therapist just terminated with me

I'm sorry. I would be completely devastated in your place. I understand his father died and that must be very hard but you've been seeing him for 6 years and he can't even give you ONE closure session? Yeah no. I hope you get the 5-10 closure sessions you've requested, even if it has to be at a later date (understandably).

I'm so sorry this is happening to you. I cannot imagine how a t could do something like that to a long-term client. There must be something more going on with him, I just can't imagine why otherwise.

In fairness, his practice has been pretty poor all along - given his lack of boundaries I'm not sure how 5-10 closure sessions would in any way help. It would just reactivate the over dependency he's fostered and you'd still have to go through the same loss that you're experiencing now. I know you want what you want but given the pain you've been in it might be better to just work through that with someone who can hold the therapeutic frame properly rather than end up entangled again with someone who isn't able to do that.

Honestly, the manner of ending here is the very least grounds you have for formal complaint. I don't understand why you'd want to threaten someone into sitting in a room with you anyway. Even if he agreed, how you'd get any kind of satisfactory ending when he's there against his will, because your holding a complaint over him, and you don't want to end in any event. It would be a kindness to yourself to let him go.

Well yes, I too feel it is shocking. I really believed at first that he had been made to do it, as no one told me anything. but it has turned out that he has decided that he didn't want to work with me anymore. this was such a shock. I thought he loved me and cared about me and he had always said that even after he retired we would keep in touch. Anyway, I have great confidence in the more senior psychologist M who is fighting my corner for me. If we don't get proper closure we shall go to his professional body. M says that any sensible person would see that the first option is better for both me and my ex T )who could then retire with a satisfactory feeling about his career - rather than a disaster). Also, rather hilariously, I was at a dinner Thursday night with my T;s other boss sitting next to me, quite by accident. As the evening progressed the boss said that he would love me to come in and give some talks - Hah! He suggested I give a talk on 'when therapy goes wrong!'. that would make my ex T rather worried - don't you think?!

Forcing someone to do what is right is rarely very satisfying.

I've been with my therapist/psychiatrist 15 years. He's told me he's going to retire this summer and that's devastating for me, even with that much time ahead. But if something happened that made him feel he had to quit abruptly, now--even without my knowing why--I would trust him enough to know he was doing the best he could under the circumstances. I think he cares a lot about me and maybe loves me. I care about him and I love him too. I would care that he was in so much difficulty that he had to give that much of his life up. Sorry, but it seems unfair and vindictive of you to talk about "getting even" with him. Aren't you worried about him, at all?

Therapists are paid for their time -clients do not need to worry about or feel sorry for them. What on earth would the point of that even be?

This is unfair and unsupportive. The therapist has a duty of care to the client, not the other way around.

I went to the board of psychology against my ex-T. My termination lasted 6 mins. I got no closure sessions. The board deemed it ethical. So your psychologist friend might be right that you should get closure sessions, but the board might disagree.

Do you really want to force your ex-T into seeing you when he no longer wishes to see or even communicate with you? What good would that do for you?

Wow, so sorry you've been going through this. I hope your new T helps you.

You don't know that he doesn't want to see you or communicate with you (which a letter is, by the way). It's true you pay for services but for a therapist to be any good the relationship has to be both ways. You can't pay someone to genuinely care about you. You just can't. If you're very upset that he's left you then obviously you cared for him. So why would you want to make his life even worse?

I think it's terrible what has happened and how it's made you feel ... But perhaps the loss of his father isn't the only issue that caused him to quit working with clients ... As in maybe he himself has been diagnosed with a terminal illness and he only has so long to get his personal affairs in order before he checks out? ... Or maybe he's been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and is losing his mind to that? ... I know that probably doesn't help how the quick termination has made you feel, but maybe he doesn't have the luxury or option of working with anyone on anything now or in the near future because he may be losing his faculties or dying himself ... Just another angle to explore ... Also hoping that you find the help you need in plodding forward in spite of this setback which I know hurts like hell because I've had a few have to up and quit themselves because of personal reasons ... One lost a brother and a cousin in the World Trade Center bombings and had to go work through that themselves before they could resume their practice ... Hurts like hell at the time, but therapists are humans just like you and me, and to me it would be wrong to expect them to act like they never had their own lives get derailed by this inexplicably cruel world we live in ...

Didn't you say on another thread that he is working three days a week somewhere else? So it's not like he's unable to work.

I hope you can move on from this and heal. I have healed from abandonment and I know it is possible.

Please. Have you ever been through really destructive or unethical therapy and then tried to shop that story around to other therapists? I have. What I found is that they mostly wanted to defend their colleague and the profession, to my further detriment. Beyond that they were largely useless.

Clients pay therapists to at least do no harm. When harm is done, it's in the best interests of clients to do something about it. Not to roll over and submit to the presumed authority of the therapist, which is a completely defeating and disempowering dynamic that could itself be harmful. As is running off to another therapist looking for validation. It could be vitally important for the OP to tell the therapist directly what the experience has done.

Thank you for making me think. YOU just helped me feel validated right here... I wish I could find words for exactly what my experience has done to me.

This is not about caring. Clients are allegedly paying for basic ethical behavior. Abrupt termination after 6 years, done via letter, vague explanation… that is hideously unethical. Personal tragedy does not absolve someone of all professional responsibility. Especially when working with a vulnerable population.

My understanding is that the OP has told her T what he's done, had tried to get him to contact her, has appeared st his home address to try and communicate all to no avail. There's a point where one needs to decide to move on and heal without possibly getting the closure one would wish for, if her T hasn't heard it before now, even with colleagues telling him, he won't get it face to face. So she might get 5-10 sessions of him doing what he does - and what he has been and continues to be damaging.

Yes Ts are accountable to uphold basic ethical standards and this therapy has been far from ethical - if I were the OP I'd be formally complaining to his professional body rather than trying to force him to give me time that he doesn't want to give. But then she would be faced with the knowledge that he's practiced unethically all along.

My specialist has written a most brilliant proposal for how to mend this awful disastrous toxic ending. He has said he is acting directly as my appointed mental health advocate in order to “broker” the best therapeutic care for me in this high risk situation.
He is proposing that my ex T has 3- 6 months off clinical work with all patients as he is obviously not fit for practice and then he arranges to see me for between 5-10 sessions to end the therapy properly. He has sent copies of this detailed multi point proposal to the ex T, the Ex'T's line manager, the NHS body, my Doctor, my Member of Parliament and the university that my Ex T works for. He is sending it both snail mail and email as the Ex T said he is no longer able to receive emails from us so we presume he has blocked us.
I am so glad to have someone this knowledgeable fighting my corner. I could not have written such an amazingly brilliant skilled diplomatic knowledgeable insightful and clever proposal in a month of sunday's.

I asked him those questions two sessions before he went AWOL and he reassured me that no he wasn't ill nor was anyone in his family seriously ill, he just had elderly parents who were nearing the end of their life. They are in their nineties. He is nearly sixty. you have to lose your parents some time. I lost mine in my thirties. so it is unusual for a T to drop all work for months after the death of a very elderly parent who has been ill for some months. Unless the T has become i unhinged. but we know he is still working three days a week at a non client post. and is probably returning to working with clients shortly.

exactly!!!

Sorry, but this seems like it has destructive undertones. I don't think this will result in anything positive to remember the relationship by, your work, or your time together.

I hope you find some closure.

So you're prepare to basically carry this open wound for 3-6 months, put your life on hold?

I honestly think your T would do well to forward any correspondence from you or your representatives to his lawyer and let them deal with it. His workplace have said he can't work with you, and he needs to work within their instruction because that's who his contract is with.

You've written to him at home, turned up at his home unannounced and now this - it feels like harassment to me. Yes, he's been unethical but you should really be taking it up with his employers, who have a continued clinical duty of care to you. If you want to complain to his professional body, do it but i can't see how this is in any way honouring of whatever good you feel was done in his work with you.

My guess is all the proposal will do push him to stop working and officially retire from therapy completely. There is no upside for him at this point except to come back and be forced into compliance.

File sanctions against him if they will help resolve things for you, but pushing someone into meeting with you is probably not going to leave things in any better place than they are right now. Let the powers that be, let the lawyers, etc. handle this issue at this point if that is what you want to do, but I suspect he'll retire before he'll consent to coming back into this mess. Yes, it is a mess he has responsibility for, and leaving the profession permanently may be, for him, the best way to be done with it. And I suspect his superiors, etc. will be fine with a voluntary retirement as a way to end the issue.

Find another therapist and work on healing your grief and pain over this loss, understanding how your reaction might be tied to your family history (just going on what you've mentioned previously).

Lot of advice. Seems the subtext is:
Dear OP, i know you are hurt and upset, but you are clearly confused. Let the adults handle this, and you just be a good little girl and run off to a new therapist who will kiss your boo-boos and make them better. Nice.

When therapists betray or deceive or abandon clients, there can be direct parallels with abusive relationships… the withholding of information, controlling what the victim can and cannot do, doing things that diminish and demean the victim. As such the client should do whatever they feel is necessary to stand up for themselves and to make it tolerable.

Just scurrying off to another therapist is possibly the worst thing you could do. I've done that. It was pathetic and degrading. It just submerged me further into subordination and weakness.

It's like training in how to be a good victim.

As for this idea that going after the therapist for resolution will spoil the good aspects of therapy, I find that laughable. If a major rupture like this is not addressed, then the whole thing is a fraud, in my opinion. The ending is everything. He abruptly and traumatically abandoned me after 6 years, but I won't let that spoil anything!