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Hellyko
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Default May 11, 2022 at 04:02 AM
  #1
Good day,
I am sorry to come with something so specific, but currently the person that usually consults me on such matters is unavailable.

My good friend goes through a hard time and started to visit specialist recently.
I am getting more and more suspicious about it: in three hour long sessions therapist was able to uncover childhood father related trauma and bind it to practically everything that happens in my friends life now.

What concerns me:
- There is practically no denial from my friend, but complete "movie style" sudden realisation and awe.
- My friend goes through a lot of stress lately: war has hit hard, long term relationship frozen in uncertainty - this person is in a vulnerable, easily exploited state, credulous.

I don't try to deny the existence of possible trauma...
But three hour long sessions led to this: "You have father related trauma that you don't remember at all. Now you try to impose the same behaviour model on your spouse, and it is what causes your problems."

Specialist has never ever met the spouse and the whole relationship situation was not discussed before the third session.
And the person in question is pretty deep, clever, with wide range of emotions, life saturated with events, and ton of possible causes of stress (including a damn war).

I have a strong suspicion, that therapist fits everything into a certain beautiful theory they have in their mind and manipulates (involuntarily, of course) patient to compel. Instead of going through a mess of possible causes, most of which are likely unrelated to each other.

So... is it possible to unravel a big trauma (which is completely forgotten even now, after reveal, by patient, except for the general negative feeling towards its cause) and then analyse it well enough to make such conclusions in three sessions?
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Default May 11, 2022 at 06:37 PM
  #2
In a type of psychotherapy called "Cognitive Behavior Therapy" opinions are offered as "hypotheses" unless there is evidence to be looked at or some conclusion is testable in some way. There can be quite a difference between a hypothesis, a working theory, an established fact and so on as you have rightly observed.

I don't know what the stardards are in other types of psychotherapy. Cognitive Behavior Therapy was developed in part by a psychiatrist was was concerned that other forms of therapy were too dogmatic and that practictioners were too authoritarian. Of course Cognitive Behavior Therapy also has its detractors.

Don't know if this information is helpful to you.
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Default May 11, 2022 at 07:09 PM
  #3
Sounds suspicious to me. Like all the fake memory of devil worship that were brought about in the 80’s.

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Default May 12, 2022 at 05:14 AM
  #4
I would be suspicious as well. As mentioned, there is such as thing as "false memories", people can become absolutely convinced something has happened to them when it has not.

This doesn't have to be the case of course, but for most people, opening up about deep trauma takes longer than two or three sessions.

The thing about the spouse weirds me out a bit as well. It is normal for specialists to not meet the spouse or partner, if this is one on one therapy, then bringing the spouse in would in most cases ring the alarm bells much more for me. But I'd also be a bit careful with therapists who immediately see some trauma as the root to every issue you have with the spouse, especially when not knowing the patient well yet.
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Default May 12, 2022 at 10:15 AM
  #5
Being told by a therapist that you have trauma that you don’t remember at all AND that this trauma for sure relates to one specific person whom the therapist has identified AND that this trauma is the entire explanation for your current problems sounds like incompetent and unethical therapy.

I would be worried too.

Even if this therapist happens to be correct about a history of abuse perpetrated by this person’s father, and furthermore about its impact on your friend, that’s still not an ethical or appropriate way to approach it.
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Default May 12, 2022 at 11:36 AM
  #6
It is possible to identify a trauma from events a client reports from their life. It is also possible to hypothesise the impact of said trauma on one's life. However, the key word here is that it is stated as a 'hypothesis' not a 'fact'.

But a therapist pushing the idea of trauma on a client? Red flag.

Similarly, any therapist (or human being) who claims that it is just *one* thing that is the cause for *everything* - that sounds more like propaganda than good therapy.
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