Anyone stay in touch with an old therapist?

Just curious. Am lamenting the fakeness of the therapy relationship.

Do any of you keep in touch with an old therapist? If so how does that work?

Just one, and she wasn't really a therapist. She was my hs guidance counselor... it took a long time to switch roles in my head, but we have been friends for about 15 years now. More like a mentor/mentee relationship, but we call it a friendship.
I don't think I could be friends with any of my other therapists. It's too weird a change in dynamic... I'm OK with the "contrived" nature of therapy. I'm not able to talk about a lot of the stuff I bring up in therapy with anyone else. There were things I talked about with my guidance counselor when she was in that role that we have not spoken of since... it's not that I wouldn't love to have someone in my life I could talk to about it, it's just how the relationship changed (and the heaviness of the stuff)...

I keep in touch with my old therapist from college (think 30 years ago). He's retired now. I had contacted him after graduation a few times concerning my career file, etc. (he also was the head of career services for my university) and recommendations for therapists in my area. We just kind of kept touching base via phone and eventually email (when it finally existed -- yes, I'm old) over the years. Not constantly. Maybe 3 or 4 times a year we check on each other. Not AT ALL therapy related beyond what I mentioned above. Just keeping track of family, health, jobs, etc. It works for us because there was great physical distance between us (I've only actually seen him 3 times in 30 years when we happened to be in that neck of the woods.) It works because there was never any illusions that he would or could ever be my therapist again, so it set a good healthy boundary there. It works because I had no transference issues concerning him; we just became kind of distant, life-long friends, but nothing terribly intimate (it's not like we're best friends or anything).

Yes. Therapy ended @17 years ago when he retired, and we've stayed in touch through most of the years since. So we've known each other for almost 28 years. There was transference and counter transference, but both were resolved. But I never felt that the relationship was fake in any way. Boundaried, yes; but not fake. And it's still a relationship with boundaries, but they're different. We e-mail every couple of months, the occasional phone call, but we never talk about therapy. Most of our talk is about our present lives, both joys and sorrows. He's elderly now, and his memory isn't as reliable as it once was, so it makes sense to stick to current news. But the emotional bond, the mutual fondness, hasn't changed at all, and I think that's what makes the continued connection possible and valued.

Yes, I keep in touch with PrevT- she has not been my T since 2000. We used to write snail mail a little. We talked on the phone for 30 minutes every month...not therapy...just catch up. I also emailed her. I always initiate contact.

Now that I have been back in therapy for a year, I still email but we talk on the phone less -maybe once every two or three months. PrevT is part of my support system.

I was also in sporadic contact with a PDoc (not the one I sued)off and on since we stopped therapy about 1993. Mostly we stayed in contact through the mail. About a year ago or more I contacted him via email. That ended when he went to federal prison. (Totally unexpected by me!). There's nothing like seeing news photos of your previous PDoc being taken to jail in handcuffs.

I keep in contact with an ex-T. She hasn't been my T for 10 years. I email her once a year, usually in Nov/Dec. She emails me back a few months after. I can write about whatever I want, but I just stick to events that have happened over the year and current plans. She usually writes back with what she's done over the past year, reassures me she still remembers me , and gives me encouragement and praise.

I also keep in contact with a past mental health counselor. She also hasn't been my counselor for 10 years. She actually initiated contact via FB. She offered to meet up when she first contacted me, but my agoraphobia was so bad that I made up some lame excuse. I write to her a little and she writes back. She's always updating me on her family (she has 6 kids and 6 grandchildren). I actually, accidentally ran into her a month ago when going to do labs. I asked her if I could take her up on her offer and meet for coffee one day. She said of course. Now I just need to get the courage to set it up.

But, I feel, the relationship has to change in order for it to be healthy. They are not in a therapy/counseling role anymore and it's not fair to put them in that role. They are a friend. They can still offer me emotional support, but I do not turn to them for emotional support. I accept whatever they give me and am grateful to just have them in my life. And the reason I believe it should be this way: if you continue to see them in a therapeutic role, then you're still viewing them as a professional and not as a person as a whole. And if that's the case, professional boundaries should still be applied. But that's just my opinion.

Yup. I have stayed in touch with the first therapist I ever saw. She is 8 years older than I and I started seeing her when I was 30 and I saw her until I was 30 when she set me up with another therapist. We then stayed in touch. Ivsee her one or twice a month, at her house or mine. I have been to weddings and graduation parties for her children. She has been to my wedding. It's been awesome.

Oh, yeah. But, I have seen 3 other therapists since than whom I do not keep in touch with. And I already know that the one I see now will jot keep in touch with me when we are done (but honestly, I am not sure we will ever be done)

I email my former T a few times a year. He writes back.

Yes. With permission of current T I'll email exT a few times a year and she'll write back. If I visit exT's town she'll let me have a "checking in" appointment. :-)

It's been a few years since I've seen him, but we keep in touch through texting. He recently told me about a recent and difficult loss, and it's been very hard time for him, so I got him a transitional object that I am getting ready to send to him along with a card. He lives far away now, but we plan to meet during my next visit to his city.

I'm very grateful for this. I really value the connection, and it has been a sort of relational model for me in terms of how the bond stays strong irrespective of distance or money or whatever. That good endings are possible, and that they may sometimes lead to new beginnings. Even though it's been a few years since the end of our therapy sessions, anytime I talk to him, it feels as if we never spent more than a week apart. I truly love him and miss him.

Afterthought-are you thinking of your future relationship with him? Just curious, if you wish to talk about it.

My family has been considering moving and I brought this up to him. I expressed that I would be sad to leave him behind (I have had frequent moves my whole life and my H and I are trying to find a place to settle - and my T is one of the few people that I have had a longer than two-three year face to face relationship with). He told me that he would like to maintain contact with me on some level, whatever I was comfortable with. Social media contact was brought up and agreed on. I imagine that's probably how we would maintain contact although I haven't decided yet.

My prevT ( saw him 8 years), well I contact him 1-2x a year via email on updates. He has only responded once but I imagine that he appreciates the updates.