- There’s a lot of popular notions about what therapy’s “supposed” to look like, but often when a client starts to have reactions to or about their therapist it goes unspoken between them
- When any of us are in treatment we bring with it our expectation of how we’re “supposed” to be in relationships. Those expectations are formed by our prior relationships, prior therapies, and our culture.
- Those expectations can leave us feeling like there are implicit “rules” between client and therapist. Can I ask about ____? I didn’t like what my therapist said, is it ok to tell them? I’m feeling like we’re stuck in treatment, is it ok to talk about it?
- If you start withholding, or keeping something from your therapist, it can actually interfere with the speed and effectiveness of the treatment; now there are whole sections of your internal world that are off limits.
- Sometimes we don’t bring things up because we feel like we’re not supposed to, the therapy is helpful enough, we are afraid we’ll hurt the therapist’s feelings, or perhaps we assume “they’re the professional, they know what they’re doing, right?”.
- Even if the therapist DOES know what they’re doing, that doesn’t mean how they are working with you feels right at any given point in time. When it doesn’t feel right that can leave the client feeling less safe. Without safety and trust we can start to withhold more and more.
- For some of us, the “rules” we intuit in therapy are closely tied to social “rules” we feel in life. Rules that are sometimes so strong we don’t question them, and rules that effect how much we ask or expect of others, and how much we take on for ourselves.
- In therapy, and in all relationships, we can get stuck in that space between “how we feel we’re supposed to be” and what we actually need.
- Therapy is a GREAT place to have that first experience of exploring and challenging that “supposed to” by working to unearth and talk through those expectations and how they effect you. The opening path to that is talking to your therapist about your expectations or concerns of your work together.
It’s not uncommon, in my personal life, for a friend or acquaintance to ask me about “the rules” of therapy. Am I allowed to ask about my therapist? What if I’m bothered by something my therapist does, is it ok for me to give them feedback?
The answer to these types of questions is somewhat nuanced, because each individual therapist will hold different boundaries for their practice – but – the overwhelming answer is – YES – bring what you are thinking about or concerned about to your therapist.
“But I don’t want to hurt her feelings”, “I don’t want to seem like I’m prying” or “It just seems like this is how he is”, are common responses I hear. So yes, on the one hand you want to be considerate of your therapist’s person-hood, but on the other hand, it is your therapist’s job to help you understand what you are experiencing with them in the context of what brings you to treatment. Feedback, questions, or concerns you have for your therapist can become barriers to you being comfortable in the room, and therapy works best when you feel at ease, and able to be open, vulnerable, and honest.
Additionally, (and here’s where it gets interesting) what you are experiencing with your therapist may be a microcosm of what you experience in other relationships. A skilled therapist will be able to help you think about how your feedback applies to both your relationship with them, as well as other relationships in your life and the themes you are discussing in treatment. A skilled therapist will also be able to help you process through how it felt to give feedback and your experience in life outside of therapy speaking up in ways that both get you what you need and take care of your relationships.
If you ask a question about your therapist you may or may not get a direct answer, but you should learn something about yourself in the process. When it’s working well therapy is a collaborative process, which means the therapist will do his or her best to intuit what you need and what will be helpful, but they won’t always get it right. So, take a risk, and talk to your therapist about what you’re not talking to them about.
Notes:
1. . My post on Cyclical Psychodynamics covers more on how we can inadvertently and unknowingly participate in creating dynamics in our relationship with others that don’t work for us.
2. Often times when we have “rules” hard wired into us about “how we’re supposed to be in relationships” we find we have a hard time balancing our needs and the needs of our relationships. Sometimes when we’re trying out new ways of being with others we quite literally feel like we don’t know how to say what we want to say in a way that feels honest, open, and kind. See this post on how to find the balance between yourself, your goals, and your relationships.
3. This is a multi-part series that will aim to help you get the most out of your treatment. See the first part in this series “Tips for selecting a therapist”.