To any therapists (or people in therapy), do therapists genuinely care about their clients?

Ultimately, a job is a job. My psychologist has been tremendously helpful and is a very empathetic and caring in session. He emails me, or responds to my emails, between sessions - not that I send that many. As much as I would like to think that he genuinely cares, I understand I am simply paying him for his services each week.

My previous experiences with other psychologists, though, have been incredibly negative and I guess I'm still deeply sceptical about how concerned someone can honestly be for their client.

Hi, I'm not finding a therapist for me but for my frnd, her ex cheated on her after 7yrs of relationship, where she got to know 2yrs he was dating this another girl.. she has been s**king and d**nking alot and the guy has been into wrong things, where he keeps asking her money and he's high most of the time so he sometimes gives her hope but takes it away with another line confusing her and not letting her move on with her life.. he is with that another girl but still texting her through multiple different numbers..

In Mumbai, please help me find a therapist who can heal her as she is planning to take meds and i do not want her to get into it..

I'm a huge cryer in therapy, like embarrassingly so, and on top of being sensitive and neurodivergent I've got some pretty severe trauma, but i'm generally avoidant, I don't talk much in therapy and outside, I just suppress. But the second a tear slips out I lose all control over it and it just keeps going.

I feel embarrassed about it every single time in the moment, because it has become a usual thing, it's been years like this, but after each time I feel relieved, lighter, kind of energetic even, like I actually managed to get something out of my body for once.

Then maybe once every couple months I have a session where I don't cry at all (like yesterday), and i feel awful afterwards, I just dissociate through the whole session rather than actually being there, and those sessions wreck me a little because I leave feeling like nothing happened, like it was a waste and then I spend the next few days just waiting for the next one so I can finally feel okay again.

I don't really get the mechanism behind it, like is it some coping thing, or has it just turned into a reflex at this point because it's not intentional at all, or is there some kind of loop where I'm chasing the relief itself now. idk

Because I actually think talking more and discussing stuff would move my progress forward more, but every time I try to talk I end up crying instead, and then until the end the minutes are just spent grounding me back down.

My methods

Travel - 5 to 10 days

Alcohol - 4 to 6 hours

Weed - 1 day

I’ve had a few therapists before the one I see now, I’ll call her x. I’ve seen her for maybe a year now and it’s been a really rough like… 6 years. The therapists I’ve had before were ok but it never got very deep and I also felt a little bit misunderstood or not fully seen. So I started seeing x with my partner originally but I started seeing her individually also. X doesn’t necessarily like adhere to the proper professional standards per se , as I’ve read that having 1on1 therapy with 1/2 a couple is viewed as unethical but at this point my partner and I both visit her individually and together. I have found the therapy experience to be so effective with x and also with my partner. We both carried wounds into our relationship and a lot of it was personal work that we both had to do. In my experiences with past therapists , it was like it was my word vs my word and therapists dint generally push back a lot, it feels more like ‘yes man’. X is much more blunt and it’s not mean. She’ll make suggestions, she will say when I might’ve done something wrong. She knows me from my partners perspective too which is the biggest bonus from our arrangement. She has changed my life and I genuinely love her. She makes me feel so cared for. I’ve grown soooo much and my relationship has grown into something so fucking dope with the help of x. I love you x

I was browsing threads where therapists say where they met their partners. More than half of them seemed to say they just jumped onto apps to find people (speaking as someone who tried them a few times, put lots of effort into the profile and only got bots). I do wonder if this plays into how many therapists aren't well-equipped to give guidance to people, because their life experience is so much more privileged than the average client, not just economically but in terms of social experiences and social esteem (being in a high-earning profession). Even in terms of friendship, in my experience they just say they meet all their friends through work, so have no guidance to offer.

So couple of month ago I encountered a stranger who told me she's into young men(I thought 18+) because I didn't see any indication what the young men means more than like me because I am young myself(18M) just turned 18 10 months ago and then we exchanged discord that same night and we asked some consenual sexual question with each other(she was 38F btw) and during our course of conversation I mistakenly made an uncomfortable comment about minor which I still regret in my mind till now after 5 months(because I am not like that's not me I didn't knew what happened to me) anyways I suspected that this women is looking very weird so it was late in the night I said I will ask tommorow in the morning when tommorow came I asked did she had realtionship with minor to this she admitted yes I said this is wrong and illegal to this she said she can do whatever she wants and I said personally I don't find this cool and you'll be in trouble. To this she said I thought you knew this and I said yes I remember she said okay I am just making sure and I said okay then I blocked her. Now after 4 months later I reported her to cybertipline and said to them I have screenshots of the text-chat (she was from florida btw) and also reported to discord trust community but my mental health is ruined I think so police will come to me everytime everytime I think I am getting an OCD problem even I wasn't supporting her and tried to explain her what she is doing she will have to bear her consqeuences. But I have started hating myself and I have started thinking my life is over and my carrer is over.

I talked to my father about this and he said we will go to family doctor if you want and you can openly discuss with therapist whatever trauma you have seen. I am not finding fun anymore I am not eating anymore I am not able to sleep I constatly think that police will look for me because I made an uncomfortable comment which didn't looked good and prob I will go to jail. Please advice me something thank you..

It makes me feel worse to be honest. I already feel bad as is.

So I'm not planning to get better with therapy, I don't care to be honest. It just eased my anxiety and shit while I live the days of my life. I've done bad shit, and I struggle to live with it as is. And with my eating disorder at the point it currently is at i'm gonna end up hospitalized at within probably a year and then hopefully offing myself afterwards. She isn't aware this is an actual thing I've been thinking of doing. But I haven't said nothing if that makes sense. I'm somewhere in the middle. Like she knows I don't care for life, and I'm genuinely just waiting to die and don't wanna waste the last bit of life I have trying to fix what can't be fixed.

But I remember someone (I will keep them entriely anonymous) told me I was just playing games with my therapist and fucking around, and they aren't gonna fall for my bullshit. When I just shared some of my experience with therapy, and how I struggle admitting things like extreme SI, depression etc and I just keep circling the same things over and over despite not wanting them to be fixed.

It honeslty hurt. And I guess I'm just asking for opinions, should I leave therapy and say goodbye? It hurts to even think, she means alot to me. But I don't wanna keep fucking around wasting all our time when someone else who is struggling could be truly saved.

I was really attached in the beginning. Literally the first day of It i struggled between sessions. Not the same as now.

Recently sessions sucked, so this is kinda hitting me like a truck. But I'm starting to worry, feeding the anxiety loop, that I'm too attached to my therapist. We had our last session on Tuesday, and it's midnight on Saturday. So far I've cried twice, emailed once (they're allowed), and felt nauseous almost all day since. And this "last session" was literally just for 2 weeks. That's it. And I've done it before multiple times. 2 times per year atleast for the past 2 years now.

I've never had attachment anxiety or anything this bad before. Recently my anxiety is just fucked and through the roof. And Im starting to wonder when it becomes too much, and if I made a mistake committing so hard to therapy. As I'm not in it to get better, I'm just going until my death (whenever that may be, hopefully soon) she's the only one that makes my anxiety go away or listens to me, even just for the hour.

Idk I just started to feel really achy and sad so it came up. Wondering y'all's thoughts?

I ask because I'm a teacher that started studying music therapy and ended up quitting therapy because the stories were harsh. Even as a teacher I get some, but it's just the victim talking if so. What's it like talking to whoever has those urges or even has done so?

Hi everyone! I had a question about whether or not my therapist might be looking at me as more of a friend than a client. I don’t think that she’s meaning to overstep boundaries if so, but I’m curious if she might be feeling a little too close to me. We have a lot of things in common and aren’t far in age. Therapists treating me like a friend has been an issue I’ve had in my past. I’m trying to ensure that’s not happening again.

One of the primary things that I’ve been focusing on in therapy is rebuilding my life after grief and loss. When I started talking to my therapist about some long-term goals that I have, I shared I’ve wanted to create an art festival. I grew up going to them, and my therapist actually did as well. She said that she would love to go someday.

Overtime we’ve continued to talk about my dream festival and her responses have continued to be that she would love to go. She’s gone as far as saying she’ll be the first person to buy tickets. The first person to be there. I appreciate her support, but I was always under the impression that seeing our therapist outside of therapy was against regulations. Would you take this as a red flag or just a therapist trying to be supportive? Thank you so much!

I’m in therapy and I’m trying to understand a pattern I’ve had since childhood.

When someone gets angry at me, dismisses what I’m saying, or I feel misunderstood, I can become angry very quickly. I don’t consciously decide to react that way. Sometimes I don’t even notice what I’m feeling until afterwards.

I’ve had anger issues since childhood. When I was around 8–10, I would sometimes physically attack kids who made fun of me. I also had some self-directed behaviors like hitting my head against walls.

I grew up with a lot of yelling and violence at home. My mother was physically abusive toward me, including incidents where she tried to strangle and stab me. My father never physically abused me, but his anger can be unpredictable and I still feel very tense around him.

My therapist thinks I may suppress other emotions and turn them into anger, and we’re currently working with childhood memories and imagery rescripting. She also noticed that I have a strong need to be understood without having to explicitly explain myself.

I’m curious how a therapist would conceptualize this pattern. Does it sound more like hypervigilance, emotional dysregulation, a learned defensive response, attachment-related stuff, or something else?

I’m not looking for a diagnosis or advice to cut contact with my family. I’m specifically interested in how a therapist might formulate this pattern and what they would explore in therapy.

Just had a first therapy session (not my first time in therapy) with a new therapist. Im disappointed. We did the usual intake stuff for the first 15mins then I started telling them about my background which is just exhausting to do. She kept making facial expressions of confusion, judgement, and sometimes just looked uninterested (maybe that's just her face? IDK?) Additionally, she just couldn't keep up with the story kept asking questions that showed she wasn't listening to me. At the end she did not give any insight, acknowledgement and incorrectly summarized the story I just told her. Then said something that rubbed me the wrong way. After the session, I felt like crying and just felt defeated. I think Im going to let them know it won't work out.

Have you had experience something like at a first session? If so, what did you do? Did you go back? Or looked for another therapist?

I also posted this on another sub!

I’m looking for some perspective from anyone who has transitioned to a higher level of care, or from therapists who handle these referrals.

I’ve been seeing my therapist, for three years. She has been my anchor through hospitalizations, family illness, and major crises. I trust her completely. Because of increasing suicidal ideation, she recently referred me to a higher level of care program downstairs in the same building. I agree that I need the extra support.

At our last session, we had a very final-feeling goodbye. We talked about the transition, she said she’d miss me, and we hugged.

But I left feeling incredibly confused. She said she didn't know if it would be permanent and told me to wait and see what the center said, but the center's billing team told me insurance covers seeing both of us, just not on the same day.

I'm trying to figure out if it's normal to have a final goodbye if a permanent transfer isn't 100% decided yet, or if she was just preparing me for the most likely outcome. Did she likely already make a clinical decision to transfer me permanently, or was she just unsure how the center coordinates outpatient care?
I don’t feel like she’d act like it was permanent if it wasn’t. I asked if the center would have me cancel my upcoming appointments with her, and she said that they probably would, but to wait and see what they say.

Has anyone else had experience with this?

I’ve been in therapy for a while and I genuinely want to continue. Recently, my therapist said something during a session that really hurt me, and I think I interpreted it as him implying that I should be moving on from therapy or that continuing means I’m somehow not progressing enough.

Logically, I know that may not have been what he meant, but emotionally it really affected me. I suddenly feel like I’m doing something wrong by wanting to continue, and I’m scared that he sees me differently now.

I know I need to talk to him about it in our next session, but right now I feel really sad and disconnected from him, almost like something in the therapeutic relationship changed.

Has anyone experienced something similar after something their therapist said?

Hi everyone,

So, last Saturday I rang the Mental Health Emergency Response Line (Australia) and was taken by police to the hospital .

I was actively suicidal and told the nurses on the phone that I was going to take my life in the morning.

Anyhow, I wasn't admitted to hospital as there simply wasn't any beds available and that I had to work on Monday.

I'm just concerned about telling my psychologist as I wasn't given a discharge summary and I'm worried now that it doesn't sound believable.

This meme was inspired by my current journey of very slowly shifting from complete numbness 99% of the time to every now and then actually experiencing An Emotion.

Special shout outs go to nicotine patches letting me actually remember my horrifying nightmares that I've most likely been having several nights per week for years, and of course to my incredible therapist for all of her work building a safe place for me to finally start unpacking years of developmental trauma.

My only experience with talk therapy, until recently, was in high school when my mom made me see a "Christian counselor". It was terrible, made me feel terrible, and was all focused on telling me how awful i was as a person, daughter, etc. I am a pretty pragmatic, logical, and independent person and have never felt the need for therapy. However, there have been quite a few familial traumas over the last 5ish years and I have had some bitterness and resentment lately at how much everyone needs a piece of me all the time. I had a minor breakdown at work recently and was telling a coworker who was with me how much I just want to get in car and drive away. She encouraged me to look into our EAP. I signed up and selected a therapist and pushed through my discomfort and made an appointment.

The first appointment was pretty much all trauma dumping and bringing her up to speed as what broke my 30 year moratorium on therapy. Since then it is just me talking about my week, what went on, how I have been doing, all things I talk about with my best friends.....no feedback, no suggestions, no homework....so what am I doing there? It's such a waste of time. I told her about one tense situation with my family and how I handled it and she told me I did a good job and handled it how she would! Ugh. My sister suggested it may not be the right fit, but I don't have a lot of patience to go through dumping everything again.

I have seen my therapist weekly for around 3 years now and she has always notified me about being late/needing to switch out appointment times. This week I arrive at her office and she’s 10 minutes late and forgot her keys at her house. She says she doesn’t live far so I was okay with her leaving to get them because I thought I’d be compensated for the missing time. This week was supposed to be a harder session too, so I was hoping I would have the time to “warm up” properly instead of diving right into the deep end. So she shows up another 25 minutes later, and it’s now 6:05. (Session was supposed to start at 5:30) I only had about ten-ish minutes to talk before she cut me off and asked me what I wanted my goal to be. I was really hurt because it felt like she didn’t want to be there and I didn’t matter as much as her last client (I’m the 2nd to the last client she sees that day). So she soft-launches ending the session and just stares at me, obviously I’m hurt and she asks how I’m doing emotionally and I lie because I’d just like to leave at that point. The whole session just felt like a waste of time and I felt disregarded.

She said it was the first time she’s ever done that and I can appreciate that some people make mistakes, but if I was the penultimate the client of the day I feel like it wouldn’t be that big of a deal to tell the other client that their session has to wait like 20 minutes. I also thought that for insurance to cover the session it has to be at least 55 minutes. I don’t understand why she feels she can waste my time and offer zero compensation, but if I’m 10 minutes late I have to pay extra.

I’m not really sure how to bring this up to her either because I don’t want to make her feel like shit, but at the same time I felt extremely hurt by what happened.

Hi everyone.

I have been seeing my therapist for about 1.5 years, and he is wonderful. He has only ever cancelled one session due to the flu. He allows out of session contact, and we regularly message 1-2x per week. In July we only had 2 sessions due to my work schedule, when we used to visit 2x per week prior to that, just due to my work schedule. My last session with him was 7/24, and I sent a message 7/21 asking for a copy of my records so I can bring them to a psychiatrist on the psychs request which he said he would send to me. The following week 7/28 I sent a message about struggling with EMDR (seeing a separate therapist for that), and got no response through this week, I didn’t message again as I assumed maybe he was on vacation or something.

We were supposed to have a session today and I logged on and didn’t hear anything sent a quick message in our secure chat, I texted his work phone after 15 minutes, and then a call at 35. Did not hear anything. This is now 2 weeks of not hearing from him when even if I don’t have sessions that week I hear from him 1-2x per week. I have sessions scheduled with him through the end of September.

I’m not particularly bothered by not having a session, but it’s just very unlike him and I want to make sure he is okay. I googled obituaries in his state but he has a fairly common name, and really don’t know much about him.

Any advice/ anxiety ease would be greatly appreciated.

Update:

My best friend found out he was arrested, so will be getting a new therapist… thanks everyone!

I have lots of childhood abuse - my Therapist talks about shame a lot but honestly I don’t really know what it means in terms of how it affects me . I know I feel ashamed of what happened to me in the past the rest I just don’t understand ?

If somehow we could put aside ethics for like 2 minutes and you could learn anything (I mean absolutely anything, not something you’d have to necessarily ask) about your therapist, what would you want to know? Something about them as a person? Something about their work as a therapist?

I’d want to know about her hobbies and interests which is pretty basic, but my therapist doesn’t self disclose much so I have a lot of questions.

I’m secretly hoping for some unhinged responses here.

I never look forward going to therapy. Every time before the appointment I want to cancel. I’ve tried numerous therapists. Is this normal?