[here today]

This topic came up in a thread a while back which is now closed. Here is a video by a therapist about a largely unrecognized danger to some clients – not all, but some.

CPD Video - Managing the Erotic Transference: Preventing Escalation and Avoiding Harm ? Dawn Devereux

I know, for me, when I was in therapy, I was looking to “them” for something I could not find inside myself. Rationally, I was looking to them to help me find myself but, emotionally, from the place I was at the time, I was looking to them for a “fix”. I felt broken, and in some ways I believe it’s fair to say I was.

I don’t know what else I could or “should” have done at the time, with the information that I had about therapy and other things I could try to get out of my misery and confusion. Nevertheless, therapy did have a downside for me.

To those who don’t want to hear that – that’s fine. But one of the things that hopefully you might learn, and hopefully sooner than I did, is that it’s up to you to screen out things that come from other people in your life that you don’t want, or that you feel can do you harm. And that, for me, was something that I could not do well when I went into therapy.

It is really terrible to feel all alone in the world, I definitely know from experience. And all our society seems to offer those of us who feel like this is therapy. Hopefully the (paid) therapy experience will help most people find ways to NOT be so alone – to find other people they are comfortable with and who are comfortable with them. Maybe most of the time that happens. Unfortunately, some of the time it doesn’t – at least not for a long time, and possibly with some very crummy experiences along the way.

[herchippedcup]

I read her article Transference Love and Harm for a college paper and found it disturbing because of how true the psychological phenomenon is. Mental health professionals can be very naive about tge wounds opened in therapy and the reaction those wounds stir in the client.

[Elio]

I watched the video and was confused about a part of it. Well, confused about the word 'Idealizing' in relationship to transference. Is all transference idealizing or only those where one thinks the other is perfect in some way?

I have started to wonder if my transference isn't adverse or crossed some line into the unhealthy side of it due to the amount of time I spend with her in my thoughts. However, I do not think she is perfect. She makes mistakes, we often don't connect or think along the same paths, and sometimes she is just wrong. At the same time, most the time, I can feel her genuine desire to help and caring, her focus and attention to me when we interact, and when with me, it is always about me; she doesn't take any of it personally. She also has a quiet nature about her and is not overly feminine while still being female, which I feel most comfortable around. These are the qualities I find that make the relationship work. I am able to see what makes things work and what are areas of challenges or differences. I know there are other T's out there that would work for me, she is not so special to be the "only one" that I would connect to. At the same time, I have no desire to try to find someone else, just the pure work of it sounds exhausting when I have someone that I was lucky enough to be assigned and connect with.

So, is it "Idealizing"?

[here today]

I'm by no means an expert. And it may be an area that's continuing to be defined. According to my understand of what Devereaux said an "idealizing transference" often happens in therapy and most of the time it is not adverse. Just sometimes. And so it's a factor to be aware of, probably, like a potential side effect that most people don't get. And if therapists are aware that it can happen then they can probably be better at looking out for it and then discussing it with the client. As Devereaux said, most of the times things worked out with mediation between the client and the therapist.

Actually, my last T and I have kind of done our own "mediation". I was basically a dissatisfied customer and sought to resolve the dispute, at first with a request for a refund, which she didn't want to do. We had some additional email and snail mail communications. And she said that she had had some consultation on how to respond to my communications. Fairly recently, 9 months after the therapy officially ended (and for which I paid her) we basically have resolved the dispute with neither side exactly "winning". She read and responded to my communications without payment, but like a good business person she wanted to resolve a dispute with a dissatisfied customer, in a way that was satisfactory to her, too. She also said that she appreciated it when I sent her a copy of the AIT link above. So things CAN work out sometimes without the complaint process, which I didn't think I had a very good case for.

[dlantern]

To add a different perspective as plural those susceptible have to have an acceptance of transference the aspects of altering the therapist. It can be embarrassing you have to use extreme boundaries sometime you have to let up those boundaries to understand what is breaking to the surface so that the rest of the system understand.. It takes work not to subconsciously allow it to become worse. Sometimes you just get a, don't idealize folks without the compassion for those who don't understand. I think if you remember that is a relationship taking up for those that don't understand at the time then especially if the therapist has some understanding what to actually get to the root of and what is actually we don't click as patient and therapist it is really revealing.

[granite1]

i just wonder what they do with the clients who fail the assessment . dont clients who have issues with this transference deserve help .it seems this therapist it suggesting that Therapists not take on these clients of high risk .ware do they turn for help

[here today]

Originally Posted by granite1

i just wonder what they do with the clients who fail the assessment . dont clients who have issues with this transference deserve help .it seems this therapist it suggesting that Therapists not take on these clients of high risk .ware do they turn for help

Absolutely. But if it is recognized that there are clients that current therapy doesn't help and can make worse, then perhaps researchers will look for other ways and therapies to help them/us. I actually have found my way to getting better, I feel, once I connected the rejection I experienced from my last T to an intolerable emotional memory from early in my life.

One of the most important things for me would have been to have a therapist who could tolerate my sometimes intense negative transference. That, I think, was what the problem/issue was for me. I idealized, and had learned to idealize, in part as a way to get along in my family and social world. No negative emotions. They were split off. But usually I had a socially compliant exterior, and turned negative emotions against myself, so it wasn't entirely obvious that that was the case. I didn't have borderline, for instance.

Anyway, once the last therapist started falling off her pedestal and therapy itself started falling off its pedestal, the negative emotions started getting active. The normal, rational me didn't entirely know what was going on, and the disconnected negative parts didn't exactly have words for some of it, and the therapist, a specialist in trauma and dissociation, couldn't handle the negative emotion I felt for her sometimes. I could turn it off, that's how I got along in the world to the extent I did, but then what was the point of therapy?

All that makes sense to me now, don't know if that's similar to other people with an adverse idealizing transference or not. But eventually I hope the people doing research on this will pick up on commonalities and ways to help people.

I'm not all bad, or hopeless. Though I had my doubts for years. Therapy plus the PC community eventually have helped.

[BudFox]

I think most of what's said by the biz about transference is the worst sort of quackery. They've built a monumental edifice on sand. They cant even agree on whether the appearance of transference represents the start of therapy or the end. Credit to Devereaux for talking about the potential for harm, but it's hard to take any of them seriously. My opinion is that developing overpowering feelings for a paid actor is inherently unhealthy. But once developed, if the response is to ship the client out to a new therapist, that is also unhealthy.

[here today]

I don't what what the biz says about transference, but from my experience it's a real phenomenon, at least for me. But I think therapist incompetence, countertransference, and unenlightened self-interest can be real, too, and so therapists' "interpretations" about transference to patients can be real bunk, bundled with the not-to-be-trusted "authority" of jargon.

In that video, Devereaux' message was mostly to the therapist community, in order to prevent harm. If transference is real and clients develop overpowering feelings for the paid actor as presumably part of the healing process, then the paid actors need to be trained in how to handle clients' transferences in ways that don't harm them. Which is not what is happening now in lots of instances.

As I said, on my own, I was eventually able to connect or relate my overpowering feelings about my last T to feelings I experienced in childhood. This was not in any way a simple cognitive or intellectual exercise. It started to dawn on me that my T was like an aunt and gradually, eventually, I connected that rejected/disapproved-of feeling to what I had felt in childhood. Feeling rejected and disapproved of by all the women in my family WAS a big deal back then. Who was I to become, if not like them? All alone is not a possible way to live. Etc. Being rejected and disapproved of by a hired T is realistically NOT such a big deal. But it sure felt like it. The activation of the feelings in the transference may have been a way for me to relive and get past them (again, not a simple cognitive exercise). But because they were too much for the therapist, I was left with them activated and then dumped. I agree -- it's a very, very bad situation and one that needs to be taken more seriously. Maybe Devereaux' work will help with that.

[Ididitmyway]

She did an excellent presentation. She outlined so many things that are destructive about the so-called positive transference and she articulated it so well. Too bad she is not bringing this information to larger audiences of professionals and consumers alike. This is such a massive issue that needs to be discussed broadly. Thanks for the link.

I also think she has done an excellent presentation, very clear and even offered some solutions. I did not have the feeling that she suggested professionals should assess clients and then reject the ones with a predisposition to this - more the opposite, my sense was that she is trying to make people more aware and offer ways to raise their awareness. I don't think I have ever experienced this in therapy (or anywhere beyond maybe a couple weeks of initial enthusiasm when meeting new people) very much, but in my work I mentor more junior people and I think some of them go through this and it hinders their work if the mentor makes some of those mistakes she mentions for therapists. I've actually learned from the video in this context.

[BudFox]

She says that if a client has enough "risk factors" for developing so-called AIT, she would be reluctant to take them on. Doesn't say what the system would do with such a client. Others say that when a client develops strong attachment or transference, that is when the real work begins.

I agree it's a good analysis, well articulated, and better than the usual, but on the whole it is a limp and pale critique of this dubious practice of playing with emotions and lives. I'd like to see one of these people stand up and ask: WTF are we doing?

She cautions not to terminate without abiding by the agreed notice period. She says nothing about avoiding termination that would be harmful to the client. On the whole the talk seems to be about helping therapists avoid trouble.

I also find this talk disturbingly objectifying.

[here today]

Yes, in the write-up before the video it said that "The Psychologists Protection Society Trust invited Dr Dawn Devereux to speak". The Psychologists Protection Society is an organization of psychologists, for psychologists in the UK. According to their website "the main purpose of PPS is to provide members with assistance when complaints are received from clients and other professional protection matters."

So, for that audience, with that point of view, I thought she did a good job. Therapists don't want complaints filed. And if they are doing things that cause harm, then people are (or may be) more likely to complain. Hence, avoiding harm is (probably) good self-protection.

I've looked up some of Dr. Devereaux' links on the internet. Here's one that's closer to the question you asked.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/...-psychotherapy

[koru_kiwi]

thanks for posting this video HT. it's good to see that there are some in the field who are bringing this topic to light to other Ts, even if it was put under the guise of protecting Ts. it at least helps to bring the topic and conversation out into the open.

in her descriptors of the characteristics of the types of Ts who may encourage this type of transference in the client, i definitly could identify my ex-T as one of those types. although, i don't think my ex-T would have a clue or admit to it. during my last nine months of therapy, due mainly to my frustrations and disappointment of my on going experince of therapy, i was quite frank and had many conversations with my ex-T sharing my concerns that i felt a lot of things that happened in therapy and in the relationship with him were more harmful than helpful. some of it he was receptive (or at least appeared tolerant to in sessions) to hear and apologised for not handling some things well over the years, but for the most part he seemed to put the onus on me, analysing it as a resistance or avoidance of what he felt i should have been focusing on in therapy instead of him really understanding or acknowledging what i was trying to say. i wish i would have had access to this video at that time and i would have provided him the link to watch it. it would have been quite validating for me at that confusing time.