Psychotherapy Scams?

Hey, guys.

I was just wondering: could anybody here please tell me whether or not there is such a thing as psychological corporations that are specifically designed and created to scam people out of their money with psychotherapy? I mean, is it particularly common? Are there corporations in which the psychotherapists are all fully aware that the so-called “psychotherapy treatment” that they offer is a complete and utter scam? I ask, because: back in 2017 I had begun what is apparently referred to as “Cognitive Behavioral Therapy” (CBT) and paid $650 for 6 and a half sessions (it was recommended that I go to this so-called “psychotherapy” for a total a six months, so that would be about 24 sessions in total... amounting to about $2,400)... but the whole thing just felt like a big scam to me.

I was already aware that “CBT” was in itself a real thing and not a scam as I had read about it beforehand. I wasn't concerned about whether or not “CBT” was in itself a scam; but, my third psychotherapist seemed to be be fully aware that this specific psychotherapy treatment that I was receiving from her wasn't actually “CBT” at all or anything else that could possibly be considered as having been real psychotherapy and that I was being scammed out of my money real good.

I decided to look these people up to find out whether or not they were legitimate, and it did seem that they were (in fact) legitimate. For example: I looked up the psychotherapist's “PSB” license number on the California Department of Consumer Affairs web site, and she showed up as a “Registered Psychological Assistant”. I also found her LinkedIn profile, but I wasn't exactly sure how to verify some of the stuff that was on there... like I wasn't exactly sure how to find out whether or not she really got a “PsyD.” at the Chicago School of Professional Psychology—do I just call the school and ask? Anyway, her boss (a psychologist with a PhD., and also both the “Director” and owner of their psychological corporation) had evaluated me for all personality disorders and mental disorders back in July of 2016, and he told me that he didn't think me to have any personality disorder whatsoever; however, he did diagnose me as having three disorders—Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), and Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD). I had also looked the owner up on: the California Department of Consumer Affairs web site, on LinkedIn, and I ran something of a background check on these people using BeenVerified and a few other web sites. These people all seemed to be legitimate, but then when I looked up their corporation on certain web sites (such as Yelp)... they did show up, except they had absolutely zero reviews. So I had no idea what their other patients thought of them.

The owner of this corporation recommended to me that I begin psychotherapy with one of his subordinates (my third psychotherapist). After feeling undecided for nearly eight months, I had finally given in sometime around February of 2017 and I decided to begin seeing this psychotherapist, hoping to get some answers from her boss who had told me the following throughout various e-mails over the previous eight months:




Once I decided to begin psychotherapy with this psychotherapist he recommended, he ended up e-mailing me the following:


I had neither spoken nor seen my psychologist since July of 2016, yet he claimed that he would: provide me with psychotherapy, give me some “limited guidance”, and answer my questions. I had already met with the psychotherapist for a total of 6 and a half sessions and paid $650, and I still hadn't gotten any answers. The psychotherapist could not answer any of my questions because they were intended for her boss, as only her boss could answer them because only he knew what he and I had talked about back in July of 2016. And there seemed to be limited communication between my psychotherapist and my psychologist in regards to me. The psychologist stopped responding to all of my e-mails back in February of 2018.

The way that this psychologist and my psychotherapist had behaved around me was all very strange. It was like they were stringing me along just long enough to milk me for as much profit as possible until I figured out that it was all a scam and I decided to bail on them, only to have myself replaced by another clueless patient. It's all a really long, weird, and complicated story that could take me several posts to explain.

Here is only some of the unusual and inappropriate behavior that I had observed my psychotherapist displaying:

On my first session with her she seemed quirky, quick-witted, and even came off as mildly immature. She interrupted me several times by saying what she assumed I was about to say. After she interrupted me for about the fifth or sixth time, she started laughing.

During the second session she seemed like an almost completely different person. Her appearance was radically different. She came off as slightly *****y. She seemed mostly bored or even annoyed as she kept sighing a lot throughout the session. At some point I started talking about something that I felt was relevant in regards to my family, like how they seem largely anti-science because whenever I start talking to them about science-related topics (whether they be about: genetics, neurology, mental illness, astronomy, etc.) they tend to get unusually defensive and start talking about God like how I was somehow offending him.

At that point the psychotherapist then cut me off and said something like: "Right. Science. You're really big on science. You're Mr. Science Man."

That was just so weird and random, I just responded with: "Uhhh... yeah." And I didn't bother finishing the point that I was trying to make. I remember thinking to myself: "The hell was that about? That was kind of *****y. Did she do that on purpose? Is she testing me somehow? Or maybe she's just religious and she felt offended. This might get awkward. I'm not exactly sure how this is supposed to help me overcome social anxiety."

During the third session I could’ve sworn that she must've been high on Adderall. I had also decided to let her do most of the talking during this session because she seemed really annoyed with me during the previous session. So what dic she want to talk to me about? She wanted to talk about pets. She wanted to ask me: what sort of pets I've had, if I had any sort of preference for pets, if I had any sort of preference for dog breeds, and so on. She preferred to discuss pets rather than discussing about my family's weird anti-science stance.


Even now I am only describing a fraction of her antics.

After my sixth session with her, I was really starting to feel angry and frustrated with the whole experience. I was feeling very angry toward her boss who continued refusing to see me, and continued to refuse answering my questions. I ended up writing a scathing e-mail to him.


And in that last e-mail that I received from him, he wrote to me:


So I had handed to this guy a total of $1,350 ($700 for the personality disorder testing + $650 for the six and a half sessions of psychotherapy with his subordinate) over to his corporation, and yet he still wouldn't do what he said that he would do. And he's never going to.

And now not only was the psychologist refusing to see me, but his subordinate (my third psychotherapist) also began to refuse seeing me. I had last seen her on March of 2017, and I wanted to begin seeing her again back in February of 2018. She then sent me an e-mail telling me that if I continued trying to contact her, that she would take legal actions against me to prevent me from contacting her. She then stopped responding to all of my e-mails and phone calls.


Thanks in advance to any body here who can answer my question.