[LostSoul6]

Has anyone had this type of therapy, and if so how effective has it been/being?
I've just started it, I wasn't given a choice that's just what the therapist said would be the type of therapy she would be using. I thought, and I feel like I need, something more therapist lead than me leading. Because i want someone to be able to help me interpret my thoughts/feelings? I get the impression I'm just going to be listened to most of the time?

It has been great for me (though my T has drawn on other modalities such as Transactional Analysis too)
Basically he has been arming me with the tools to lead my own process work. He doesn't just sit and listen; there is a lot of input, but he is more interested in helping me to think about my own process and come up with my own answers and solutions, rather than directing me.

[Soccer mom]

I think your T. will have more input than you realize. I think this is my T's approach. She sits and listens but she asks questions and makes connections that I'm not realizing. She doesn't talk too much because she says she doesn't want to distract me or lead me down a path I wouldn't have gone. She wants to see my thought processes and let me lead. I have a very hard time with me just talking - I'm not one to come in and "blah,blah,blah" the whole time. So, she has to talk more than she probabably would because I don't know how to keep going with my feelings. It's hard but very interesting when you figure out things on your own!

[SnakeCharmer]

Person Centered Therapy is also known as Client Centered Therapy and it was introduced by Dr. Carl Rogers many years ago. It was considered a revolution in psychotherapy and, with well-trained Ts, it has helped thousands, maybe millions, of people.

The therapist listens and offers unconditional positive regard, something many people are missing in their lives. In fact, many people have never experienced uncritical and accepting interactions with other people. Never, in their whole lives.

Dr. Rogers believed that people had within them the ability to think and feel about their life problems in a way that would allow them to find their own answers and solutions if they were allowed to talk, vent, brainstorm and discuss with a T who actively listened to them with warmth, empathy and unconditional positive regard.

Does it work? I've known people who really benefited from it. After a while, it positively changed the way they interacted with people. For the first time in their lives they'd had someone listen to them without ripping them to shreds directly or indirectly and that's the way they started acting toward their children, partner, friends and family. They slowly learned to give positive regard to the people they cared about, lived with and worked with. That made life better, not just for them, but for their families. They listened more and criticized less. They didn't become doormats. But they stopped the automatic, non-thinking criticism and complaining that had formerly been habitual.

At the time when Dr. Rogers created Client Centered Therapy, it was considered caring to correct and criticize children so they could improve themselves. That kind of verbal correction and criticism were considered loving as long as it wasn't shouted. So you had all these people who, no matter what they did or how well they did it, were told they should do better. It was the way I was raised. No matter what you did, it was never good enough, you were always exhorted to do better. It gets oppressive.

However, Client Centered Therapy wasn't for me. I like an active, directive approach. That's my personality. But if it was all that was available to me, I'd use it and do my best to benefit from it because it does help a lot of people. I guess a lot depends on how much effort the client is willing to put into it.

I hope it works for you!

[sunrise]

I have had this type of therapy and it was very effective. I think it was the best thing possible for me at the time. If it's not client-centered, then it would therapist-centered, with the therapist's agenda, direction, topics. That would be a less healing experience for me.

[stopdog]

I do very badly with a therapist who tries to take an active, direct approach with me. But if it is what you want, there seem to be a lot of them out there who want to get all active at a client. I think it is harder (it has been my experience) to get them to explain why they are trying the manipulations that they try and to get them to be quiet about other things than it is to find those who want to try and tell clients what they think about the client specifically all the time.

[LostSoul6]

Thanks guys :-) I will run with it for now, i'll give it a couple of months, if I don't think it's doing anything for me I'll let my T know and see what else can be done.

I'd like to hear how it goes. I feel like my T is the opposite of client centred, whatever I say she challenges and looks at a different way, it's tough, half the time I thinks he has got it wrong, or that it does not really matter how we look at it, to focus on my feelings would be better. I think I might like client centred, I think I could figure out quite a lot myself if someone listened and helped me, I would feel less like a moron.

[gayleggg]

I'm not sure what it is called, but my cousnelor listens and then offers a view on what he heard. He really thinks about what to say and then offers either another option I hadn't considered or shows his agreement with my assessment. It's been really good for me to hear a logical approach to my issues. It centers around my depression and daily life. All my old stuff was handled by a different counselor years ago. I guess I'm on a maintenance dose of therapy.