Addressing your T

My T is a PhD, but it's first name basis both ways.

It's strange how we're all different. I want to call my therapist Dr. because it highlights his/her credentials and deeper knowledge of psychotherapy. I want to look up to my T as knowing more than I do so as to help me with my complex problems.
I also didn't like it when my primary care doc wore shorts and polo shirt in his office.

It so happens my T now is a LMHC, social worker, and the best trained therapist I ever worked with. I want to call her by some title that shows special regard but can't think any that isn't stupid or common.
I always did like calling teachers, nurses, etc by the title, "Miss Lester", or "Miss Butterfield" or whatever, using Miss in front of the last name. It sounds both intimate and respectful at the same time.

My therapist and I are on a first name basis. With my psychiatrist I refer to him as Dr D and he used my first name. I'm quite comfortable with both.

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We called each other by our first names. Both in session and emails. I wouldn't have liked calling him Dr X and then pooring my heart out. Like someone mentioned here before, it's like putting up a wall.

I call both my T and my pdoc by their first names. I've been with this mental health organization for a few years now at three different locations. At the other two locations, I had to call the pdoc "dr Surname". But at this location, which does both inpatient, residential, PHP and outpatient, it's "FirstName".

In my country you have two forms of "you", though, and I always use the most polite and distant form for my pdoc. Although he did say last session or the session before that that by now I should feel free to call him the other form.

Oh, and I once told my pdoc he wasn't a doctor but a pill therapist. He did NOT like that. A nurse was with me at the appointment and helped me explain that it was just about the biggest compliment I could give him - I'm terribly afraid of doctors and don't trust them (I'm a survivor of medical torture, so it's somewhat understandable) and saying he wasn't a doctor was just about saying "I recognize you're not evil".

Edit: I just turned 18, by the way. And I have (and have always had) therapy at a organisation for child and teen psychiatry. Don't know if that matters.

With my first two therapists, I always used their full name (first and last) when writing down their name. And to avoid being uncomfortable or awkward I started emails with just "Hi".

I call my new one Dr.R, she's a phd in clinical psych, but I see her at the psych hospital and they all do that there. She's ridiculously down to earth and human though so therapy doesn't feel "formal" at all. If she called me anything but my first name it would really weird me out.

I've also never said my T's name to her but in emails I always address her by her first name and she signs them with her first name. She really only has used my name a couple of time over the past 7 months. My T also isn't a Dr. so I guess it might be a little different.

I don't mind using my T's last name - it suits the way I want the relationship to be for me - it's symbolic, I want them to be a mentor. I call T Dr. First initial of last name and I called previous T Dr. Lastname.
However, having said that, it would drive me absolutely nuts to have them call me by my last name. That's *my* boundary. Only strangers call me by my last name. Previous T only addressed me by name once and she used my last name without any title. I wasn't brave enough to call her on it at the time and it's still a sore spot.

The woman does use my name all the time - I have no idea why. I know she is talking to me - I am the only other person in the room. I do not address email or letters to her by name- I don't use anything. I don't think I have ever used her first name when speaking to her - there has never been any reason to use her name (I would use her first name if I had a reason to use her name at all - I just never have had). Even if I talk about her to the two people who sort of know I see one, I call her that woman and do not use her name.
If I sign the letter - I only use my last name or, if very put out, I use my whole name with title.

I've never had a therapist who insisted on a title. I thought first-name was the rule.

My T is an LCSW, and we both call each other by our first names. I also call my pdoc by her first name (which felt unusual at first, but now I like it) and she calls me by my first name. I had a pdoc once who insisted on calling me Ms. Lastname, and when I said "you can call me Claire" she looked at me like I had 5 heads and scribbled something down in her little notepad. It totally weirded me out.

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She is an LPC, and we've both always used first names.

Same! I find it puzzling that my T uses my name frequently when it's just the two of us in the room.

I wonder if it is a way to build rapport/attempt to bond that gets taught.

I am sure a T uses first names to establish that the relationship works best without formality or reserve. Clumsy perhaps if used often, but perhaps the T feels that you are distancing yourself and they wish to signal that they would prefer to lessen difference.

I call my T by her first name and vice versa.

Nobody uses any form of address in the room. Even though we speak English (where such address is not necessarily inappropriate) both T and I are too mired in the local usage, where it would not be appropriate. Or at least that's how it is for me - I could never address somebody in speech unless I had to get their attention or identify them, it would feel unnatural to me. In writing, I use the shortened form of T's first name, he uses my first name. No titles or last names. Again, I would not use a title or last name with anybody in Sweden, it's just not done except in a very few contexs that are irrelevant for me, and that usage carries over to my English even though I know very well that the rules for address are different in English.

My ext-T never generally used my name but once when I was in an emotional state she used my name, I sensed that she was doing it purposeively there, it in some way connected with the child in me being spoken to by my mother, it felt like she was using a well practiced technique. It didn't feel wrong, and could have been helpful. Following this I tried out a T for two sessions, I decided to give this T my name in abbreviated form, which my mother does not use. This T used my name constantly, to excess, and as it was this abbreviated name it felt really odd.