[Mactastic]

My T gave me a wonderful gift last week, the gift of open emailing Emails work great for me. I feel sooooo much better after every one, problem is I was having super-guilt for taking up his time. He never responds more than to say thank you for sharing or whatever, but I know he reads all of them because he'll bring stuff up in sessions.

Anyway, he told me it's perfectly okay for me to email whenever I want and how much I want. I told him I felt bad because that's not time I'm billed and he kindly told me it's up to him to set the boundaries, and emails is one boundary that doesn't phase him. I'm so relieved!

Now, phone calls is a boundary I think he likes tight (fine with me, I hate the phone.) What about your T? What's allowed and what's frowned upon?

[HazelGirl]

My T allowed me to text her whenever I want. I think if I needed it, I could call her, too (in fact, she called me once when I was having a really hard day). She used to allow me to email her, but she doesn't check her email often and I think she wanted to make sure she didn't miss something important from me.

[Leah123]

My therapist encourages writing emails as she knows it facilitates the emotional openness, gives her insight into my day to day struggles/concerns, and maintains our connection between sessions. She would not charge for brief emails/check-ins/progress reports, but typically I write at length and she replies with some amount of detail so I pay for the vast majority of the emails at short-session rates, an arrangement that works well for both of us.

[someone321]

With respect to my current T - I still am not so sure actually however the consulting T has said that I can send her e-mails

[sweepy62]

no emails, but calls allowed whenever directly to her office, she gets back to me same day. but i dont call often. with this new t I am meeting today however, I doubt I will be calling anytime soon.

[Hoppery]

Emails once every two weeks.

He opened the door to emails and I'm closing the door a little by setting myself the boundary of one email per every two weeks.

[Canyon]

My T encourages me to email him. He is really quick to get back to me but it tends to be a really short reply. I'm good with that because I just want to know that he reads them. He usually brings up things that was said in the emails.

[unlockingsanity]

My T really encourages contact between sessions, but I think that's part of his philosophy of his approach - to be available to clients.

[BlessedRhiannon]

My T encourages me to contact her between sessions, in whatever format I feel comfortable with - text, phone call, or email.

We've had many discussions about this, because I struggle with contacting her outside of session - I feel like I'm intruding. In a recent session, she made it very clear to me that she is fine with me contacting her, that it's something she manages on a client by client basis, and if it ever becomes a problem, she will let me know. I've finally decided to just accept her word for it that I'm not intruding and that she's okay with a weekly email or two.

[anilam]

calls, texts, mails...I'm not doing any of that, however, don't feel the need to. I only contact him for scheduling purposes.

Great it's helping you.

[nottrustin]

My therapist is fine with which ever mode of communication from her clients that are from her private practice. She works at a hospital and for those clients she does not mainly because they can leave messages at the office and she gets back. For her private practice phone calls go directly to her cell or home phone anyway. She prefers she be contacted on her home phone if calling but will take the call either way. I typically use email as it works better for both of us. I have also have her hospital number which I never use. If I am having a really hard time I will ask her to call me when she gets a so we can talk which she does. Sometimes it is about other things as well...recently she recommended a book..so I sent her an email asking the name plus I showed her a couple of others that I had heard about. She ended up sending me an email telling me not to order as she was ordering them for her personal collection to lend to patients. Usually she has me read books first and tell her what I think so she can decide which of her clients they would be useful for...

I'm glad your therapist is willing to meet your needs, and is willing to work with you on the desire to be in touch out of sessions.

Before therapy I never used email. My therapist did not care how many I sent. She just wanted me to know that if she could read them she would, if she couldn't they would have to wait. Usually within two or three hours. One day I sent 33 and she responded 21 times. I was having a very rough day. My first email was in my fourth month of therapy, and by termination fourteen months later I had written over 1566 emails — gmail lost a few, if not many. My therapist answered at least 2/3 of them. Some responses much lengthier than my one line or two. We did therapy anyway that worked.

Several months ago I was looking for a poem I sent her by email. I realized then that I had written so many. I was a little embarrassed and tried not to think about it. I emailed my therapist to see if she could find the specific email. Her response, "Could you help me out with a time frame or some key words, there 1566. I have a faulty memory when it comes to dates and names, yet my therapist searched a few hundred emails later that night with no success. We talked on the phone that morning and I mentioned my embarrassment, she laughed and said it doesn't bother her. Before therapy I would be living with shame, and Today I'm not even embarrassed by it. It makes me laugh.

The other day I got a beautiful Care2 eCard from her for my birthday. I was impressed that she remembered.

Do what you need to do to take care of yourself in consultation with your therapist.

[Rzay4]

My newest T does not like email but is very quick to call back. All my other Ts allowed email and phone calls. It's weird not being able to email.

[Raging Quiet]

My t sometimes says to contact her in between if needed. I tend to only email to change times/dates. I've sent her 2 'emotional' emails in the last 6 years.

[willowbrook]

I'm allowed to email my Pdoc with notes for next session, and the occasional piece of art or writing I've done. I can phone him if I need scripts written before our next appointment, and I'm also meant to call him if I'm really struggling (like suicidal thoughts level struggling) although I haven't had the need to do that because I put everything in the email.

T and i text, email, and call each other a bunch. We are in different countriies right now so we do only phone/ skype therapy. So we email lots and lots.she emails back we spend hours and hours on the phone

[always_wondering]

I have sent him a few emails. Unless they are truly significant. ,He does not respond. Message to me, avoid sending emails unless they are really important.

[Bentay]

Your T sounds so nice. I don't know if its because I'm in the UK or if it was my T but boundaries seem a lot tighter, no emails, no text (didn't have his no) never spoken to my T on the phone, no contact between session (unless i was desperate & wrote him a letter). Even when I used to ask him how he was (like when you walk into a session & say how are you ? out of politeness) he never answered, just smiled politely.

[ready2makenice]

I don't call,text or email the woman!!!

She doesn't respond to emails but will call back if I leave a message within a few hours and I never text T anymore.

She's pretty much unavailable outside of that room. If I really needed her I could probably get a hold of T but I never do and I'm good with that.

[Bentay]

Originally Posted by Goingtogetthere

I'm glad your therapist is willing to meet your needs, and is willing to work with you on the desire to be in touch out of sessions.

Before therapy I never used email. My therapist did not care how many I sent. She just wanted me to know that if she could read them she would, if she couldn't they would have to wait. Usually within two or three hours. One day I sent 33 and she responded 21 times. I was having a very rough day. My first email was in my fourth month of therapy, and by termination fourteen months later I had written over 1566 emails — gmail lost a few, if not many. My therapist answered at least 2/3 of them. Some responses much lengthier than my one line or two. We did therapy anyway that worked.

Several months ago I was looking for a poem I sent her by email. I realized then that I had written so many. I was a little embarrassed and tried not to think about it. I emailed my therapist to see if she could find the specific email. Her response, "Could you help me out with a time frame or some key words, there 1566. I have a faulty memory when it comes to dates and names, yet my therapist searched a few hundred emails later that night with no success. We talked on the phone that morning and I mentioned my embarrassment, she laughed and said it doesn't bother her. Before therapy I would be living with shame, and Today I'm not even embarrassed by it. It makes me laugh.

The other day I got a beautiful Care2 eCard from her for my birthday. I was impressed that she remembered.

Do what you need to do to take care of yourself in consultation with your therapist.

Wow she sounds amazing!

[Freewilled]

I've emailed my T once because I was freaking out....but that's it. I don't call or text unless it's due to schedule/billing stuff. He told me I could call anytime but I don't know what that means exactly

[Jdog123]

My T allows texts, emails, and phone calls (the latter is more for if I feel that I need to talk/am not in a good place). There is no limit with texts and emails, though I try to keep non-urgent things to email, which she can check at her leisure versus texts for which she gets an alert. She will email, text, or call back if I ask. If I don't ask (though I really never call her), she might or might not answer - depends on her schedule and what I wrote. This works for us.

[AllyIsHopeful]

That's great that your T opened up email communication! I'm happy for you. Especially since it seems it is already benefiting you by adding huge relief.

My T doesn't do email as far as I know. I'm not sure if she communicates through email with anyone. She has always allowed texting and calling her personal number from day one. She has even made sure I knew it was ok to call the office and leave a message on the business phone, in the event I am uncomfortable contacting her through her private #.
She has never scolded me or talked about random, inconvenient, or late times I have text messaged or called.

My therapist did not offer texting. She has no cell phone. I could phone as much as I wanted. If you could answer she would, if she couldn't she would call later. We did have a few 2 hour emergency phone calls, because I didn't want to come to her office 15 minutes away. One went till after midnight. She said she wasn't going to leave me no matter what, and she didn't. The one thing she said was she would never call the police on me, no matter how much of a danger others thought I might be to myself. I learned to trust her 100%. She was my safety and security. Trust was the key.

[Mactastic]

Everyone has different needs but I'm sad to hear how tight some of your T's boundaries are on this thread. I could not work with someone like that. If I ever start therapy again in the future I would ask if emails are okay. I do not want my T's cell phone number (I know myself, the temptation would be too great to text often) but I LOVE that the email door is wide open. I sent of a long one the other day and at the end I told him "thank you, no more emails this week, I promise" and his response back was to send as often as I need to. He said that it's fine if I use it to journal. Emailing really helps and it's such a relief to know I can use that freely now.