anymore than he wants to help his other clients if that makes sense.

I don't know...it's a job. As with any job, of course they want to succeed and do it well. I am sure that they DON'T want to screw up and mess you up worse...but I think our version of "helping" and theirs is very different.

I checked, yes.

I do believe, they want to help. Who'd want that type of job, if they didn't? Can you imagine? All day, every day?

And even PDocs, to me, like all other doctors, are in the field, because they have a sense of helping others. MD, comes after my pdoc's name.

I have no reason, to believe, pdoc nor t, have intentions of bringing harm to me. So, yes, I feel they want to help.

As some have already said. I do trust my T because it's his job and he said that he likes his job, especially moments when he manages to really help... Thus, of course he wants to help me but I don't think that he wants to help me more than other clients (ok, maybe he would be a little more proud of himeself if he helps me as I'm his "worst case" - he actually used this description )

Yes, I believe my Pdoc genuinely wants to help me.

- He has waived all fees, because of my financial situation

- He took me on despite the clinic he runs/works for not usually handling long term cases

- He has never played mind games with me

- He has always treated me with respect

- The one time we had a bad session, he took ownership of his role in that, explained himself and apologised

- He has never given me any reason not to trust him

- He gets so endearingly happy whenever I've made progress, but at the same time he also shows compassion and empathy when I'm not doing so good

Yes she has proven it time and time again, its a different story with a new t which I am suppose to start working with alone on jan 30th, I met her yesterday and I found I have not connection with as of yet

I totally believe that my T wants to help, sometimes it seems that he desperately does. I just get the sense that he often is not quite sure how to go about it.

Like Healed said I believe that he wants to help because it is his job and he likes to help people in general.

I think in general therapists want to think they help. I don't find it specific to me exactly. So I believe they want to help in general. I doubt the woman has an urge to help me specifically. She may want to help clients, I am a client, hopefully I will find some helpful use for her - sort of thing.

No, not anymore. Not after what I've been through.

I answered before I read the full question... haha.

I read "Do you believe them?" and that was it, so I clicked sort of. I believe that my T wants to help - that's his job. I do not believe that he actually cares about me personally, and I don't always believe the things he says about me.

I don't know why they would either have/want to tell me that or have a reason to lie if they did.

I think they choose which clients they want to stick with and really help while the other clients they just put up with to get a paycheck and don't care much either way.

Absolutely. The proof is in the pudding as they say. They've demonstrated their commitment to my well-being consistently for over 9 years.

I picked "sort of" because I sometimes believe that's so and sometimes not. My T has been super consistent over the past year - he's never canceled a session on me, is never late, always does a good enough job of keeping focus where it probably needs to go - I mean, it's ridiculous. But I always go back to maybe he just wants to be a "good therapist" in my mind. Like he has to figure me out and crack the case, if you will. It's so funny because he told me recently he just wants me to have a good experience, to help me wherever help is needed and it's not about being a good T. I never told him that I wondered about that. Not sure what I think of that one.

I believe my Pdoc. She's never forced meds on me and never hospitalized me. She gives me her advice, but then asks me what I would like to do and repeatedly tries to identify positive coping solutions beyond meds by actually talking to me. She also backs up her opinions with research.

I really don't think I could ask for anything else from a Pdoc.

Yes, 100%. My T has given me so much of herself and her time. She is genuinely concerned for me and shows it in ways like asking me to check in after a doctor's appt, being available to talk when I start falling (I have a habit of waiting until I'm in crisis), sitting next to me and comforting me in our appts when appropriate, and she'll say things like 'while i was driving home from our session i thought x."

I trust my therapist and psychiatrist completely. I trusted them right away and can't explain why. It takes a while for me to open up usually so maybe I was lucky. I'd like to think you could blindly trust all Ts, Pdocs and anyone else in the field, but you can't. I know some
Ts personally and they take their roles very seriously and really care about each patient. But there are always others. Ts are human after all and even with the best of intentions can give bad advice and/or make poor decisions for patients.

So even though I answered yes to the poll because my nature is to trust unless I see obvious red flags, I think you should go into T with a bit of a guard up just in case.

I have a wonderful psychiatrist. There are many out there so one that is evil should be fired and you should find another one or find a psych nurse (basically they're the same). There are bad Ts out there too, believe me.