[WrkNPrgress]

I had a therapist who upon first meeting implied that she was in a same-sex relationship. I asked her in our first meeting how she felt about GLBT issues or had experience with this topic. I am a lesbian and wanted to know if that was any issue for her and it's important to me to 'read' their response. You can tell a lot about their comfort level from the initial reaction.

This woman replied that she had experience in her own long-term relationship. That answer, in the context of that direct question, told me she was in a same-sex relationship. I accepted it.

It was a few months into my time with her that I realized she was not, nor ever had been, in a same-sex relationship.I left shortly thereafter.

I suspect she only said that to keep me in the office that first day. She may have intentionally misled me, and or only meant that her personal relationship could inform her enough about GLBT issues. Either way, it was unacceptable for her to mislead me and/or compare a heterosexual experience with that of GLBT. They are not the same.

It was fine that she was heterosexual, that was not the issue. The issue was that she lied and made a false equivalency. I think if I were older and more experienced, I would have recognized that her answer was dodgy and challenged her directly as to what she meant but I was new to therapy at the time and not much on challenging the 'authority' in the room.

Have you ever caught a therapist in a lie? Did you challenge them?

[jeremiahgirl]

No, never heard him tell a lie.

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[atisketatasket]

Caught outright, no. Strongly suspected, yes. Didn't bother with a challenge as this was No. 1 and I expected I'd get more lies if I did.

No. Never

[dj315]

Ha! Mine's the opposite. Mine told me his "wife" was a band director when I talked about a verbally abusive one I had in high school when I know for a fact that he's gay. Except I know this from Facebook stalking him and his profile pictures a long time ago so I didn't challenge it I just tried to move on from that really quickly. It's his choice to decide whether or not he wants to disclose that fact to me or not though so I guess I respect that. I just wish he had chosen a term like friend or spouse if he didn't want to. It made me feel like he felt he had to lie about it to me like I'd be offended or something (which I wouldn't).

[ThisWayOut]

No. I don't see a reason t would lie to me either... I would be bothered by feeling deliberately mislead by t with a response like you recieved.

Dj315, i've heard some gay men refer to their so's as "wife". I haven't heard it so much on the lesbian side of things (I simply refer to my wife as that)... never did bother to ask why they did it, but i've heard it from a few friends.

No, can't say I ever have been aware of any of them lying to me.

[divine1966]

Not that I know off.

As about things like saying "wife was a band director" maybe it was ex wife. He can still be gay. Heck he can be gay and have a wife.

Maybe "experience" meant something else. Like she had brief encounter but doesn't want to tell people. Or her partner was bi sexual or something. Or he cheated on her with a man. It was experience in her relationship in a sense.

My daughter is happily married. To a man. Prior to that she lived with her female partner for 4 years with intent to marry but that didn't work out. Prior to that she dated both men and women about equally. She has no gender preference. So maybe if she said to someone she just met that she has experience, people would think she is lying because she is married to a man.

Just wondering

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[dj315]

Originally Posted by divine1966

Not that I know off.

As about things like saying "wife was a band director" maybe it was ex wife. He can still be gay. Heck he can be gay and have a wife.

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Well it was "is" in the conversation at the time, as in current. And I knew he was gay from the profile picture of him holding hands with his husband (spouse? wife? partner?). I do hate that I know that from "facebook stalking". If I could go back and do it again I would have waited until I was as comfortable as I am with him now and just asked if it still bothered me so much to know almost nothing about him. I could have avoided this whole occasionally uncomfortable situation.

I also didn't know that some men call their male spouses wives. To each their own, I guess. I'm clearly a little ignorant when it comes to the terms.

Well this would really bother me too. It is an outright lie and misleading. I am glad you walked away from her when you found out the truth. I have had two ts lie to me about numerous things and I walked away too when I found out the truth. I have been lied to enough without being exposed to lying in therapy, I could never trust a t that lies.
I went to a t recently and she told me she was in a relationship with another woman in the 70s. I didn't ask her about her sex life but she knew this would help me with the trust between us!

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[feralkittymom]

Yes. Never from my long term T, but from a T who led a group I was a part of. I did confront her about something and that's when she not only lied about her own actions/statements, but allowed the group to then act out against me for "attacking" our T. I left that group soon after. She resigned from the group a couple of weeks before I left, which I saw as an obvious recognition of her guilt, but the animus from the other group members couldn't be overcome. But she never took any direct responsibility for what happened.

[stopdog]

The first one does it all the time. I used to point it out but now I don't bother -I expect it and simply do not believe anything she says. But since I usually don't let her talk much and never had much expectation anything she said was all that relevant - it does not matter much.

The second one - not that I know of.

[runlola72]

I haven't had experience with T's lying, but I tried to catch current T in a lie once, but it was actually not a lie. Just my overactive imagination

When you asked your T if they had experience with GLBT matters, could their answer have been referencing the "B"... like either T or partner being bi? Just a thought.

my first therapist, who ended up dumping me out of nowhere one night, loed to me at our first meeting. she told me a story about something that happened to her "aunt" that i already knew what a common therapist story to tell sbout change, because my husband is a therapist (she did not know that yet.)
I should have ran away right then, because i never could trust her.

[junkDNA]

yeh. i had written him a letter and told him to open it on the day of the lawsuit mediation against my former T. my current T was driving me to another city to sit with me in the mediation. anyway the note was just me telling him to plz keep private about what will happen (at the time we were in a residential treatment facility that had weekly "team meetings" to discuss residents). i put it in a small bag. a few days later i saw the bag on his desk and there was air in the bag. i remembered flattening it out so there was no air. i asked T if he read the note before he was supposed to and he said no. so i told him about the air in the bag. then he said ok yeh i read it but only because i was afraid it was a sui note

[koru_kiwi]

my T had mistakenly sent me a text that was meant for another client telling this client that he was quite unwell and would have to cancel tomorrows session. he sent this text shortly after i had just seen him for a session and he appeared perfectly healthy and normal to me during our entire session...unless i had left him feeling ill??

he soon realised that he has mistakenly sent me the text and apologised saying that was for someone else. all i said in response was 'oops!' and we never spoke of it again.

since then, i have always had a little niggle in the back of my head wondering just how honest and forthcoming that he has been with me, especially when he cancels sessions.

[paingrl]

No my T i dont think has ever lied to me

My T lied many, many, times. He lied about something very important. He has lied to people I know, he has affiliated with criminals who have violated me at his direction. Liars are often arrogant, self-serving, users.

He is so deceitful that no one can trust him. He lies to all his GF's to keep them from finding about the others.

I suggest you get away from that T because when someone is caught lying you can bet they are lying to others in their life and will lie again to you in the future.

[luvnola]

Yes and yes. A long term t cancelled an appointment and told it was because my insurance was messed up and not paying and that she was going to straighten it out. I knew it was a lie so I asked her directly and told her I suspected she was not telling me the truth. She confessed that she really needed to cancel my appointment bc she had moved to a new area and her cat had got out of the house and she was trying to find it. I don't really knwo why she felt she needed to lie.

I also caught her doing her therapist manipulation thing that I think they all do.

Neither was a big deal to me. This was by far my favorite t.

[rainbow8]

Yes, but I put her on the spot. I suspected that something was off in her marriage, but I couldn't believe it so I was direct with her. I said "I noticed you're not traveling anymore so I wondered if everything is all right with your marriage." I had a gut feeling about it but how could my "perfect T" have marital problems? She said something like " No, we're fine, just not traveling so much". I may have said "I'm glad" and then she said " No, it's not all right. I have to be honest with you", and she told me they were separated. I never felt so close to my T as that moment. I would have found out later and been hurt, so I'm glad she didn't really lie.

[Shaly78]

My therapist told me she loved me and believed in me another day she said I hate those others!