How to find a new therapist - a discussion of interview techniques

Sooner or later, I'm going to have to find a new T. (Well, I don't HAVE to, but eventually I'll want to.) I don't want to end up with a T who is a bad fit or who might accidentally hurt me.

While thinking about how to interview potential Ts, I realized that behavioral interviewing is kind of like voir dire during jury selection. The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior so the general rule is not to ask hypothetical questions because hypotheticals invite people to answer based on their idealized self. No one wants to admit that they're unfair or, God forbid, racist.

I've come up with a few questions, and I would like to hear suggestions from others and also critiques of my method.

1- Tell me about a time when a client has been difficult and highly resistant. For example, they may have refused to do anything you asked them to do, or they may have refused to answer your questions. How did you handle that situation? (This question is a distraction--I don't really care about the answer that much, but it seems like a reasonable question and will hopefully get the therapist talking.)

2- Tell me about a time when a client has asked for a hug. How did you respond?

3- Tell me about a time when you've had to terminate a client.

4- Tell me about a time when a client has told you "I love you." How did it make you feel?

5- (This one has to be a hypothetical for obvious reasons, and you can imagine why I would ask it.) Assume that you were recently diagnosed with a terminal illness. What do you do with regard to your clients?

Depending on whether or not this is important to you, you might ask what their policy is on out of session contact.

I'm curious as to whether most therapists would answer these, with the exception of the last one. My T is incredibly tight-lipped about other clients and their stories. I don't think she would talk about specific examples, even in an anonymized way. Like one time she shared one general comment another client had said about doing long-term therapy with her, and I could tell even that was right on the borderline of what she was comfortable saying.

That's a good point. I had not thought of it. But I don't know how to extract real answers from them except by asking them about their past experiences. Everything I've ever read about voir dire says that asking hypotheticals is useless.

I wonder if you could make it more general - ie...

What is your policy on physical contact?

What is your termination process?

How do you handle transference?

Etc...

Yeah, but general questions are like hypotheticals--they invite the therapist to answer in a way that they hope they would act, and not how they would actually act, if that makes any sense.

People have policies about this or that, but it doesn't mean they will actually adhere to those policies in real life.

I wish I had discussed this with my therapist before he died. He probably would have been able to help me figure out how to interview future therapists. But, at the time, I was so upset about him dying that I refused to discuss the possibility of finding another therapist.

I never “interviewed” a therapist. To be honest, it never entered my mind to do so. I just went in and introduced myself. We talked about what I was needing from therapy. I shared my major concerns for my own situation, etc., and I listened to how that therapist responded. Did they seem to understand what I was communicating to them. Did we seem to be on the same page. Did I get a sense that, at least initially, the therapist go me. If I left feeling positively about the discussion, I returned. If not, I didn’t. If I was ambivalent, I gave it another session or two. If by that point I was still not feeling it, I moved on. I tend to get a read on therapists fairly quickly.

I have never actually interviewed a T. When I met Emdr T asked her questions about Emdr but never about the T

I've never interviewed a T either, but I'm thinking that some interviewing might be in order for the future. I got lucky with my T, but it was more or less by chance.

I don't know if I should leave it up to chance again. Now that I know what I want and don't want in a therapist, maybe I can take a more targeted approach.

Or maybe not. I don't know.

I agree that they might not talk about specifics, because of confidentiality.

I think it sounds like a good idea to 'interview' even if it's in a more general sense. I see what you're saying that people can have a policy but then not necessarily behave in the way their policy describes. But I think you can still find out a lot of useful things, and as you are someone who has been in therapy before and so you have an idea of what you are looking for, I think this could be very useful.

For me, if I were to start again with another T, I think the biggest question in my mind would be what kind of therapy do they offer. Personally I don't think I would get on well with traditional psychodynamic therapy, but on the other hand I would want someone willing to work long-term, so not a basic CBT course either. (Ideally, for me, schema therapy! In this hypothetical scenario where I needed to start again...) I also think it would be very important to me to know what are their qualifications, roughly how many people have they treated with issues problems to mine (they could answer this in a general way, like I've been seeing people with x problem for y years or something like that).
Also 'what is your approach to our if session contact?'

I think it could be a really good start to begin with these questions. Also I think you could get a 'sense' of the T by the way they answer, as well as the information they give. E.g. do they overshare, do they refuse to answer something, are they comfortable with you taking the lead and telling them your questions, etc.

I can relate to wanting to know more on a therapist that you're going to see. I think there were some threads years ago on this topic too but I know articles
Just a quick google
How to Interview a Potential Therapist. Twenty Three Questions to Ask

How to Interview Your Therapist | Psychology Today
((Ooo #4 I may take a note on).

I am not sure if this is helpful but my last T .. I asked questions some general questions and also I mentioned some problematic encounters with others In the past... like I was very upfront on "us" being on the same page and explaining one of my experiences with how it hindered me more than assisted... I inquired how we would try to avoid that.
That again could be a hypothetical self of a T but I felt it helped me out with opening up as we went along.

I've never asked one question re my therapy. I just went with it. If things arose we talked it out.
A T may answer your questions. But the proof is in the pudding.

A good idea is to look for therapists who have written some stuff and read it. I read a book my T wrote before I met with him. It gave me a good idea of who he was and even included anonymised/amalgamated examples from his practice.

The mistake I made when I interviewed potential therapists in the past is that I did not really interview them. Just talked about myself in the first meeting, what I was hoping to use therapy for, and let them speak about whatever. It was too free-floating. I would certainly do it differently now and ask them a series of specific questions, especially about their experience in the areas I want to address and about their therapeutic approach. Both of my Ts had enough online info to give a good idea about their backgrounds, training, interests etc but I think those websites, articles etc can be very polished and it is meaningful to ask them on the spot and see how they explain it. I agree with others though that they may not be very open/honest about their experience with other clients (both of mine distorted things quite a bit), this is why I would rather ask about them and their views and observe not only the content of what they say but how they say it, how precise they are in their explanations (I really dislike sloppiness and that was a main issue with my first T), complex reactions, how they interact with me etc. And, again, I would ask about things that are especially relevant to what are important for me and what I want to do with my therapy, which it seems you have already integrated in those questions somewhat.

This is the first thing that came to my mind. Well said and pointed out.

I would also find out if they have a specialization and whether that is a fit for you. What manner of therapy do they use (ie. CBT)? How structured are they and their sessions? Is seeing them a matter of a set course of time or is there no boundary in this way (my own therapy is CBT over a 12 session period but she seems flexible on this).

I really didn't seek out a therapist. One was basically found for me and I accepted the suggestions. I was recommended my psychologist by my psychiatrist based on her specialisation in handling PTSD. Then my veterans' affairs case manager went on to recommend her too.

I'm a lawyer too and I'd discourage you from approaching interviewing a therapist in the way you would approach voir dire. Like lawyers, confidentiality for therapists does not allow the reveal of any client information specific to a case (in the extended way that would be useful to you) without permission, even without identifying information. I just don't think that a voir dire approach to therapists will reveal the "biases" a therapist might have or a "bad" therapist you want to eliminate in the way that voir dire can help lawyers eliminate potential "bad" jurors.

I've interviewed a number of therapists on each round of my 3 long term t's and I think the best way to get to know any potential interviewee is to approach it like a funnel, with the broadest questions first and more specific questions afterwards. I was looking to get the potential therapist talking about what they do and how they do, picking up on things they said or didn't to ask follow up questions. To me, therapy is an interaction, and this helped me assess how the potential T and I connected.

I started with questions about training, experience, and their choice to become a therapist. Such as "tell me a little bit about when you made the decision to become a therapist," "tell me about your training" and "tell me about your experience working with people who have [for me, trauma] issues."

The process of interviewing someone can tell you as much as their answers. My T didn't interrupt me (he still doesn't), but he used a brief opening to ask me this question, "so what have you found helpful in the past with therapy?" I'd had what I thought was my last therapy session in another community 15 years earlier. He also asked what I found not helpful.

But since you know what you want in a therapist, it strikes me that those things can be useful, direct questions. As in, "I've learned from past experience that I want my next therapist to . . . . ", see how s/he responds.

For me, the broadest questions and listening to their answers reveal much about the potential therapist's working style. How comfortable they are with themselves is very much revealed in this process, and how comfortable they are with being transparent about how they approach things. How reflective and thoughtful they are also comes out in these kinds of questions, because I was not just looking for a description of facts, but for the way they talk about their work.

Good luck with it. I've come away with every interview with a definite sense of this person is/isn't right for me. My most recent round of looking, I eliminated one person on the phone and another after an hour where she answered my questions in the most superficial way and asked me nothing about myself. My current T, who I've seen for 9 years, I found right after her.

I totally understand what you're aiming for here, but I don't think any T will answer those questions entirely honestly (at least not in a first meeting). For starters, even if they will agree to discuss other clients in a general way, they will be forced to "change the story" for the sake of confidentiality... and lets be honest- even the best and most forthright people give somewhat idealized answers to interview-type questions anyway. It's just human nature when you're being interviewd by a stranger to put your best side forward. Not that most people would outright lie....but they also won't confess to their big misteps either.

You're probably better off sticking to questions regarding their basic policies and then guaging how authentic, flexible,and human they seem to be. How are their listening and attuning skills? You can feel that kind of thing in a first meeting without getting into too many details (on either side). Do they talk more about themselves, pontificate about their knowledge, degrees, and methodoligies, or seem genuinely interested in learning about you, etc. You know, really observe and listen to them...and then use your gut intuition to guide you. You seem like a very intuitive person so you're probably good at reading people.

I think these are brilliant!

Everyone seems to have different views on this, here's mine: I would be inclined to suggest that you express your concerns more directly, so for instance if it's important to you that a T allows hugs, it seems more straightforward to say something more directly about that like maybe: 'I've found in the past that at some points I really wanted to hug my T, do you have any particular boundaries on this?'

I think all the questions would be great to ask, I don't think everyone would have the same answers as to what they need and they'd outline boundaries as well as relationship fairly well. But some of them a T might answer in a kind of weird way because that requires trust and understanding of your situation.

Something else you might want to think about if that is anything that you feel like you can do (I can imagine it can be very hard)... what would your T suggest you do? Like what would he suggest you might need from the next person you talk to?

Y'all have some really good points. I'll respond in more detail later. (Slammed with work right now but procrastinating by coming here...)

I might as well cut to the chase. My main issue is that I want to avoid a T who is like LT's therapist. (Sorry LT!) I want to avoid someone who would find my feelings to be "creepy." It's not that I don't want the therapist to be honest. If the therapist found my feelings to be creepy, then I would prefer that they were honest about it. However, what I want to avoid is a therapist who would find my feelings creepy, if that makes any sense.

Had I told my therapist that I held a transitional object he gave me for comfort and that it was because the object represented him, not the room (why the hell would a transitional object represent the therapy ROOM anyway), he would never have said it was creepy. Not because he would lie to me and tell me it was fine when it wasn't. My therapist was always brutally honest with me. But because he would not have found it creepy in the first place.

I want a therapist who is going to be comfortable with my feelings. Someone who can hold my feelings and not be weirded out by them. Someone who would normalize my feelings and not shame me for them.

And I can tell you, even if the therapist lied and said they were comfortable with your feelings, you can tell if they really aren't. And that weirdness would be really harmful to me.

My therapist was always comfortable with my very intense feelings towards him. My feelings intensified exponentially as his health deteriorated and I was on the verge of losing him. Before I told him how I felt, I was always afraid it would be too much for him. Too insane. But it never was. It was fine. He thought my feelings were perfectly normal. Of course I loved him. Everyone loved him.

He responded to my feelings not only with acceptance, but he showed me that he valued my affection without crossing any boundaries. And he showed me he cared about me, not only with words but with his actions.

How am I going to find another therapist who would/could do the same? I truly believe that some people are not capable of this.

I think some therapists use professional boundaries as an excuse to keep their client's at arm's length because they aren't comfortable with true intimacy. The kind of intimacy that requires the therapist to give a little of themselves to the client. I don't know, I'm just blathering at this point. Gotta get back to work. More later.

Not blathering. That made total sense to me. Especially the bit about therapists needing to be comfortable with true intimacy and giving a little of themselves.