[stopdog]

Would you mind if the therapist contacted you, unbidden, except for scheduling? I don't mean with anything untoward like for a date or any sort of unprofessional purpose - but even if for a professional purpose with reasonably not bad intentions on the part of the therapist.

[mindwrench]

If I have a good T, I wouldn't want to do anything to mess it up. Things could get weird if the structure of the situation gets flimsy. As much as I would want to be in more contact with someone who gets me, not worth the risk.

I have had three very excellent therapists who each at one time or another took it upon themselves to contact me for various reasons. Their contact was completely appropriate and professional under the circumstances, the contact was helpful and very much appreciated. These calls weren't done indiscriminately or frequently, but with great care and respect.

[itisnt]

If the T contacted me by email, phone or text "unbidden" to tell me she heard a great joke today, or look at this great YouTube video or hey, ate at a great restaurant, you should try it out or Hey, here's a picture of the new shoes I bought today, I'd give her the heave ho. But if he/she contacted me to tell me that there's a great documentary on trauma on this evening on PBS, you might want to watch it, or after a difficult session, she contacts me to see how I'm doing or if she contacts me to ask about the side effects from the medication I'm taking has lessened after the suggestion she made to decrease the dosage or something along those professional lines, I'd be fine with it. I don't want to "chat" with my T by email, text or phone, but I'm fine if it is a professional reason.

Once upon a time i would have enjoyed this very much, but now it would feel intrusive. I'm not sure what changed.

[atisketatasket]

Well, the only one who's contacted me unbidden is No. 2, which was a check-in email. She handled it fine, but I didn't feel I needed it, was surprised, did not want to feel special or attended to, and can easily see where things could get messy. Clients could come to expect such behavior after a bad session, and be disappointed if it didn't come. Result, mess.

As for non-therapeutic stuff, no way.

my therapist calls me out of the blue on occassion. to check on me or ask me something or just whatever. i like it when she does it.
we never have regularly scheduled sessions because we live on opposite sides of the world and we both have completely crazy schedules. so we talk when we get a chance.

[ilikecats]

I'd love it if my T just randomly contacted me for non schedule related things. She has once, when we were talking about me doing yoga. She texted and asked if I had tried it. I was really happy to get that text. Last year she also texted and wished me a merry Christmas. But I don't quite remember if that was out of the blue or if we had already been texting about something professional related. Either way, I was glad to hear that from her.

I would find it uncomfortable. The only time he's ever done it is to cancel a session and that's the only time I would ever expect it.
T1 has sent unsolicited communication to me twice since I stopped seeing him. This time at 2am, telling me he has separated from his wife and want to catch up. It makes me very uncomfortable indeed.
Boundaries are useful to me because I need to know what to expect from a therapist to feel safe. Predictability is important to me.

[Sarmas]

I don't think there's an issue with that. If it's a t that was contacting a client to see how they were holding up and checking on their mental health status then I don't see how that's an issue. That's a very professional thing to do. It's almost like a follow up. It doesn't have to be done in all scenarios and cases. I think that the T can still stay professional while conserving their boundaries as they reach out.

[Luce]

My ex t contacts me not-in-response-to-something-else sometimes but email is our only contact and we don't have scheduled contact so I don't think that is weird.
If current new t contacted me for anything outside of our scheduled sessions or scheduled contact that would be super weird and unnecessary.

[ThisWayOut]

I picked "other"... I think I agree with others that contact related to therapy is fine. I think I would wonder what's up if t simply contacted me out of the blue, though I have some memory issues, so It might seem unrelated to me while it's actually still in the scope of what we were working on.

[ThisWayOut]

Originally Posted by Echos Myron

I would find it uncomfortable. The only time he's ever done it is to cancel a session and that's the only time I would ever expect it.
T1 has sent unsolicited communication to me twice since I stopped seeing him. This time at 2am, telling me he has separated from his wife and want to catch up. It makes me very uncomfortable indeed.
Boundaries are useful to me because I need to know what to expect from a therapist to feel safe. Predictability is important to me.

Wow. That would be very uncomfortable...

[Myrto]

I sometimes read on here that therapists send texts wishing "happy birthday" or "good luck" and if I'm being perfectly honest, it would be great to receive such texts. But I understand that my T doesn't send those as it would be too close to a friendship and she is not my friend. However, checking in on me after a difficult session would be perfectly appropriate and therapeutic. But she doesn't even do that. I don't think she cares that much.

[MobiusPsyche]

I would not mind.

[stopdog]

I am not talking about unprofessional contact.

I would not like it at all. They don't get to check up on me or anything like that. They have to stay back.

She did only once, it was while I was taking a break back in 2013, during the break my dad passed away and I called her about it talked for 10 minutes or so then the break continued. She emailed me a couple weeks later just saying she was thinking about me during the difficult time. There was no pressure to come back and I appreciated the contact a lot.

[ruh roh]

Yes. My therapist has checked in maybe three times in a two year period and it helped.

[nottrustin]

T has contacted me a few times over the years. Sometimes to wish me luck on big events coming up. a couple of times I have had concerning medical procedures and I tod her I would email and didn't so she emailed me for a check in.

We live in a small town and consequently have a dual relationship. The other contact we have we keep totally separate from therapy. She has emailed me quite a bit for that but like I said we keep it completely separate.

My ex-therapist did that a few times. I was uncomfortable with it, but also felt special from it at the time. I don't think it is appropriate and can't imagine any circumstances where it would be the right thing for a therapist to do. I am talking about unbidden contact, not a call back type contact.

I instantly voted "Yes - I would like to know the therapist thinks about me..." but thinking about and imagining it more... I think part of me would be happy to hear from him in the moment but I probably would not appreciate it much and would feel it is intrusive or pushy even if the contact is related to therapy material or my well being in general.

My former T contacted me twice after we formally ended therapy and I definitely had mixed feelings about it, mostly negative. It would probably be different in an ongoing, good relationship though. Well, I clearly have ambivalent feelings about this question...

I know the times I was contacted did not feel intrusive. The reasons varied, but generally they pertained severe crisis of some kind: seriously suicidal and checking in with me, husband in the ICU and checking in on all of us, my son in the hospital and being sure he was getting the best care, my sister's death and checking in on all of us. They didn't call to shoot the breeze nor was the contact really all that unexpected. They had shown consistent concern and care in these situations and it was very natural that they would place a call to me under the circumstances. In the case where my husband was in the ICU, even his pdocs (both old and new) called because it was such a rare and potentially deadly situations they were highly concerned to be sure he was getting the right care (in the hospital he was under other physicians' care who weren't familiar with my husband).

My t has contacted me about scheduling or if I asked her something and she didn't know so she would find out and text it to me but other than that she won't. First t always checked up via text and I wondered what kind of relationship this was and was confused by it, I would start to text her and she accused me of crossing her boundaries. I think she didn't really know what she was opening up or didn't discuss the boundaries or the limitations of our working relationship, as a new client this was confusing for me and I developed a dependency on her which soon turned into erotic transference. I can't blame her entirely but if she had of been professional and explained our boundaries it would have helped.
As a therapist I have only contacted clients outside of session for scheduling. But yesterday I text one of my clients because of what we were working on yesterday. It was directly related to that and I will discuss how it was for him to receive that text next week. We have been working together for a year and he has never asked for outside support and yesterday I seen a really vulnerable side to him. I rand my supervisor and explained and he thought it was OK in this instance because it was related to what we were working on!

[junkDNA]

hes asked me how i am unsolicited. hes sent me pictures of things in stores and stuff that usually involve cats. just stuff like that. it hasnt bothered me, to be honest. i like knowing he thinks of me outside of our scheduled times

[velcro003]

I put "other," because it did happen recently, and it made me feel good...but i wouldn't like it if it was a regular occurence--that would freak me out. I was throwing a party for the first time ever in my apartment that i lived in for almost 6 years, and almost cancelled the night before, which she knew about because I called her freaking out.

I e-mailed her the next morning and said I wasn't going to cancel it, and she didn't need to call me back. She did anyway, and wished me luck on the party.

That night she texted me that she hoped the party turned out well and I had fun. It was completely unbidden, but I thought it was nice she was giving me a little extra boost.

In the year and 4 months that I've seen her, this is the first time she's done that. If this were to happen every week, or just randomly over small things, I wouldn't like it. She knew this was something important to me, and caused me anxiety, so I found it helpful to know she was thinking of me.