Sneetches and dual relationships

T and i are both part of the same very small community within our city - let's say we're both sneetches. He is an active sneetch, raised in that community, etc. i, however, only found out i was a sneetch after a great aunt died - it was a long-time family secret for..let's say political reasons. Some info was shared with me then but other important documents that should've been passed on to me by my (abusive) mother were destroyed by her instead.

Anyway, five years into therapy, i said i wanted to talk about being a sneetch and what that might look like and mean for me. T got all weird, accused me of wanting to know his personal stuff and we had a rupture over it. He ended up apologising, and - with my permission - put me in touch with someone else from the sneetch community. His explanation for that was he thought it better i discuss being a sneetch with someone different from him because we had other things to talk about in our sessions. That didn't really sit well with me but i couldn't figure out why so agreed.

(aside: it didn't work out at all as the other sneetch was adamant i wouldn't be considered a real sneetch unless i underwent conversion + other stuff that doesn't matter = she and i didn't stay in touch and i felt excluded and weird so backed off exploring my sneetchness).
(aside #2: i have ptsd and i'm autistic so my thoughts/reactions/feelings may look or sound different to expected as a result. please keep that in mind.)

Fast-forward to now, my abusive mother died recently (abusive father died couple of years ago) and as well as trying to process that and figure out how i feel about it etc, it's got me thinking more about all the generational family lies and weird stuff, and the need for community and not having it. so i talked a little about that community part in my tx session last week and it went VERY BADLY. T told me i have to choose: either continue with him as my therapist OR be part of the sneetch community but i can't do both as it is his community and his boundary. Awful conversation, session ended badly, no contact between because i couldn't find any words to email.

So to today's session: i talked about how i feel about having never had community (big part of my abuse was being kept severely isolated), being made to choose now, him gatekeeping an entire community (not even sure that's legal), playing god, excluding me from the only community i know for certain i belong to (most of my 'family' turned out to be a lie or is completely unknown), the irony of T spending years telling me i need more people around me and now saying "NOT THESE PEOPLE!" etc.

He said it's been his boundary for years that he doesn't treat sneetches because he did a couple of times and it didn't go well. I pointed out that he never disclosed that five years ago - or even right at the start when i stated on my intake paperwork that i'm a sneetch - or anytime since. He got all defensive and snotty about that. It was another horrible session with him insisting he's not excluding me from the sneetch community, he's just making me choose therapy or sneetches. Except that if i want to continue therapy with him (which i've invested a decade of blood, sweat and tears into) that means being excluded from the sneetch community. He was quite cold and detached about it all, even when i was clearly distressed and confused. Session ended badly again and i'm left feeling like garbage and carrying all this stuff for another week.

I'm not even sure what kind of response i'm looking for here. I'm assuming everyone will say T is right, he gets to draw the boundary, he gets to keep the community, i have to suck it up and either find a new T (right at a pivotal part of my therapy) or live without sneetch community until my therapy is done (and maybe even after that as well). I'm just...i don't even know. Can i maybe just have some sympathy or something for all this additional hard stuff that's suddenly come up in my therapy that i'm really struggling with. thanks. (apologies for all the words)

I don't know that I'd say your T is right. However, sadly, it does seem like you'll have to choose between your community or your T. Not because it's fair, but because your T is forcing that decision.

I can't even imagine how hard that must be. The two people/group that you're accepted. You shouldn't have to choose.

Your Ts reaction alone would make want to find another T.

I think your T is WAY out of line and handling this very poorly. I honestly don't think I could continue to work with him because of this alone. But I undersatnd attachment and how hard it is to start over. I think you have been very articulate about the way it makes you feel and compelling in your arguments.

My T and I have a community in common, and we just handle it like adults. We talk about what to do if we end up in the same place at the same time, we talk about relationships we have in common and how to handle that, sometimes we do therapy around it if it stirs up stuff in me. Dual or overlapping roles are not inherently unethical--they just need to be managed so the client is not harmed. That is the most important thing here, that the client is not harmed. And it seems to me that either of the options he is offering could cause you harm (you are either denied your community or you lose your T).

Once my T and I were in a situation where others in the community could get something from T that I thought I wouldn't be able to get because he was my therapist. When I told him this, he said that clients are not supposed to be harmed from dual roles, and it's the therapist's job to ensure that doesn't happen, and that denying me something that other people in the community got because of our dual roles would be unethical. And so I, too, got this thing that others in the community were getting from him.

(As I write this, I'm finding that I'm quite mad at your therapist. He's being a jerk.)

I feel like I should add, maybe there is nuance to this that would make it impossible/harmful for the two of you to be both members of the same community and therapist/client. I suppose that is possible. But generally, in most circumstances, I think both should be possible

I agree with oliviab . Drawing such a hard line - seems like the damage is already done. He is not comprehending his role as a t. I get the sense that he is trying to stop you from finding out something shady about his role in the community - like he's a player or something. So even if he were no longer your t, you would not like having him in the community. It feels like, unless he can resolve this issue for himself, he can no longer be your t. Its not a you problem, its a him problem. He is being unethical.

Wow. This is horrible. I agree that this is a problem on his end (his stuff) and he is not skilled enough to keep it from impacting (possibly ruining?) your therapy with him.

It also sounds like he is accusing you of wanting to explore this part of yourself and the sneetch community JUST to somehow get a glimpse/foothold into his life?? Like this interest in being a sneetch is all about him (rather than your own self exploration or desire for community) and you're practically a stalker who is invading his privacy? I could be reading that wrong--but wow that is quite the accusation. That alone would be a deal breaker for me. I could never trust him again.

He has really put you in a double bind. I'm sorry.

Have you had a sense of this kind of behaviour or attitude from him before in different contexts? This seems like such pronounced rigidity and insensitivity that I would imagine you had encountered it before. I ask because identifying patterns and repeats can help you understand your process and how you relate to others - including identifying what is unacceptable for you in your relationships.

Thank you all for your responses. i appreciate your thoughts, your support, and your acknowledgement of the double bind and the potential for harm either way. there isn't anywhere else i can talk about this weird 'therapeutic relationship' stuff so i'm grateful for this place.



i'm still trying to process these past two sessions and all the thoughts and feelings and questions that are coming up.
questions like:
- do i really want to end therapy at such a pivotal point?
- do i want to lose this therapeutic relationship that has been so difficult for me to even form in the first place (severe trauma/attachment/trust issues)?
- do i want to have to start therapy over with someone else? (especially when waiting lists here are extensive and i could be facing several months of no therapy at all)
- if i choose community, how would i even do that, what would it look like, and what if it doesn't feel right for me after all? (i'm an introvert; i'm not even sure yet if community is what i want or need)
- how would it feel to maybe sometimes see T in community and not be able to talk to him about any of my stuff anymore?
- if i stay in therapy, will i always feel like something's missing?
- will i resent T for making me choose?

i guess T's been thinking about it too as he emailed me a while ago sending caring thoughts for the weekend and a quote from Doctor Who (shared interest): "My experience is that there is, you know, surprisingly, always hope." which i think he's meaning as us somehow working through this. the problem is we're coming at it from very different positions/situations. he has the community and our therapeutic relationship; i'm only allowed one or the other. i'm not sure how that can be worked through.

I guess it might depend on what type of community we are talking about? Is it something on a crazy side? Do they have orgies? Swap partners? Or sit around naked? He might be apprehensive sharing that with his clients. If it’s something innocent though, why does he care? Weird

Of course old people's minds go to naked. Don't listen to us!

Who are you calling old 🤣🤣🤣😂😆

lorde, no! no orgies or nudity involved, as far as i know. if that was a factor in the community, i'm not sure i'd want to be a part of it; public nudity is so not my thing.

it's a small ethnic/religious community. i belong via ethnicity - tho' i'm an atheist - but wasn't raised knowing that, whereas T was. in many respects, it is as much my community as it is T's, but he has said i cannot participate in any way while in therapy with him. part of my distress is that he's only now disclosed that boundary despite knowing my ethnicity all along.

I don't like what you T is doing. This kind of a dual relationship is not unheard of, but this is the first time I hear a T being so stubborn. If it is just regular religious stuff, I don't get the problem. A normal thing to do would be discussing beforehand how to act if meeting there. Like if there is greeting ok, discussion no or whatever feels right. And to have a plan what to answer if someone asks if you two know each other. Maybe a vague "from work" or "through someone".

My T and I lived in the same small
Community for a few years. Her office was right across the street from my business, and she even shopped at
My store every once in a while.

It was a little weird when she would come in, but I also liked being sort of part of her outside-of-therapy life, like I was special.

Is it possible that maybe you’re looking for that sort of outside connection with your T, and that’s why you want to be active with this group?

If not, then I think your T should be open to figuring out how this can work for both of you.

So if let’s say it’s the only mosque or synagogue in town, you cannot attend services because your t attends the same place? I don’t think it could be demanded of you. How unique is this community that you can’t find any other group in the area? If you are an atheist I am unsure why you want to belong to a religious community especially since you said you didn’t even like them . Could you research other options?

i'm sorry for being vague; there are reasons for that including that i wanted to be able to talk about this aspect of my life without triggering the heck out of myself because it is so tightly interwoven with my trauma. my upbringing was extremely abusive (both parents; physical, sexual and psychological abuse). when i say i was kept isolated, i mean that, for the first two decades of my life, i was pretty much only allowed out of my parents' house (i wasn't allowed to refer to it as my home) to attend school, then a part-time job (but all my earnings were taken from me), and the occasional medical appt (where i had to lie about injuries). there was occasional interaction with other relatives but under threat of more violence if i so much as even tried to hint to anyone that i wasn't happy happy happy and part of a loving family. i have severe ptsd and even after i finally managed to engineer an escape and move far away (though there was still forced contact for several years), it's taken a long time (i'm middle-aged now), and a lot of therapy, and the deaths of both my parents finally, to really feel like it's safe to process and talk about and work through all the trauma and stuff that i carry.

anyway. to answer some questions people asked here: the community i'm talking about now is very small and there is only one in my city (and going outside my city isn't an option for me). it's not only about religion, there's a vast history and cultural and ethnic aspects that i might want to participate in. please remember this is still all very new for me (as i said, most of what i was told about myself and my family was lies) and i really only raised it with T as it occurred to me when my mother died that i might finally be able to be a part of something i was denied. and no, it's *not* because my T is. this is really about me trying to figure out who i am, what i need, where i belong in the world, etc. especially now my own child is grown and flown the nest.

sorry. this has ended up being way too long and maybe it's just something i need to work through by myself (tho' that's really been my entire life and where a lot of my trauma lies, and unlike my T i don't have supervision to bounce this around in so i came here). and maybe T does get to lay down this boundary and i just have to accept it and leave exploring community for whenever i eventually finish working with him.

Really a him problem. My brother married my t's sister (like 40 years ago; none of these relationships exist anymore) so i am familiar with dual relationships. My t prioritised our relationship as it was the pre-existing one and she was the relevant t (brother and SIL also were t's). Also she told me she talked it over with her partner (agency and personal).

Another time, i had a severe rupture with another t regarding boundaries. Actually its what brought me to this website. I talked it over with a former t (my immediately previous t), a gf who is a t, and a
neighbor who was a doctor.

All that to say, get a second opinion. You can tell your t beforehand or not. But you are not without resources.

It took me awhile, years to learn that my T is not always right and she has baggage..

Everyone has boundaries but it’s totally your choice, albeit an awful one.

Although I’ve never used an online therapy service, but maybe that’s an option?

my usual 90min session was a bit over 120mins today as T and i went back and forth on this sneetch stuff. still not sure where i'm at with the therapeutic relationship (the non-disclosure part of this whole situation really hit me in the trust/safety feels), or how i feel about where T has drawn his boundary and the impact of that on me. but he did do some proper apologising and explaining and clarifying so i now understand more about the whys and wherefores.

and while T was a bit prickly at times - as was i! - he was, overall, more open, warmer, less defensive and more compassionate than the previous two sessions. i do believe that he's always trying to do the right thing for my therapy; we just don't always agree on what that is.

i have a lot to think about before next week's session, but my head is sore after all the talking so the thinking might have to wait a while. oh, and i also sought some advice (confidentially) from the Psychologists Board and they pointed me to an advocacy service and various bits of info on dual relationships etc., which i'm also going to mull over.