I was reading another thread and thought, wow, has anyone here not been harmed by a therapist, and what is the reason? From what I've read, I can think of a few who have never been harmed offhand, but there seems to be so many, so I thought I'd ask directly.

It's choose all. I realize negligence can come from a therapist's personal issues, incompetence, etc., but these categories seem to match with the results I'm looking for.

I have never been harmed by a therapist. That doesn't mean they were all great; I tried and left a few along the way who might have had the potential to be harmful, but I didn't stay long enough for them to do so. I've certainly never had any of the scenarios you list as options except maybe "honest mistakes," but I've never had one make a simple honest mistake that left me "harmed."

[Argonautomobile]

Also never been harmed. I feel very lucky.

[atisketatasket]

No. 3 made some honest mistakes that did harm me. But she also owned them and tried to make amends for them.

Psychiatrist was unethical/unprofessional with an ultimatum. No. 2's cold goodbye doesn't really fit into any answer.

I realized there was a need for a couple of revisions then found out that a poll can't be edited after its posted.

There should have been an "other" option, oops.

[AllHeart]

My t has some emotional problems. She has said and done some hurtful and upsetting things to me in a rejecting way but I do not view it as being harmful. She always makes up for her wrong-doings.

[Out There]

Yes , I think it was a combination of incompetence and egotism. I threatened her with a formal complaint , although I didn't have any intention of actually doing that - I just wanted her responses and reflections. I think her supervisor was more clued in and very concerned about what had happened. She blurbed herself as a trauma T , I don't think she had the first idea about trauma. In fact I'm getting a little triggered by remembering it and talking about it , so.

[ilikecats]

I've never been harmed by a T. I've only seen two though, and one of them was only for two sessions. My current T is great and I don't think she'd ever harm me in any way, intentional or not.

I'm really glad to hear that AllHeart. I think those who don't own their mistakes are the kind who are most likely to be the most damaging.

I've thought of scenerios where therapists or psychiatrists were incompetent or had serious emotional problems but didn't cause significant harm to me because I recognized it or the potential and left.

All therapists have some type of emotional issues or will make mistakes, but this is meant to capture data about significant harm. I think that would be harm that is long lasting or disruptive or really emotionally painful.

Maybe it's not as bad as it initially seemed. But it's always one too many.

[junkDNA]

my T sexually exploited me... he came onto me. of course i said yes... then he started taking me to strangers houses that he met on the internet so he could watch them have sex with me... it wnet on for almost 2 years

ill never get over it

[Luce]

I have never been harmed by a therapist. All up I have probably seen about 15... some only once or twice, others for 1-7 years.
They weren't all helpful for me, but not one of them was harmful.

[growlycat]

Yes but none of the above. T was a bad fit for me. He overall was not unethical but he may have terminated with me in an unethical way. I was a teenager and his cold personal style just reinforced old issues. He hospitalized me then walked away before I had a newly east abolished therapist. We were such a bad match.

I'm a survivor of medical torture. Yes, I have been harmed by therapists.

I ticked three yes categories - emotional baggage, incompetence and malpractice. T1 seemed to let his emotional baggage get in the way of therapy because of his incompetence as a therapist, yet when he recently contacted me out of the blue to tell me he had split from his wife and asking if I wanted to catch up, he crossed the line into willingly unethical.
Who knows what his intentions were, or whether I could have ended up ticking the second box too if I had been more vulnerable at the time he contacted me.

[The_little_didgee]

I was emotionally butchered by psychiatry because of misdiagnosis. The professionals wouldn't listen and tended to blame me for my apparent lack of progress. The treatment was making me worse. They tried very hard to fit me in the diagnosis even though most of them thought it was wrong. I was told I was sexually abused (repressed memories) and had all kinds of issues that I didn't have in reality. None of them bothered to verify any of it and talk to my family. It was easier to misdiagnose and tell me, "Didgee you are wasting my time", over and over again.

A lot of those people don't have the ability to come up with their own opinions and diagnoses. Most of them fail to listen and observe accurately. They see what they want to see, because it is easier. They can manufacture psychiatric illness with their therapy, hospital stays, and lots of drugs that cause symptoms.

I am still not over this. It is going to take awhile.

[Queas5y5]

I have been immeasurably harmed by a cruel, sadistic, narcissistic therapist. I am a good person, I never set out to hurt anyone and my T turned into a crazed lunatic "out to get me" (in a bad way). It was intentional, it was so cruel and hurtful to me. He has ruined all parts of my life that were good and they were few and far between. Somehow he insinuated himself into my inner circle and turned everyone against me. I guess he wanted what I had and gave no thought as to what it would do to me. After he realized what he did was hurting me he continued to do it!! I cried in misery every day because of the hurt. Did anyone care?? NO!

He hurt me along with others. Someone was jealous of the little bit I had in life and decided she wanted that for herself so she just TOOK IT ALL FOR HERSELF.

I never deserved this and am still crying over it. My life has been irreparably changed for the worse.

[Merecat]

No, I've never been harmed by a therapist, I've seen 3 over the years, one has literally changed my life and the other 2 kept me functional at a time when I was quite unwell. I'm thankful for their care and support.

[here today]

I voted "just" (1) due to the therapist's baggage and (3) because the therapist was incompetent.

With any other business professional those wouldn't be such a problem for me. I can watch out for a carpenter's incompetence and put up with, or not, their emotional issues. Even an attorney or doctor. But in a "relationship" with a therapist those issues can be very damaging to the emotional trust which is, supposedly, part of what therapy is trying to address. When it doesn't work it's just more trauma which I don't have very good resources to deal with because of the unhealed original trauma. That is not sane. But it is also not sane for the profession to rely on individual therapists who reject us when we are so much further retraumatized that we are hard to deal with. That's not an individual therapist's fault but it definitely is a systematic one, and nobody in the profession is taking any responsibility for looking at effects of the system as a whole.

[bounceback]

No never really been harmed. Had some who were better than others but none who harmed me. Most helped me

[UglyDucky]

I checked, "yes, but it was an honest mistake," and "no, I've not been significantly harmed," though I'm not sure I can justify both occurring together. The two Ts who saw me in my younger years - 20s and 30s - should have picked up on what my problems were, considering where they were trained and the education/experience they had. On the other hand, I'm just now coming face to face w/the anger I harbor that I've lost so much of my life because they misdiagnosed.

Now, I have a T who sees me and knows what I've gone through. But I'm feeling so damaged and having so little time to "get it right," that saying I've not been significantly harmed doesn't make sense. I'll leave that to you to figure out. I am, however, glad that I chose therapy this third time (for all of you who question whether or not therapy does more harm than good). I'm lucky to have found my current T. I may not quite get to the end of things, but I'm glad I kept trying.

[precaryous]

Yes, it was sexual, emotional, psychological and financial exploitation.

Possible trigger:

In my grade school years I have been beaten with my dead dog's dog collar until I left my body. I have been terrorized and beaten by my father. My mother didn't stop him. Neighborhood kids tricked me into climbing a tree then beat my bare legs with sticks not letting me climb down. In middle school I was tricked into visiting a friend's house to play parcheesi. A phone call came in for me. It was a guy...calling me!? A male voice on the phone said, "These girls wanted me to tell you they think you're too queer to hang around with.." I dropped the phone. I ran home through snow drifts in my stocking feet.. I never told my parents. No one liked me.

The abuserPdoc knew all these things and more. He still picked me to sexually abuse. He still picked me to trick me out of $5,000 back pay I received from Medicare when my disability came through. He said he was afraid I would spend it all. I never saw it again. He saw a trusting, innocent, unintelligent patient coming and took advantage. I hate me.

The abuse and the litigation (which I lost) has been the most difficult thing I have ever gone through. I'm still going through it.

[BudFox]

Originally Posted by The_little_didgee

They can manufacture psychiatric illness with their therapy, hospital stays, and lots of drugs that cause symptoms.

That is a crucial point. Iatrogenic harm seems to be horrifyingly common in the MH system. I would add that psych illness can also be manufactured by applying diagnoses and labels, which can change internal chemistry and self-state with their pathologizing and stigmatizing implications.

I found harmful therapy to be uniquely insidious. There was therapist baggage, poor judgement, lack of professionalism, sadism, and more, but the greater part of the harm came from all the subtle psychosocial stuff happening below the surface, brought out because of the disempowering hierarchy. I feel emotionally violated. I don't feel harmed by the therapist so much as by the process.

[velcro003]

I have seen about 4 different T's, and never been harmed by them. My current T is probably the first one where I have actually moved forward a bit in my life, but I dalso by blame my past T's either.

[kecanoe]

Ex T didn't handle telling me about his retirement well, especially since he had told me that 'we would work thru' my dependency and we definitely hadn't done that, nor were we able to do that. I did have 3 other ts who were very supportive. Even t3 who said he had done nothing wrong in retiring said that he had made a mistake in telling me that being dependent would be ok and we would work through it. Two years later, I am ok with it. And actually glad that i quit seeing him before he retired because that is what got me to t3 who is proving to be extremely helpful. Even when I heard that he was still seeing long term clients, I was glad that I ended with him when I did and did not keep seeing him until he really did close down. I think he has still not completely closed down. So his "mistake" in giving me so much warning (1-1 1/2 years is what he originally said) ended up being good for me. But it was an awful experience.

[MBM17]

Maybe when you meet with as many therapists as I have, you're bound to have some bad ones?

But even considering that I'd be likely to have a harmful one, my time with destructive therapists was more than double the time with helpful therapists, up until my current therapist. My therapist calls it a series of unfortunate events that I've had so many therapists who caused more hurt than help. It's really kind of ridiculous and unbelievable.

That's why I keep talking on here about working through my issues with harmful therapists. Working through trauma from therapists with a therapist is really complex. We're working hard on it and it's bring up really big, bad stuff from the past that I had stuffed down, and I'm really struggling right now while we try to work through it.