Therapists and their machinations

The only thing current T does out of that list is mirroring.

I realized it's rather unconscious for her which actually kind of freaks me out more because I'd much rather that she do it consciously.

It stopped bothering me once I saw how unconscious of a response it is.

She used to do (a lot) the whole "I am feeling now (E.g. dizzy, nauseous etc) whatever you're feeling" trick which really bugged me -- at times it felt over the top and rather manipulative and at times, well, I was surprised that I could be read so easily.

She stopped doing it after I started staring at her silently whenever she made such statements.

i will say my T has never played stupid. She sometimes tries to normalize things for me, and I either ignore her completely, or roll my eyes at her and tell her that it very therapist-y of her. She has told me that she feels grateful that I can speak to her about my dark feelings. I usually just say nothing, and inside am like "whatever," but I don't think she is acting "at" me. I know that is a strong belief of yours SD, and I am not trying to change it--I just don't think my T deliberately sits in her office every day and acts.
I will agree with you that I am not a fan of normalizing either, but I also don't think my T is trying to treat me like I am an idiot (and i am sensitive to those type of remarks). I think the effect is that they are trying to make us feel like we are not alone in our feelings, but I personally feel that I don't honestly care if I am alone with them or not--it is just how i feel, and I want her to understand and listen, that is it.
Mine probably would explain if I asked her. Nothing she has said has been important enough for me to ask her, but I trust that if I was like "what prompted you to say that? It feels very contrived," or whatever it is I feel...that she would explain to me her thought process.

I have noticed my T doing this ocassionally, and I don't think it is conscious either. On some level, I don't think this is a "trick" of the T as SD may think, but just human nature. I have noticed on multiple ocassions, how a friend and I would be in sync when walking. I thought it was fascinating because I, as a short person, have much shorter strides than most people around me.

I think mirroring is more of a human thing.

My therapist has this way of asking permission which really works for me - even though this in itself is kind of a machination, it helps that he makes it all so explicit and up front. He's also written a few books where he explains exactly what he does and why. I found this very helpful in the beginning especially.

Mirroring: A calculated therapeutic technique or just conversation?

I think it is a normal human thing—like your walking example—but therapists take it to a whole ‘nother level. Right down to trying to sync with your breathing. (Happened to me.)

And so to me it is a machination, trying to get the client to think of this as any normal old relationship, when it is not.

It doesn’t happen to bother me because it at least means they are paying attention. But I would never describe a therapist’s mirroring as the mirroring a friend and I might do to each other.

So, I don't think current T fits either velcro's or your description of the whole thing.

I suspect -- as I've told her (much to her chagrin) -- that she sometimes tends to go into a sort of dissociative state in therapy, which is when the mirroring goes out of whack.

So, I've seen her stare fixedly at me (as if she's out of it) and almost repeat words and sounds I'm making.

When I stop and just look at her, it's like suddenly she snaps out of that fog or whatever and becomes 'normal' again.

So, it's not what a friend would do but it's also not terribly conscious (she clearly recognizes how weird it looks, immediately after she does it but it's like she's operating from some other universe at that time).

Sometimes my therapist makes me repeat things back to him like I'm some kind of moron. It annoys me, but it doesn't enrage me. There are times when he gives me cop-out BS answers, and that annoys me too. Makes me think he's not being honest. But then there are times when he tells it like it is, and I appreciate that. So it's a mixed bag, basically.

I'm not sure I believe my T when she tells me how special I am. I'm sure she says that to all of her clients. I remember her saying "trust the process" but not too often. She will say something but is "grist for the mill" but that doesn't bother me. She says "I'm human" sometimes when she makes a mistake or when she thinks I think she's perfect. I usually see beneath her words because she's a good person.

Like a lot of people have mentioned, how you feel about these things will depend on how you feel about your therapist as a whole. The therapists I saw only briefly did these things and they felt like cheap parlor tricks, but that's because I knew they didn't give a toss about me.

I see through some of the 'machinations' of my current therapist, but I don't mind them, because he's always worked in my best interest.

Two things:
One, by the time i am called in to help on a problem (im thinking of several times in computer programming), the person who was originally unable to solve the problem, usually doesnt want to believe me anyway. They are pretty stuck on THEIR definition, their solution. So, not only has their attempt with a wrench failed, they object to me using a snake (or whatever!).

The second thing - and ive said this before, and i dont know why im the only one with the problem - i have a hard enough time being real and saying what i want to say, i dont have a lot of energy left to judge t.

So that would be you find those people’s machinations useful?

The one that drives me crazy we have talked about before, and it is the " Well I am human too" as an excuse for anything that goes wrong that rests clearly on the therapist's shoulders.

It incenses me. It implies one of two things: the T thinks of himself as superhuman and thinks clients view him that way too, and it comes as a surprise to remember oh yes I am JUST a person not a , lol, god or that the T is always biting his tongue, swallowing irritations, checking annoyance and basically schooling himself to act like he cares and the conversation is flowing, so that he sees his mistakes as the result of superhuman effort.

Either way, my T does not have "sorry" in his vocabulary, and would never admit anything he does isn't top shelf to a patient( he doesn't say client) . ( I do adore my T- just a pet peeve that goes with the question).

I don't find those machinations really useful but can tolerate them if moderate. The times when they irritated me most where in situations when the expressions obviously contradicted something else said, or when they were used as excuses from the T. My second T was pretty good at making it seem tailored, subtle and quite natural most of the time and I told him this because I think it is good professional communication skill.

Well, if that's a machination, my T did it, too. Especially when I was in a mildly critical cognitive state, with an underlying feeling that my sense of self had been attacked or neglected, etc.

I had learned early on to "turn off" the feeling of being attacked or neglected, and had very good cognitive capacity for understanding other people's mistakes and maintaining cool in the face of that -- but to do that in therapy would have been counterproductive, I thought. So, I had no trouble understanding cognitively that the T was human -- and for her to state that at a cognitive level, as if my cognition needed the "change" or improvement, was just plain wrong -- and insulting, not understanding, rejecting, etc. Focused, maybe, on the fact that she felt attacked at the moment. In which case, for her to say something like "Can we step back for a moment? I'd like to understand some more about what is going on with you internally right now. Can you describe it?" Or something like that. Client-focused, not therapist-focused.

I guess the main thing that bothered me about "I am human too" was that nowhere in life -- not even in therapy -- was I ever allowed to be "human, too" and accepted as who I am. Except with my late husband.

Certainly not in therapy.

y'know - this question reminded me of something my t said thursday evening during my session. i'd been talking about the psych class i'm taking right now, because I finally worked through the "mystery therapist" activity in the last chapter which is on Therapy (I hadn't let myself actually look at that chapter beyond the section names until I at least finished everything that was due up to 11/11 haha) anyway! the mystery therapist activity first taught about 8 different types of therapy, and then played short video clips describing briefly how a fictional t worked with a particular also fictional client and their issues. As I went through that activity a couple of times I was like "OH!!! T does that with me!" recognizing those types of therapy from my own. She asked me which types I identified from my own therapy so I told her saying "These are what you do!" she just laughed and then said "those are the ones you RESPONDED to." I was like, OH!

So now that I read your question, SD, I'm thinking more about this - and recalling times in the past when I've gotten upset with her in sessions and stopped talking and then come on PC later and typed things in the dear t thread like "t, don't pull that crap on me" - those times were quite likely when she's tried types of therapy with me that I did NOT respond well to - like maybe I saw through them because she was too obvious in her attempt or something? I dunno! This makes therapy even MORE fascinating to me now!! That the ones I responded to, does that mean she "did them right" or something? "Did" them better than the others? Or do people just respond naturally to some and not to others? I guess that's why the eclectic approach. Funny how a couple of yearrs ago learning of these "machinations" as you called them would probably have pissed me off, but from where I'm at now, I'm seeing them like someone else wrote I'm sorry I forgot who but as tools of her trade. Psychology is becoming endlessly fascinating to me! Thank you for asking the question.

Did the therapist tell you what the point of them was?

I try to look beyond the obvious or surface of what is said, see if I can determine a purpose in the larger scheme of things. None of us says very brilliant things to one another very often I don't think and yet we have relationships for some reason, like/dislike people for some reason, etc.

I'm sometimes clueless and need a two-by-four applied between the eyes (obvious stated over and over) before I see how I was looking at something and what is actually being said/meant are/were not the same. I remember getting very frustrated at my T for saying the same thing I didn't want to hear over and over but then remember suddenly getting it "correctly" finally so I better understood what she was saying.

To me, therapists often have the unenviable task of trying to teach us what the color "blue" looks like, as in "The sky is blue". I may know the sky is blue but what that "means" to other people and why I should care, etc., I may not know.

I don't see that as their task. I certainly do not see anything about the therapist as them having an unenviable task - they signed up for it and get paid to just sit there.
How hard is it to explain "when I say X to you it is for Y purpose"?

She didn't have to, the point of them was obvious. To help me with those things that I came there seeking help with. And they did - they helped me start to understand myself and why I was the way I was, and ultimately to figure out how to change the things that I wanted to change. It was quite a bumpy road at times and she waded through a lot of **** with me but y'know what, we got there.

Was it obvious they were supposed to help because you believe the therapist says things that are meant to do that or was it specifically obvious about each particular thing the therapist did at you? So do you mean it was obvious on how X technique was meant to specifically help you with the Y reason you went to a therapist? I am serious in trying to understand.

I guess I never really had a problem with the approaches and techniques my therapists used. I was aware they were using them. They didn't normally have to explain why they said what they did or did what they did; I generally was quite capable of seeing that for myself. Where I didn't understand, they were quite willing and able to explain it to me. I came out of therapy much healthier and more stable and much more content with my life, able to handle life now in a way I was unable to previous to their help, so I'm certainly not complaining about it.

I have no idea why the woman stated the obvious or tried to normalize or spoke at all ever in terms why I told her I was hiring her. Nothing the woman ever said was useful. I found a use - but it was not from anything she did and had nothing to do with the reason I hired her in the first place - that has not been helped at all by hiring her.

ah. well i guess it was obvious to me all along that she wanted to help me learn how to help myself. I've pretty much always, consistently felt that she was sincere in wanting to help me (i say pretty much always because obviously from my posts here there were times where she was really off base and things did NOT work). I really didn't know she was doing specific 'things' that were actual 'things' until i learned about them in my psych class, if that makes sense. Now knowing about those techniques, I can look back and see how she has used those ones that, as she said I responded to. I'm pretty sure I know the ones she tried and failed with because I got pissed off or just withdrew from too. It's all so absolutely fascinating to me 1, and 2, it has all worked together for the good for me, so because of those 2 reasons I don't even have it in me to feel like I was manipulated or things were "done at" me. I am closer to understanding what they mean when they say "the process" or "it's a process" or "your process". Like, understanding it inside myself as it applies to me, but not to where I could explain my understanding to anyone else yet.

That's interesting to me, that you were aware that they were using approaches/techniques. Most of the time, I was not aware at all that she was using any techniques. I thought we were "just talking" haha. This psych class I'm taking is really proving to be a revelation to me in some ways. I have done more than my share of complaining along the way when I felt like things weren't working - but I'm coming out the other side not complaining about any of it - because i can see how it's all worked together, even the things that didn't 'work' per se, to bring me to where I am today - a well-rounded, happy, confident person.