• saying " I did not sleep much all weekend because of what you said last session. YOu really ruined my weekend and family time"
  
• terminating by email.
  
• crying because I got angry, and saying " how could you get this angry with me!" so that you feel awful for being angry. ie taking it personally. (it was about stuff about my mum)
  
• being 20 minutes late
  
• forgetting the time of the session and so telling you your session has only five minutes left when you walk in the door when in reality you have a whole 90 minutes, she has just got it wrong.
  
• Saying things are okay, like phonecalls, or emails and then months later saying they are not okay, so you feel punished.
  
• her allowing you to talk for 30 minutes on teh phone even though you remind her that she said only ten minutes, and then next session she BLAMES you for 'going on for 30 minutes'!
  
• using sensitive issues to throw at you when you are feeling vulnerable and she is feeling mad at you. She throws them at you. Like stored cannon.
  
• Insisting she is NOt out of her depth when she is. She didn't even know what counter transference IS never mind be able to look at the fact that she is IN it.
  
• LYING TO ME. She said my doctor had told her to terminate with me. I asked my doctor and he said "oh no, she insisted that she should end with you."
  
• working whilst being incompetent.
  
• lending me her cardigan and refusing to take it back, saying " no, keep it - I have another one, give it back some time later" and me believing that and then her saying weeks later " And you wouldn't even give me my cardigan back!"
  
• Summing up my entire 16 months of work with her as "you are just very skilled at getting people to care for you." boy oh boy.
  
• pretending to be kind and caring whilst actually feeling mad and resentful underneath until she actually cracked.
  
  

Oh god, I could go on but I had better not as I have steam coming out of my ears and I have only listed about 10%

Hi Forlorn.... I'm so sorry this happened to you and I will eventually reply to your other thread. There is nothing worse than finally trusting someone only to be abandoned by them. I'm sure you have read about what happened to me and how I've been trying to get past it and recover from the trauma and damage from my oldT.

I think this is a good thread but I would suggest that you re-title it by calling it something like Red Flags of Bad Therapist or How to Identify a Bad Therapist... because your subject line now is a bit confusing and may put off others from responding.

I read with interest your post and also Sadly's. I think in a nutshell what you are both describing in many cases is

-Therapists who do not keep clear boundaries. As in the privacy issues with the clear door, the lack of a noise machine etc. As in making self-disclosres that are inappropriate (I didn't sleep all weekend because of what you told me, or complaning about their personal lives).

-Being Inconsistent...This is a BIG red flag. They offer things they cannot live up to or resent living up to... like email or phone calls. This only ends up making the patient feel punished when they finally take them away or if they complain about the emails while still allowing them it makes the patient very confused and unsure and undermines the very necessary attachment process. Not keeping to specified appointment, being late, forgetting appointments, cutting them short all add to confusion and disruption.

Being defensive.... Another BIG sign. If the T cannot accept all your feelings and hear what you have to say, even about them, you have a problem. I'm not saying you should be allowed to be abusive towards the T but if you do have an issue with them they should hear you out without becoming defensive and making YOU feel like a bad person for expressing your feelings. If you go in and say "you made me feel really horrible because you didn't answer my email and I was so scared I didn't want to see you today" the T should ask you about those feelings, where do you think they come from, what emotions were stirred up etc ... maybe offer an apology and reassurance and NOT say...well how can you expect me to answer your emails when I am so busy, I'm too tired, I have a lot of other patients etc.

T's need to be absolutely consistent, keep their own feelings OUT of the therapy room (unless the self-disclosure is therapeutically appropriate), hold the frame and the boundaries of therapy and maintain privacy and a comfortable atmosphere for patients to feel safe in.

TN

the clear glass bit is shocking to me.
But I don't know what the noise masking machine is. any one care to explain?

Sadly, the noise masking machine is used to prevent anyone outside of the office door hearing what is said inside. It is usually a small box that emits "white noise"...a hum or a blowing sound, rain or ocean wave sounds.

TN

What a thread... Yes, I've experienced several bits of yuck via therapists in my past, including...

*Answering the phone, and taking a good five minutes to converse with her child who seemed to call EVERY time I had a session.

*Forgetting me, not once, but twice. (Literally, I was walking in as she was walking out.)

*WAY too much self-disclosure - I knew all about her abusive ex, her children's handling of the divorce, her diseases that sometimes had her working from her house (that is where I finally drew the line, I was not going to her house!)

*Taking time out of my session to walk to the restaurant next door to pick up dinner, and then proceeding to eat for the remainder of my session.

*Paying more attention to the dog, that she always had to bring to sessions because she didn't like leaving him at home, than to me.

Yes, I've been through 4 really unprofessional Ts in my history. I loved my first T, but she left the country. I love my current T, and she's assured me she isn't leaving (her family is here, kids in school, etc)

I do think, though, that I had to experience the bad Ts in order to get where I am able to actually work with this great T.

Sounds like things are rough right now Forlon, I hope something good comes your way soon!
((((Forlorn)))

Yeeesh!

Can anyone say incompetent.

There are a few Rate My Doc type sites but I'm not sure if calling out some of these horrendous Ts on those would help others or not.

quote:

Insisting she is NOt out of her depth when she is

Oh Sadly, that is a huge one. I will not deny, that being a therapist must be a very intense field to work in daily, one that I could never have the gumption to do. Which, is why I'm not. However, I wish more people would realize how out of place they are in the therapy room instead of whatever reasons they have for this so-called desire to "help people".

quote:

pretending to be kind and caring whilst actually feeling mad and resentful underneath until she actually cracked

yeah, wow, I'm right here with you. What I still don't get is what my T was so mad at me about? What did I do to her or trigger within her that she could feel justified in being frustrated and resentful?


TN, I updated the title thanks to your suggestion

You know that thing where they say don't send an email response in anger? I feel like some therapist haven't learned that. It's how to be angry with someone, but to not show it until you've had some time to cool off a little. I would expect emotionally regulated experts like therapists should be very skilled at holding their own emotions and maintaining a cordial atmosphere. But I suppose I expect too much because those therapist like to chirp on about how they're human and prone to mistakes. Well, stop being a therapist and go do something else with their lives. Teach yoga, knit scarves, anything else.



Wow Room2Grow, I am speechless at those. At this point, nothing they do is unbelievable, but still it is very shocking to know it exists so much with so many awful Ts. ((((Room2Grow))))

I am speechless at some of these examples! I'm sorry for all of you that had to go through that.

My first T had some pretty major issues: Keep in mind I was 15-17 during this time and now days I would never put up with this crap. I was a kid and had never been in therapy before.

*Taking me in her car to pick up her children from school and trying to hold the session in the car with the children there!

*Running errands during my session time. She would have me in the car and we would do therapy in the car while she ran errands.

*Therapy at McDonalds while the children play in the play place. Yeah, that's not good

*Buying the same outfits as me after I would wear them the first time to T. She would say, "oh that's a cute dress! Where did you get it?" I would tell her and then the next session she'd be wearing it!

*Having me over to her house, though I did find it humorous to see her in her hair curlers and watch her put her makeup on.

*Way too much self disclosure.

*Lack of privacy regarding other clients

*Chronically late, ended early and charged the full amount

My 2nd T and current T are/were good with boundaries. The only thing I would say that makes me really upset is being inconsistent. It makes me feel really scared.

STRM! I am speechless at those examples. Yikes

How could any T behave such ways is in no way understandable. The woman was seriously disturbed. Unfortunately, you had to experience that with her and unfortunately she has children. Crap, I can't imagine what they must be like now.

But fortunately you know it was bad therapy boundaries and behavior and do not tolerate this in your current life.

That outfit thing just screams "loony T woman"



((((deepfried))))) that is awful to do at such a time in your life. I really wonder what the heck these people think.
The vibe thing is true and so easy to ignore for me since I like to think they are "perfect". yeah well, I guess I won't be thinking that very much anymore.

I feel another book coming on
The first one was
How TErminations Can be Handled Badly and HOw to Do them right.

this second one is:
Real Life EXamples of Therapist's Blunders
and WHY they must have done it, so that you T's can learn NOT to do that again.

We shall have a whole bookshelf before we are done here.

Wow, my T isn't necessarily the most consistent guy, but no red flags compared to what you guys all have. Jeez!

LG - all of those are straight out weird, but #3 and #4 are seriously "WTF?!"

Wow, LG - they are bad!

Craziness. Still shocking and unbelievable, yet very believable considering all our histories with crappy Ts.

LadyGrey, wtheck?!? I am speechless really. Insurance fraud on top of all the other negligent stuff, but geez, illegal much?

I'm not sure what spontaneous thing I would do if a crazy T ever showed up at my house at night to "check" on me. I'd probably chuck a handful of flour right in her face.

STRM, I have heard of the rubber band thing before. I can't remember why people thought it was effective to self-inflict pain on yourself in order to stop thinking negatively. Isn't that sort of like trading your left shoe for the right one? And then to have her do it "for" you. my goodness. I'm not even a violent person and I want to scream at some of these Ts "what the hell is the matter with you?!?!"


Ok, so here are some more to add to my list:

• Wore a very low cut blouse so that literally half of her left boob and bra were fully exposed.
  
  
• Forgetting what has been discussed and giving me the same handouts session after session because she forgot she gave them to me twice before.
  
  
• Talking bad about my previous therapists (without knowing them personally, only based on my description) then acting just like them or worse.
  
  
• Getting to the session late because she ran errands, then taking another 5-10 minutes to explain why she was late because of the errands, then telling me I had to leave at the normal time because her next patient was there. Why do they get the full time but I don't
  
  
• Being jealous because I am good at a craft and she was not.
  
  
• The kid thing reminded me of one therapist who actually brought her 9 year old son to work and he knocked on the door and interrupted our session to ask her a question.
  
  
• One guy therapist said I was very attractive and that I should just go to bars and pick guys up and sleep with them. When I said I wouldn't be interested in doing that, he said "well then stay at home and be lonely and cry".
  
  
• Arguing with me that I should pay what other people pay (more) for copay even though that's not what my insurance says.
  
  
• Mispronouncing my name after several sessions.
  
  
• Yelling at me.
  
  
• Promising to never terminate me ever
  
  
• Breaking my heart
  
  

quote:

One guy therapist said I was very attractive and that I should just go to bars and pick guys up and sleep with them. When I said I wouldn't be interested in doing that, he said "well then stay at home and be lonely and cry".

I had a doctor say that to me once. Not the last part, but the first part. He told me that I should just be out having sex with as many guys as possible. I nearly fell over from shock.

Forlorn, so many of those examples are just so sad. I'm sorry you had such a bad T experience!!

Gosh, i Think we have met some really bad T's and we have not got on to the criminal T who did things so bad to me they can't even really go here, they are that bad.

goodness. It makes me so glad for the good ones. I have friends who are counsellors or therapists and because I know them, I really know them well, I would not recommend them to anyone - because the front they put on as therapists, where they reveal so little about themselves is so far removed from the confusions and chaos of their own lives and inner lives. Sigh.

Scary isn't it.

BG! That therapist was AMAZINGLY bad, I am SO SORRY you experienced all that. My goodness.

And - way to go BG - for standing up to her like that.

I felt like cheering when I read that bit.

quote:

I feel another book coming on
The first one was
How TErminations Can be Handled Badly and HOw to Do them right.

this second one is:
Real Life EXamples of Therapist's Blunders
and WHY they must have done it, so that you T's can learn NOT to do that again.

My T was aghast and appalled at some of these red flags that I told him that T's out there do to their patients (along with what my oldT did to me).

I had to let Sadly know that he said this would be a good book. That unfortunately, people do not know what to expect and what they should be aware of and what to run from in therapy. He told me/us to keep posting about it so that more and more people would know what good therapy looks like and what the warning signs are. I smile when we talk about this group because he is so totally NOT threatened by my sharing my experiences here. He is so supportive and thinks it's great that people are being educated about the therapeutic experience.

TN

I am going to add...(just for the sake of any therapists that might read this-

*Not having clearly delineated policies about outside contact, but developing loose policy that isn't very clear during the course of the therapy, and eventually causing clients to have to draw their own boundary about it since yours are so unclear.

*Telling clients that important things should be covered in sessions, but then going ahead and covering important things over emails anyway. Giving into me, instead of kindly but firmly saying no. Never apologizing for mistakes to me except over the email, but on the other hand telling me that I have to be vulnerable only in sessions and not on email or the therapy won't work.

*Responding really amazingly consistently to emails in an extremely kind and caring way, making me feel very special- saying it's ok, saying it's part of the therapy for me to learn to ask and to do what I need to do, appearing to like corresponding with me in that way-- and then eventually, after problems develop around it- without explanations, no longer responding at all, or very ocassionally and very inconsistently- even to scheduling matters, causing extreme anxiety and feelings of being "thrown away."

*Leaving *everything* up to the client, no matter how much they are floundering around and not progressing. Not taking responsibility for the client's progress or lack of progress, but subtly sending the message that if the client isn't progressing it is *entirely* her fault. Refusing to put yourself on the line for the client in any way shape or form. Taking the whole concept of not rescuing someone to the extreme, where even things they cannot control or help will not be assisted.

*Letting the client go to rock bottom...and then leaving them there.

TN - your T is brilliant.
I do seriously think we should make a book from our experiences. Anonymously most probably of course.

Good on your T for being so supportive of this site. sweetP thinks it is a good site too and of course knows about some of the people on here, like TN and AG and Yaku and some of you others, as I sometimes quote your comments and he finds them both interesting and helpful. It is good to have this forum to air things.

More things about bad therapists.

1. Telling you they have unconditional love for you always and then terminating when you get in a really painful place.
2. Liking to be thought of as a sweet kind and caring person so working in a hospice where they can cultivate their feelings of being such a nice sweet person whereas in reality they are a bundle of unexplored stuff, but they don't even see that.
3. One ex therapist I had did not know I had been raped and I know that as a fact because when I worked with them I was in a very effective denial that even I believed. Then a year ago I told them that I had been raped and they said "oh but you can't have been as you never ever mentioned that to me, you always were so ADAMANT that you weren't." then last month I said that I needed them to hear that I was raped, and I knew they did not believe it , and they said, " oh but you told me that 23 years ago!" Now this is untrue, but I think she really believed it. How weird is that?

Even sweetP is not immune to mistakes. LOL. when I first met him for my assessment session, he told me that he could see me each week indefinitely. I was delighted and reported this back to the ex C. Then on the next phone call he said the magic word 'indefinitely' again. When I ended with the ex C I was so glad about the fact he was there indefinitely if I needed him. At our first formal session he told me he could see me once every two weeks for one year. I was stunned!! He had NO MEMORY of saying that he had said 'indefinitely'!!!! My god. You can imagine how I felt. He then insisted that his hands were tied but I had to remind him that he told me early on that HE made the decisions about how much time etc a client had, that there was no one saying it from above. He went bright red. I told him that my friend who is a well known psychiatrist in the UK assessed me as needing once a week AT LEAST and so did three of my colleagues who are senior consultant clinical psychologists. I had to bring in the opinions of bigger guns than him. He looked flustered and the next week told me he could see me once a week. The memory of that still worried me but at least he adjusted in my favour. We now have the 'only one year' opinion hanging over me.

((((BB)))) So glad you are able to claim right now that these things are not, and never were, your responsibility to manage for your T! Hang in there!

Sadly - honored that I would be quotable, although I don't see myself having much of anything interesting to say, despite the fact that I obviously like saying it!

I have some things I could probably add onto here, but as I haven't suffered too many ill-effects yet, I don't know if they're red flags. It seems like you usually don't know red flags until you see them, but:

-Scheduling issues. Always running late and repeatedly allowing sessions to run over due to poor closure until client has to take responsibility for the containment process.

-Accepting and encouraging more outside communication than T seems capable of processing (i.e. seems to not remember or put together a lot of the stuff I've told him that you guys find worrying when it is left unaddressed).

-Sending you off to God (praying for you or encouraging you to "abide") rather than offering practical help when safety issues arise.

-Fuzzy boundaries, roles and expectations, leaving client confused (seems like my T believes this should all be negotiated organically, at least with a people-pleaser like me).

-Seeing two members of the same family individual therapy without discussing and establishing what the guidelines are first.

I'm not sure any of these things are really red flags or just kind of irritating or difficult, on occassion. So far, I still feel like my T's generosity, care and humility far outweigh this other stuff.

I have had a lot of therapy and I have to say that most have some problems. But damn some that you have listed here takes the cake!! How do they get their licenses?

I know I'm REALLY late to this thread, but I wanted to post on it way back when I first read it, and now I have the chance so I'm going to! I'm really sorry for everyone who's had awful experiences with Ts, I also think it's good to have lists like this because that way others might have some backup for things that appear to be red flags in their therapy, and know that sometimes at least, it's not them but the T.

Seeing as how I have now seen the sum total of 33 therapists over the course of my life, I have quite a few ‘bad’ things that in retrospect constituted red flags. (These days I respect my own instincts about these things.) So here's my little list:

Constantly telling me I had to ask for what I wanted from her and the therapy and when I (once) did so, she very angrily stated ‘don’t you tell me how to do my job’.

Getting to a session a few minutes early and asking to use the loo, then being ‘told off’ with the words, ‘I am going to finish the session early today to make up for the time you’ve arrived early. Don’t do that again.’ That was my second session with this one and also my last.

Being told to sit down and wait when I got up to leave 1 minute before session time was up. Indicative of rigid boundaries being enforced as a sign of weakness and need for T to be in total control, rather than a sign of strength and certainty.

Therapists who do as much if not more talking than me. Then when I comment about the fact of their talking too much, say it’s because I talk so much that it ‘makes’ them talk a lot. WTF?

Therapists who constantly interrupt when I haven’t finished talking, or who jump in with THEIR spiel the moment I pause for breath. This sort leave no spaces or pauses for reflection. This means they’re neither listening nor are willing to be with me while I think about what’s just been said. It also means that it becomes a battle to be heard, which results in my feeling pressured to get out as much as I can before they interrupt or jump in with their (usually irrelevant) comments. Which they then respond to with even more talking and interrupting...

Therapists who ramble on with anecdotes or little homilies that have no relevance whatsoever to what I’ve been saying. One guy jumped in just as I’d finished talking about anger and how I needed to express it and ended up going off into a reminiscence about his anger at his mother and how bashing cushions didn’t work, after about 5 minutes (I was watching the clock so I knew the time he took) he said, oh don’t know why I said that just felt I wanted to talk about it...

Therapists who quote paragraphs from a text book in a generic way instead of relating what they are trying to say specifically to me and my set up.

Therapists who apologize unnecessarily and insincerely specifically to pre-empt the direct expression of anger at them.

Therapists who don’t ask questions.

Therapists who won’t admit they don’t understand what I am saying but carry on talking as if they have understood.

Therapists who start pointing out my ‘pathology’ before they’ve gotten to know who I am or what my set up is.

Therapists who make a virtue of being ‘challenging’ which is just a cover for a big ego ride/need to feel superior on their part.

Therapists who are unwilling to accept what they perceive as criticism of the way they work, who respond defensively and aggressively, instead of listening for what the implied criticism reveals about ME.

Therapists who continually glance at the clock during the session.

Therapists who ‘warn’ me off participating in internet forums, especially when it’s a by rote knee jerk response without bothering to check with me what benefits being on a forum brings. This one actually is a pretty good indicator that the T has a preconceived therapeutic agenda and is not interested in learning about who I am. A T should NEVER tell me what to do (or what to think and feel for that matter), they can help me talk it over and discover for myself what I want to do, but being told what to do is a definite red flag for me.

Lol that will do for now!

LL

LL, I am speechless...still

When I read this the first time I couldn't respond because I literally had no words.

I'm actually trying to combine a list of sorts and see which ones stick out. So far Too much personal disclosure has been mentioned a lot.

I appreciate everyone contributing like this. I know it can't be easy remembering this stuff.

I agree, I think these examples should be in a textbook somewhere. Screw Freud, let's talk about what's going on right here right now.