Sly things that therapists do, such as chair placement

Yeah, that's what I thought at first too. Until I started to go a bit loopy from trying to ignore it and telling myself not to be paranoid;-) Mine have done it with me to try and snap me out of my tendency to be a 'pleaser'.

It's very hard to please somebody who gives you contradicting directions: talk to me/shut up and listen, express your emotions/I'm not here to pander to your sniveling, I'm here for you/you're a nuisance, Yes, previous T actually rolled her eyes and complained about how annoying her clients were straight to me in session. I was just frozen, staring at her like 'what on Earth is *wrong* with you?!', but I never said a word, because I've been too well trained to be a good girl, and that's what she was trying to break open in me.

She uses somebody else's office so it is set up and she doesn't move things around. I have never noticed if T wears a watch if she does I have never noticed it. The clock in the room is facing me.
The only thing I have notice is that if there are clients in the waiting room (room next door so you hear people come in) then she hugs me in the office. If there aren't any clients she has hugged me in the hall. I figure that is because she doesn't hug everybody.

With my last Therapist she sat right across from me and I thought that was way too close.

CBT T turns the clock so only he can see it.

If I lean back in the chair, lean or turn away from him, he will lean closer. Sometimes he will break into my line of sight just to make eye contact.

I wear a watch and have a phone with the time on it. I would not let the therapist be the only one who knew the time.

My T didn't do most of these things, but it was clear that his office set-up was planned to make clients as comfortable as possible: tissues close by, chair placement, subdued lighting, etc. I appreciated that. If I had a particular request and it could be accommodated, he did. I was happy to not have the clock in direct view because I would have obsessed about it; but if I had wanted to know the time, there was nothing preventing me from wearing a watch.

But I wonder how many who are concerned about such things as "manipulation" feel the same about their medical providers' offices, their accountants' offices, etc? Good office design fulfills the purposes of the task; I don't think that need be viewed negatively, nor as adversarial. I arrange my classrooms in certain ways to influence group dynamics because I know it will facilitate the learning goals which are partly my responsibility.

So often I read observations that cast the T as either manipulative or alienating (soft lighting is sly, overhead fluorescent is punishing.) I think a lot of the attached meaning in these matters is projection.

Current and former T shared the same office. When they decided to re-paint a few years ago, they had a feng-shui consultant. Interestingly, the only thing changed was the paint color, and the sofa and some storage cabinets placed differently. The bookcase, T's desk, and client chairs all remained in the same places. And former T's orchids stayed put on the windowsills. (In fact, the orchids have remained, and of course I think of him whenever another one sends out new blossoms.)

When I first started to see my T we would have the session sitting in chairs with a desk or table between us. I used to think that was because with DBT there was quite a lot of writing to do. But T has since relocated us to the regular seats around the coffee table. Now I wonder if she noticed that I felt safer with the desk as it formed a physical barrier from her...

She also knows I'm very self-conscious and would never admit to things like transference, so once after the session was over and I was paying, she casually said something like: I'm a mommy type of person and I sometimes feel like I'm a mommy to you. I was so caught of guard that I said: I guess you could say that. She reassured me that this was ok, but I would never have admitted it during session.

Can't think of anything alse for now, but will come back if I do...

How is it different from a therapist labeling a client resistant or other labels they use to position the client? Also, they are fairly open, from what I have seen, to admitting they do things specifically to manipulate clients in specific ways but without giving the client full disclosure. Even if it is manipulation with good intent, it is still manipulation. Deciding in all situations how much one is willing to be manipulated is the choice of the individual.

I don't think good Ts label clients; I think they observe and identify patterns of thought and behavior. I don't have a problem with that if they're competent because that's what I engaged in therapy for. When a medical Dr diagnoses a condition, I don't consider that labeling, either. I think in both cases full disclosure is an illusion; informed consent is fine, but full disclosure would demand a level of knowledge that most clients/patients Ts/Drs are not able to have. I don't define manipulation as necessarily negative, but it overwhelmingly is used negatively here. My point was that sometimes a T can't win: if the office is designed for the comfort of the client, they're accused of being sly and manipulative; if the office is not hospitable, the T is accused of being cold and uncaring. In both cases, I think those are projected feelings, and perhaps some sort of defense.

I believe in therapy as relationship, and within those parameters, neither can have complete control and best benefit. I understand you don't view therapy from that perspective, so the client must have complete control of the process.

I think they are manipulative in everything they do - but if the office is the thing that is upsetting to someone, I think there are ways around it - I wear my own watch and have taken in my own chair for example. I think there are ways to thwart or manage their other types of manipulation too as well as one can consent to or go along with other manipulations that do not bother them.
I agree manipulation in and of itself does not have to be negative in intent.

The fact that you have taken in your own chair is hilarious! The PowerPoint was awesome too:-)

My t does a lot of things the original poster talked about. She offers something to drink, asks about the temperature, walks me to the door and opens it, grabs her scheduling book at the end.

my T leaves the door cracked when we meet bc i have sexual trauma with a former T (where we had sex in therapY) and i told him it makes me feel better to not have the door closed.

sometimes he asks me if i would feel better if there was something inbetween us whle we talked like a chair or a pillow.

sometimes we dont even meet in his office and go for walks or swing on the swings outside.

he is very accomodating to me and wants me to be comfortable

What's a good casebook? Ideally as PDF

I never notice anything that was calculating in her office set up. She'd just doesn't seem like the type. Tissues were most always available, yet I appreciated it more when she reached for them to wipe my tears.

I've been trying to think of anything of this kind that my T does, but I honestly can't come up with anything. He has no tissues visible anywhere. His chair is positioned differently at different times. He gets up to shake hands when I'm leaving, but he doesn't walk me to the door - that would be rather weird, I think. He turns off the light when I am lying down, so I don't get the interrogation light in my eyes, though sometimes he has forgotten to do that. His clock is placed where I can see it when I lie down, but not when I sit up, so there doesn't appear to be any particular strategy there, either. He has never asked if there is anything in the physical environment that is uncomfortable for me (there isn't) although he does give me the choice between lying down or sitting up. There is no trace of the previous client, though I am not quite sure what traces there could be.

I have a theory about the tissues. Most ts i've seen have them slightly closer to them than the client, so the client either has to ask the T to pass a tissue, stand up and get one themselves (that's me) or not ask for tissues and cry, or not ask for tissues and not cry. This tells the t alot about the client and maybe their style of asking for help.
Personally if the tissues were inaccessible to me i would rather gouge my eyes than cry or ask T to get me one.

Just my 2 cents worth.

With the amount of clients/patients T's have, I am less inclined to think there's some personal, hidden agenda, where I am personally concerned. Sometimes one client/patient walks out, as I walk in...where's the time to purposefully use sly/clever/manipulating methods on me, just one of many?

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Mine has them the opposite. They're right next to where the client sits so the client can reach them without having to move, get up, or ask.

I agree. In order for most T's to purposefully set up arrangements for individual clients between session and also find time to go to the bathroom, listen to voice messages, speak to coworkers, etc., they'd be running around likely madmen between sessions to get things just so. I actually find the mental image of my T doing this rather amusing, but completely unrealistic.

I am sure thought goes into furniture arrangement in general for their office, but unless something unusual is about to happen like a family group coming in or something that requires rearrangement, I doubt changes usually get made before sessions.

Kleenex boxes? My T's is practically in a different place every time I walk in, evidence that his clients choose to sit in various places and the kleenex is wherever it was needed at that time.

Clock placement? In the T's line of sight just makes logistical sense. They want to be able to glance at the time without it being obvious because that would bother many clients who would interpret clock watching as boredom, etc.

I'm sure there are certain changes made by certain T's for certain clients due to circumstances that they are working with, but I doubt individualizing for patients would be terribly practical much less easy to remember and do consistently.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...-psychotherapy

I dislike that blogger, but the topic there seemed pertinent.

I carry a handkerchief on the exceedingly off chance I might ever need one at the therapy appointment.

No idea where the tissues are because I don't cry in there. Clock is where she can see it but I can't. Pretty sure that is on purpose.

There is an object in the room that I stare at while we talk. One day it was in a different spot and I wondered if she had done it to try to get me to look at here. I didn't ask though.

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Thanks PC people for sharing what you've noticed!

Now, I'm reading a book about how therapists should be grounded and pay attention to their own breathing in order to bring about calmness in the client.

I like knowing this stuff. I find it endlessly fascinating.

Technique seems to be another thing that therapists hone over time. I brought a family member to therapy and then I got to watch while my therapist totally attuned to my family member! Like, it was like I wasn't even there and the therapist made all the sounds and body movements that she normally makes with me.

I found it fascinating and I realized that she has some "go-to" lines that she falls back on to make someone feel good about himself or herself. One of them is, "Good thing you were so smart to figure that out!" ... And, "You relied upon your talent to escape that situation." ....Stuff like that.

So, I know I'm not special. It doesn't mean the compliments aren't true. But the therapist definitely has a bag of tricks to draw upon, so to speak.

The more that I learn about therapy, the more I realize that my therapist excels at her craft. I'm glad she's not so harried in between clients that she actually has time to think about chair placement and other wily things.

I wonder if my T ever has clients who cry, and what they do with the tissues afterwards. And whether he actually does keep tissues anywhere in his office - I can't imagine him offering them to me if I should need them so presumably he just doesn't have any. All the more reason not to cry in therapy!

To be honest, if I did notice any of those "wily things" it would probably make me feel cared for, rather than manipulated. But as I say, I don't think my T does them.