The Five Questions You Must Ask Your Therapist
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Friday, December 21, 2007
2:55PM - Client confidentiality?
I was a client of the therapist highlighted on the Channel Four News yesterday.
http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/society/law_order/psychotherapists+unregulated+/1211947
The camera zoomed in on my name which is on his website. Channel Four were filming his website so it's not their fault, but it is Derek Gale's. I left 'therapy' although I don't think therapy is the right word for what he does, isn't therapy supposed to help people improve their lives? If you saw the news, you will have got the gist of what this man does, it does not resemble therapy and to call himself a therapist, gives the rest of the profession a bad name. Anyway, when I left, I wrote to Derek Gale and asked him to remove my name from his website and I told him that he did not have permission to use anything I may have said when I knew him, for his promotional purposes and he should remove the link from his website to my professional website. You might be wondering why I am making a big deal out of it, my professional reputation is good and how many people actually go to his website, probably not that many, but this is my point.
Derek Gale expects his clients to repay him over and above their fees. To quote him "You were nothing until you met me and you could not have been the success you are today without me. You owe me for that, a million pounds couldn't pay me back for the kindness I have shown you." He expects his clients to credit him in a public arena, for me that meant crediting his name on record sleeves, and I was told that if I respected the work we did, I would put him on the guest list for every gig he wanted to come to. I didn't feel that I had a choice which is something I'm going to explain more about. You may not be aware that I was in a critically acclaimed indie rock band in the early 90's. Just as the band was about to take off Derek Gale told me that in order to pay him back, I should consider giving him a royalty off the record we were about to record, if it had been a hit record, it could have earnt him a million pounds. When I say consider, I mean heavy handed adamant insistence that he was right about this, so I did not enjoy being on the receiving end of this disregard for ethics, never mind the way the music industry works. I don't think it would have even been possible to put a therapist on a royalty cut of a pop record, royalties are meant for the writers/musicians and record producers. But arguing with him is a waste of time. He is one of those people who always have to be right about everything. So after Derek Gale ignored my request to remove my name from his website I wrote again, and as he continued to ignore my request, I simply didn't want to get into an argument with him. So I left it alone.
I think that I should have the right to keep the fact that I went to a therapist a completely private matter, especially as he is causing such controversy in the profession. As I am writing this on line, you can appreciate that I am choosing to go public but it should be my choice, not forced on me.
The unnecessary force and heavy handed influence which leaves his clients with 'No choice' but to do what he wants them to do, is called a double bind. It is one of the main reasons for my career coming to an abrupt halt although at the time I never suspected that a therapist's motivations could be so underhand. In psychology terms a double bind, done by a person in a position of perceived authority, which a therapist is, can cause a recurring negative thinking pattern, in which the client cannot see that they have any choice. I would describe it as no longer being able to see any light at the end of the tunnel. It can feel quite unbearable when it kicks in. The kind of thoughts that occur as a result might go like this “There is no way I can make my relationship work, I just can't see it, there's nothing I can do, I am going to be miserable if I leave but I am going to be miserable if I stay.” Whatever the person does next they still feel miserable because under these conditions whatever they do, does not feel to them like they made a choice. They are left severely doubting themselves. The person cannot think rationally while they are in this thinking pattern, and they cannot come up with solutions, and even if one is suggested, they cannot see how it could ever work, so they stay stuck in thinking that there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
I discovered that information about how a therapy client can be put into a double bind is available on the internet, but there does not seem to be any information available on how to break the thinking pattern.
I believe that people need to know about the negative thinking patterns that can be imposed when a therapist uses psychological techniques for their own benefit rather than the clients. It's not only the client's state of mind that will suffer, their whole life can suffer as a result. The client may stay in therapy for years, when that was never their intention, they may attend naked therapy sessions because of the 'bullying approach' Derek Gale calls 'tough love' which makes his clients susceptible to actions that under any other circumstances they would not choose to do. The client may cut off from their families, change careers, leave relationships and even be influenced into thinking that they cannot have children, altering their life in a way that can never be replaced. That is extremely serious, but impairing a person's ability to think positively means that a person can stay stuck, not only in their lives but in an emotional state of mind you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. If you think negative thoughts, negative feelings are going to follow, but if you can't get out the way you're thinking, you will stay stuck in the those feelings. It's nothing short of abject cruelty to deprive a person of their ability to get out of a negative state of mind. And that is what the double bind thinking pattern does.
I am sure you're aware that a sales person can persuade a person to buy something they don't really want, but do you know what the techniques are? Do you know how to manipulate another person in the very first conversation that you have with them? Do you know how to manipulate them to think a certain way? Or to feel certain emotions? And if you did know, would you choose to manipulate other people, for a power trip or to make money? And if you did, would you tell them that what you were doing was helping them? That you could save them from the terrible feelings they are suffering from. And then put them further into an emotional mess so that they keep coming back to you for help? Would you enjoy having someone be dependent on you in that way?
If it were a therapist who was behaving like this, you might even wonder if the therapist was mad. It leaves me wondering why there is a stigma attached to having been a therapy client. People assume that you have problems, they never consider other possibilities. What if there are people who know what techniques they can use to influence people? What if they use them to purposely harm rather than help people? Because they need the 'high' they get from the power trip? Did you know that people get an immense 'high' from a power trip? What if they make a large income from this con? If anyone recognised what they were doing, they wouldn't confess would they? Wouldn't making out they were the victim, serve their purposes better? Isn't it a fact that some people feel sorry for the underdog?
Monday, October 1, 2007
10:56AM - Suspension Order
The therapist I went to has recently been suspended by the Association of Humanistic Psychology Practitioners, the UKAHPP, around two years after they received a complaint. They had received serious complaints about this therapist in the past but took no action. They have serious complaints being made against a different therapist and no action has been taken over those complaints either. Their suspension of Derek Gale has not been made public knowledge in way, shape or form. You could not tell by going onto their website. This therapist is ignoring his suspension and continuing to practice regardless.
Doesn't this make a mockery of the ethic of practicing with integrity?
If the therapist does not tell their clients or make it public knowledge on their website, they are hiding the truth from their clients and from potential clients who may make a different choice if they knew. Whether the complaints are proven and he is struck off or the AHPP decide that he hasn't broken their code of ethics and only give him a warning, the fact remains that people are concerned about the methods and techniques that he uses. Derek Gale's clients have a right to know that so that they can make their own informed decisions.
The fact is, many of Derek Gale's clients have been in therapy with him for 12, 15, 20 years even and when they decided to go to him, there were no professional regulations. He ran self development workshops in order to get therapy clients. There are no professional regulations that a person should adhere to, in order to run a self development workshop. After a person had attended a self development workshop, he would then tell them that he was actually a trained psychotherapist and could help with their problems. The problem being that Derek Gale is known for pushing his clients and causing them to get extremely upset and emotional which makes them think they need help. It is hard to tell when you are on the receiving end of this kind of technique that the problem is not you but the technique and the person who is using it against your well being in order to make you think you have problems that need a professional's help.
When I met him the only professional organisation that existed was the British Association for Counselling, now known as the BACP but at that time it was set up for counselling only. A few years after I met Derek Gale, he told his clients that he had been invited to join a professional organisation. I remember endless discussions in his therapy group because he was so angry that they were delaying approving his membership and his regular clients spent hours discussing it. All of a sudden he was allowed to join a professional organisation and that organisation was the AHPP.
Derek Gale didn't tell his clients he was working with at the time, that he was only allowed to join the AHPP on the basis of having been in practice for so many years and not because they approved his training. Those clients thought that being accepted to that professional organisation meant something about Derek Gale's training being recognised professionally. To this date, the ex clients who are now making a formal complaint, have not been able to find out what his training actually is, apart from a certificate in psychodrama that has not been verified as being anything more than a certificate of attending a weekend workshop. The AHPP are still unable to verify what his training is when asked, but do admit that Derek Gale was allowed to join on the basis of the number of years he had been in practice when he joined. Derek Gale claimed that he was on the board of directors of the AHPP very soon after he joined and it was advertised on his website until recently. His membership to their board of directors is something that the AHPP will not make a clear public statement about.
It was because of Derek Gale's membership to the AHPP that he was able to join the Health Professions Council, the HPC although he didn't register in the name that he practices under, so it was only when the ex clients who wanted to make a formal complaint actually found out what that name was, that they were able to finally make their complaint and he was suspended immediately. Derek Gale did not make it known to anyone that he had registered to the HPC as Hirsh Derek Gale. That prevented clients for years from being able to make a formal complaint to an organisation that makes it public knowledge when a member is suspended or stuck off. A really important point, if members of the public are to be protected.
A lot of people are unhappy with the idea of the HPC having the powers to regulate the psychotherapy professions. I have read comments from people who say that the HPC can't do the job properly because of the loophole which means that although Derek Gale is suspended from practicing any kind of drama or arts therapy, they do not have the power to prevent him practicing psychotherapy. This seems to me to be missing a very obvious point. If the other organisations supported the change, the loophole would be closed.
What I think the important question is, is how come these people think the public would be better protected by organisations who don't make suspensions public knowledge?
More importantly arguing over who has the power isn't the real issue, what can be done to enforce a professional organisations ruling is of much more value to the public who need protection from this kind of rogue therapist who is continuing to advertise and take on new clients. As proved when Natasha Pearlman from the Daily Mail booked a session and he told her she could also attend psychodrama and music workshops if she wanted to sign up.
To me this is a sign that the professional organisations need to be given the authority to actually stop a therapist from practicing, until the after the professional organisation's hearing. These are extremely serious complaints that have been made which are being backed up with hard evidence and a large number of ex clients who can verify eachother's accounts of what happened.
It is not that Derek Gale's current clients might waste time and money, he uses techniques that when I was on the receiving end of them, made me distraught and suicidal and unable to think clearly, in particular double binds as Gergory Bateson discovered (see the links below) Derek Gale's clients are at serious risk.
If the complaints against a therapist are so serious, as the whole long list of unethical practices talked about in this case are, shouldn't the professional organisations have the power to prevent the therapist from practicing, until the professional hearing is over, in order that their clients are able to have some time to consider their alternatives without the therapist's influence? The influence of a professional in a position of percieved authority can have so much influence their client does not recognise that they are not willingly making choices but making choices they would not make under any other circumstances. In one of Derek Gale's psychodramas a client was sent to Coventry for an entire week, even his wife did not speak to him, all because he didn't want to run a morning meeting. It's doubtful that any of the people involved would have chosen that response without the therapist's influence.
My deepest concern is for the people who are suffering unnecessarily in a situation that none of the professional organisations can do anything about, at the present time.
Gregory Bateson (1904-1980) is most famous for developing the "Double Bind" theory of psychology. Gregory Bateson originally defined the term double bind as “communication in the context of an emotionally important relationship in which there is unacknowledged contradiction between messages of different logical levels.
http://web.ionsys.com/~remedy/Bateson,%20Gregory.htm
Sunday, September 23, 2007
1:07PM - Daily Mail Exposes Therapist Continuing To Practice Regardless Of Suspension
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=483201&in_page_id=1879
The comments about this article are not surprising given the small amount of information they've read out of a situation that has been going on for thirty years unrecognised, and that is the point. You can only assess a situation according to the information you are given. Although this therapist has credentials, certificates and memberships to professional organisations, at the time I went to him, there were no specific therapy organisations and at that time he claimed to be working in self development, which at the time, early 1980's, had become very popular and everyone I knew had attended some kind of self development type workshop. Information about how they could be damaging not readily available. People do not need a training to run self development workshops so although he claimed to be a trained psychotherapist and psychodrama therapist, it wasn't the deciding factor in attending a self development workshop.
But even nowadays while the professional organisations can tell you who their members are, they can't vouch for their members abilities. All therapists will tell you they can help you and if they have a professional looking website, articles in magazines, books published and clients who will tell you that the therapy works, all there is to go on is your own judgment backed up by the information you have available. It's not unreasonable to think that a workshop or therapy session might be a waste of time and money and not get the desired result, but it doesn't seem to be widely known that if it's not a positive experience that it can actually be extremely harmful and damaging. Specifically what will cause harm and damage a person needs to be made more widely known. While you may arm yourself with knowledge about what to avoid in a traditional therapy, recognising the line where an alternative method of therapy such as voice, music or drama therapy crosses the line and becomes harmful isn't easy to detect. At the time of writing my book, I had trouble finding specific information about what the rules of psychodrama should be in order to keep safe, the only information that was available was what it could potentially do for me, in the right hands. Details of what the dangers are, in the wrong hands, were not readily available.
This lack of knowledge in the public domain means that deciding who to go to may well involve trying out some sessions with the therapist before making a decision. We hand our power over to a professional, that is what we do, we don't go to our doctor then automatically refuse the prescription, we try it and if it doesn't work, we consider other options. It is hard to tell if therapy is helping because it is supposed to take some time before you can tell. The problem is that harm can be done very quickly if the professional is only claiming to be a 'therapist'. The therapist I went to uses emotional exercises and mind altering techniques that cause a negative emotional state and a negative thinking pattern which make his clients become dependant and feel unable to leave. Public awareness needs to be raised about these techniques because you can't avoid the dangers if you don't know what they are.
If you are not sure that the therapy you are receiving is helping you or if you've had a bad experience and are looking for ways to recover, the RESOURCE PAGE on my website has information, questions to test your therapy, books, articles, and where to go for help. www.thefivequestionsyoumustaskyourtherapist.com/resources.html
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
2:40PM - Therapist Suspended In The Press
The media have taken an interest in this case at last. While the articles cannot go into the depth that would be needed in order to answer the question ‘Why didn’t you just walk away?’ It’s a start. Because the newspapers focus on sensationalist items such as this therapist ‘encourages his patients to take illegal drugs and join nude workshops’ the real point I feel is missed. A person who is a position of perceived authority such as a therapist, has influence over their clients. In this particular case, encourage is the wrong word, his clients were bullied and forced to do things that they didn’t want to do, from painting his centre or picking him up from the airport, because he told them the activity would help them. When they questioned his motives, they were on the receiving end of what could only be described as a press gang. What you also have to understand, and I’ll liken it to women who end up in a relationship where they are physically hit, it obviously doesn’t happen on the first date, otherwise they would walk away. This therapist only was able to force his clients into these activities after they had been with him for some time.
When you go to a doctor and they give you a prescription, you don’t automatically say, no I am going to get a second opinion before I go to the chemist, do you? Most people would take the medicine and then if it doesn’t work, then consider going to another doctor. The trouble with therapy is that it’s difficult to know if it is working. This therapist told his clients “It has to get worse before it gets better” but how can you tell if you are better than before you went or just better than when you were worse, if you follow me.
Another aspect of this situation that needs to be understood, is that this therapist socialized with his clients, and put extreme heavy pressure on his clients to cut off from their families and friends outside of his therapy group. One of his methods involves sending a client to Coventry if they don’t conform. This works when a client has given up their life to make their ‘therapy’ a priority and they are in a vulnerable state and the fear of having their emotional support pulled from underneath them, has power. This therapist knew to use this technique when his client was in a vulnerable state, otherwise they would just walk away.
The really frightening aspect, is that while a client has to be involved for a while to become so influenced that they will do things they don’t want to or know to be wrong, damage can be done in one weekend workshop. I went to this therapist, not because I wanted therapy, I went to what was advertised as a self development workshop because I lacked the confidence to sing. The workshop leader was apparently also a psychotherapist and during the workshop he made the participants take part in an emotional exercise during which I got extremely upset. The workshop leader who is known for ‘pushing’ his clients, pushed me too hard and then told me that I was upset because I had deep emotional issues which could only be resolved by having therapy and he was in fact a therapist and could help me but I needed to sign up for a number of sessions as it was a procedure that would take a while before I noticed any improvement. There was always another ‘issue’ that needed his help and ‘a number of sessions’ turned into many years. I wasn’t even looking for therapy, I simply had questions about my life that I wanted answered and yet I was drawn into having therapy which had an extreme negative influence not only over my state of mind but my partner, family, career, finances, and my whole life was affected negatively for many years.
The Times published an article on Monday 6th August.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article2204202.ece
The BBC also published an article on their website
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/essex/6933654.stm
The local Guardian published this article
http://www.guardian-series.co.uk/mostpopular.var.1600495.mostviewed.suspended_therapist_continuing_to_practice.php
This article was published on the Londonist website today
http://londonist.com/2007/08/toothless_regul.php
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
Friday, June 29, 2007
1:10PM - The Therapist Is Suspended By The Health Professions Council
Finally! A professional organisation has taken a serious complaint seriously enough to take action.
On the 27th June the Health Professions Council concluded that a suspension order was necessary both for the protection of the public and in public interest. You can read more at the Health Professions Council website
http://www.hpc-uk.org/complaints/hearings/index.asp?id=508
The Health Professions Council acted very swiftly which is encouraging in light of the bill currently on its way through parliament concerning the Regulation of Psychology, Psychotherapy and Counselling. The suspension came a week after receiving the complaints, six in all. It’s a huge relief for people who still have family members and friends involved.
The Association of Humanistic Psychology Practitioners, the AHPP is the professional organisation that the therapist is still a member of and was on the board of directors, according to the therapist himself. They have not take any action over a complaint they received against this therapist in nearly two years other than to demand a written explanation which the person making the complaint has not been allowed to see. If he did in fact make a reply, this still hasn't been followed up with any action. Bureaucracy can be slow but this level of red tape does not serve to protect the public neither does it help if a therapist is wrongly accoused, so the question is, what is the delay all about? The AHPP did not take any action over serious complaints they received in the past over this same therapist. A complaint came from a group of therapists who were concerned after seeing clients who had been in therapy with the therapist in question. Therapists have a duty to report another therapist if they have concerns, but if no action follows from the professional organisation this rather defeats the object of that code of conduct. If the Health Professions Council’s response was to immediately suspend this therapist in the interest of protecting the public, doesn’t it call into question the motives of the AHPP? In my last post I wrote about how the AHPP phoned me within an hour of having a meeting in which their facilitator listened to my complaint and told me NOT to contact the Health Professions Council because my therapist was NOT a member and that “it’s not a legal matter, it is a matter for therapists” Is this the action of an organisation who wants to help protect the public? My therapist was a member of the Health Professions Council, a fact of which I am truly thankful.
Gaby Hinsliff, political editor of the Observer wrote an article that was printed on Sunday 28th January this year entitled Crackdown on therapists who abuse vulnerable
http://www.guardian.co.uk/medicine/story/0,,2000639,00.html
In the article, Gaby Hinsliff writes about the need for updating regulations in the psychotherapy and alternative health professions. Bee Springwood from the AHHP responded to this article by writing a letter to the paper, in which she said that any government regulation would only interfere with a procedure that the Psychotherapy organisations were perfectly capable of regulating by themselves and they were petitioning against government support.
If taking NO action over a complaint which includes the therapist having inappropriate relationships with his clients, exploiting his clients, inappropriate methods of conduct, encouraging clients to break the law, and failing to keep proper records, and this is just a short summary of a long list in which EVERY point and sub point of their own Code of Ethics has been broken, how exactly do they think they can do a better job than government regulation would allow for?
Speaking as a person who has suffered from a serious abuse of the profession, it seems to me that the Health Professions Council are taking their role seriously, as you would expect. I think that they will make a big improvement in the profession very quickly, if they way they have handled this complaint so far is anything to go by.
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
12:59PM - Who Is Protecting Therapy Clients?
My experience of making a formal complaint to the professional organization that the therapist I saw was unbelievable. I was appointed a facilitator who listened to my stories, his jaw dropped to the floor, he was clearly shocked. I was then told that their procedure would require my list of complaints to be given to the therapist. We would then meet in a room where the complaint would be discussed by a board made up of therapists from the professional organization. I was outraged, a complaint of the serious nature that I was about to make, and they suggested we sat in a room together. It would be like expecting a rape victim to sit in a room with their rapist for a ‘group’ discussion. Within an hour of leaving this meeting, I was phoned by the professional organization and told not to go to the other professional organization that this therapist is a member of, The Health Practitioner’s Council who do actually have the power to injuct him and prevent him from practicing. I was told that the therapist was not a member of the HPC and I was told not to take the complaint to the law either as this complaint was “a matter for therapists”.
Why was I told NOT to do the things that could prevent a person who masquerades as a therapist from ruining more lives? This therapist is not doing therapy that perhaps ‘doesn’t work for everyone’; he is not doing therapy at all. He is running a Psychotherapy Cult that damages his clients psychologically and keeps them dependant for years. He is on the Board of Directors of the professional organization that he is a member of, isn’t that shocking? What does that say about the professional organization? They have someone on the Board of Directors who is running a Psychotherapy Cult and they are doing nothing about it?
Apparently there have already been complaints made about this therapist, and no action was taken. A third party complaint that was made subsequently has only resulted in the therapist being asked to make a response in writing. Which he hasn’t. In fact, although he is not allowed to resign from this organization while there is a complaint pending, he is hiring a lawyer to fix it so he can. Why would he try to resign when he has the ideal opportunity to have his therapeutic approach and methods verified and approved?
Meanwhile, the therapist is failing to tell his clients that if he resigns from this professional organization, he is still a member of the HPC. The only problem is that he doesn’t tell his clients that he is registered to this organization under a name that he doesn’t use. In fact, until very recently, nobody knew about this ‘name’ and unless you knew the real name you couldn’t put in a complaint with the HPC because they don’t seem to be aware of the name he practices under. Shocking, isn’t it. And this therapist claims to teach integrity! He has told his clients that his ‘insurance’ will still cover them in case of an accident, why does he fail to mention that his Professional Indemnity Insurance is affected by the complaint and that the only cover they are getting is a cover up of the truth?
The question is, how come the professional organizations see it as “a matter for therapists” when they have so little control over the behavior of their members?
And since when did an organization of therapists, have more value than a court of law? Are they suffering from a ‘super ego’?
Sunday, May 28, 2006
9:27AM - The Therapist Messed You Up?
When I left therapy for good, I had realized that there was something very wrong with what was happening in the one to one sessions and the regular group meetings but for a while I didn’t know how to articulate the details of what had been wrong, until I left and starting researching. Up until that point, if any of his client’s complained, the therapist would put it all down to his client’s ‘madness’ and how could they possibly be able to tell, ‘their issues’ were clouding their understanding of what was happening.
While in therapy, I had only read therapy books recommended by the therapist and he chose books that seemed to be heavily weighted in his favor. When I finally did some research of my own, I discovered that my ‘therapist’ used all the common therapy language but turned around the therapeutic concepts so that ‘therapy’ kept his clients in a constant state of trauma. By constantly blaming ALL of his client’s problems on their parents. The client’s parents were the root cause of every unhappiness past and present. He made his clients angry. He told his clients that forgiveness was a waste of time, and his clients ended up believing him. And so they were kept in a loop of getting angry, having some sort of cathartic experience on a regular basis, which would provide a temporary relief. Then they would need to come back for more relief from a state that this therapist had put them into and so it would go on for literally years. This created a dependency on the therapist, one which he developed in other ways, by constantly criticizing all other therapies/therapists, and constantly saying how his clients had been “nothing until they met him” or “practically certifiable” and “how lucky they were to have met him, because they wouldn’t have survived if it weren’t for him” and constantly making his clients believe that he was the ONLY one who was able to help.
It took me a long time to realize that the therapist always made negative comments or on the rare occasions he gave some kind of praise, there was always a “But…” on the end of the sentence. Negative comments were given to every client and over every area of their life. Over a period of time, the effects were devastating for the clients, but after they had been with this therapist for a long time, they would all put the negativity in their life down to the ‘condition’ the therapist had diagnosed them with. These diagnosed conditions were always severe. If a client came to him and said, they were unhappy, he called it a depression, if they got depressed, at some point their condition increased to a manic depression, a person who was afraid and confused and wondered if they were mad was classified as Borderline. I discovered later that not one of his clients actually suffered from the symptoms of his classifications, but the constant trauma that he put them in would make them believe that their state of upset was because of the diagnosis and therefore their own problem, rather than the truth of situation; the therapist’s actions caused his clients to become permanently in a traumatized state. They were suffering constant pain from abuse. BUT abuse from the therapist, and NOT solely from their parents and childhood as the therapist made them believe.
The therapist gave his clients books to read to make himself appear to be in line with professional views. The books could present only one side of an argument or a theory that appeared to back up what he said and the clients wouldn’t know if the books were out of date or if they were regarded with any amount of validity by the profession. Or if they were written and produced by a reliable source.
How would any member of the public really know what constitutes good therapy or what changes are being made in the therapy profession? It would usually only be because a member of the profession told you, but who is there to stop a professional giving you wrong information? This is very alarming. Even the professional organizations have very little information about what to expect from a therapy.
When what constitutes a cure is so highly debatable, this leaves the profession open to all kinds of abusers and the therapist as a professional can suppress any instinctive feelings the client might about the therapist doing harm, as ‘their issues’ that need to be worked on with the therapist. Or say that a cure takes years and that is going to cost a lot of money. The fact that therapy is expensive leaves the profession open to all kinds of potentially abusive situations. The combination of lack of checks by the professional organizations, lack of regulations by the government and potential of money to be made easily, leaves this profession open to corruption.
Some people would say, but you must have noticed something was wrong, but why would any person suspect a professional? We don’t automatically look at our doctor’s prescription and go and get a second opinion, nor do we automatically try and find out if a therapist is giving the correct cure.
We don’t expect to get killed by our doctor or ****ed up by our therapist!
Sunday, May 21, 2006
10:49AM - Need For Change
If a therapist is struck off from one professional organization that they are a member of, that doesn’t automatically mean that they will be struck off other organizations that they might also be affiliated to. What are the implications of this? They can continue practicing, with one less qualification on their website or advertisement, what difference would that make to potential clients? How many people check either what a qualification means or if a therapist actually has the qualifications they say they have?
Certificates can be given after a short course which may constitute a minimal number of hours, after which it can be displayed and the now ‘qualified’ person can start practicing. The certificates do not explain on them what the practitioner has learnt nor how long they trained for.
Not all therapies training require that the practitioner undergo therapy themselves. But even if they do, they are only required to go through the therapy for the duration of their training, whereas the clients are often in therapy for many years.
Just because a therapist has a certificate or is affiliated to a professional organization does not prove that the person is fit to practice, and in spite of requirements by these organizations to continue training and keep up with changes in what is considered correct treatment, there is nothing in place to implement this.
The same applies to supervision, how does a potential client know if their therapist is under supervision? The professional organizations require that a therapist is under supervision, some for the therapist’s entire working life, however, the organizations don’t appear to check up on the therapists that are affiliated to them. Although the organizations require supervision that does not automatically mean that the therapist follows the organizations regulations. Who is overseeing this?
As long as there are no government regulations there is little or no redress for people who are abused by therapists who are not a member of a professional organization but these organizations neither have much power to take any action. An injunction that requires a therapist stop working is only available to some organizations that are government regulated, and at the moment this applies to very few of the organizations that therapists can affiliate to. When are the government going to start regulating the therapies profession, in spite of the difficulty of classifying what constitutes good therapy?
It is time for the profession to be treated the same way the rest of the medical profession, after all therapists are doctors of the mind.
Saturday, May 13, 2006
10:04AM - What benefit is there for a client making a complaint?
There seems to be one major problem with making a formal complaint against a therapist which is there is nothing in it for the client.
The client will be required to make their complaint in writing and it will be very time consuming to write their complaint, they will have to explain very specifically how their experience is a breach of code of ethics as listed in a guideline that may have been written for therapists rather than to aid the client in knowing how to make their complaint comply with regulations. The language may be complicated and difficult for the client to understand. The client’s complaint must fit the guidelines for the complaint to be taken into consideration, however shocking the clients story is, it is not enough that the client’s story could be a breach of human rights.
Even if the code of ethics is simple and clear to read, the client will have to write down their experience which may be extremely painful for them, and going over their story may feel like an extension of that experience.
Then they are faced with knowing that their behavior and past is going to be further analyzed by a board made up of therapists, even if they are supposed to only discuss whether the organization's codes of ethics have been broken, most people would surely find this daunting. What happens to these personal writings when the procedure is over, may concern some people. The therapist is going to get a copy, so they can defend themselves, and what is to stop the therapist from accusing the client of lying, they have their own income to protect. Without hard evidence, with or without a lot of support to proceed it would be tough for the client to go through the procedure alone. There must be a perceived risk that they will find the experience humiliating or otherwise difficult. And what for? The therapist may get struck off from the organization they are affiliated to, but that doesn’t automatically mean they will stop practicing.
If the client ever wanted to complain about the therapist, the chances that they will make a formal complaint must be slim.
Saturday, May 6, 2006
5:41AM
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Since I have started telling people about my dreadful experience in therapy, people have started telling me all kinds of stories of their own. One woman I met told me that she had been to several therapists; one in particular she felt had a very destructive impact on her. She didn’t feel she could complain, he was a director of a therapeutic association and she didn’t know who she could complain to. His position prohibited her from even considering making a complaint. Another story I heard was about a therapist who had a sexual relationship with one of his clients, the therapist had put the blame onto his client telling her it was her fault and all about her issues with men. She did not complain about this therapist.
How unfair that the opinion of a so called professional is believed by a client and ‘the client is mad’ or ‘has issues’ can be used against that client. The power balance in this relationship is so easily abused. And woman who are abused, so often blame themselves and do not speak up. In my opinion, therapists must know this. It’s easy to understand how then, therapists who abuse their clients do not appear to be afraid of being struck off the professional organizations they register to.
If sexual abuse in the therapeutic relationship is sometimes difficult for a client to recognize as being solely the therapist's responsibility, imagine the difficulty that clients have recognizing emotional or rather in this case psychological abuse.
The number of formal complaints registered with one health professionals organization I spoke to, show that complaints have increased in the last year. Quadrupled. But a very small percentage, only one fifth, of complaints were made by the clients themselves. The highest number of complaints were from the organizations who the practitioners work for. They have a duty to report an unethical practitioner. Their business could be in danger if they don’t report the practitioner. It must also be easier for an organization to make the complaint for a number of reasons. It is obviously less personal when the complainant is an organization and not an individual but also the power balance is more equally weighted.
The complaints procedure has to protect therapists against malicious complaints, that is necessary and right, however in protecting therapists from what is a rare occurrence, are the health professionals organizations providing enough help and support for individuals who make complaints against their therapist?
When ought a client have the courage to prevent others from suffering abuse from a therapist even if the procedure of making a formal complaint may be a difficult experience and may only get the therapist struck off an organization and not actually prevent them from practicing in future?
Saturday, April 15, 2006
5:02AM
Did you ever have a bad experience of a therapist, therapy, psychoanalysis, psychotherapy, counseling, group therapy or drama therapy? I have heard many stories of unethical therapists, who seem to be able to get away with causing harm or in some cases severe abuse.
I wished I had known what questions to ask my ‘therapist’ when I first went to see him. I had a dreadful experience. I came out of sessions, not only feeling worse but positively reeling. Sometimes it took days to recover from trauma my therapist had put me through.
The complaints procedure has also left me reeling. There is not enough help for people who want to stop a therapist from harming other people. I think that the complaints procedure would prohibit all but a very strong person from following it through, and this worries me, does this mean that vast numbers of bad therapists are getting away with what can really only be described as emotionally damaging people, thereby requiring the people who have gone to them, to get further help to get over their negative therapy experience as well as the initial cause of their seeking help.
I wondered if there were others who had a similar or different bad experience who would be willing to talk about it, and I realized what a unique opportunity there is through blogging. People can share their experience and remain anonymous. Many people I am sure would not want to reveal their identity, but they can still reveal their story here. And I invite those who are seriously concerned about the lack of redress for their bad experiences with therapists and or the societies that they are affiliated, to tell their story. If you have any comments to make please do so, whether you have received bad treatment in one to one sessions, in groups sessions, or in training to become a therapist.
If you would like to comment on the five questions you would recommend that a person ask their therapist, please post your suggestions here. Thank you.
Gena Dry.
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