#therapists

[kiindr]

it takes courage to be kind. it takes effort to be kind. no, it does not cost $0 to be kind. Kindness is a choice. Sometimes, a hard one. But people still make it and that's what keeps the world going.

[kymsys]

✨teaching lesson✨ I've been working on a game called "Vampire Therapist" for a little while now and I'm so excited ITS AVAILABLE ON STEAM AND GOG NOW 😩🙏 our little team has put so much love and effort into this visual novel type indie game, so if you like a cowboy vampire to become a therapist and treat other vampires..AND visual novel type games? this is for you!! if you're interested, pls try it out, it would mean the world to us 🥰

(also yes we are aware of bugs and continuesly try to fix them and improve the game 🙏) DISCLAIMER: this is purely shipping art, no such thing happens in the game. and what happens in the kink room stays in the kink room 👀. (yes there is a kink room and yes there is biting. THIS actually is true.)

[snakeautistic]

So many therapists are LAUGHABLY misinformed about autism. When I was first researching autism I brought it up to my therapist and she laughed it off because I knew not to only talk about my special interests during therapy, and I didn’t stim super visibly and frequently. That was an incredibly invalidating experience for me.

Even after that, when I could tell she’d considered it further and realized my theory had merit, it was like she was afraid of the word autism. She’d say I was quirky, or a little different, or just very sensitive, and that I “moved at my own rhythm”. At the very most she’d admit that I might have some slight traits but if I was autistic I would be “very very high-functioning” and probably didn’t meet enough criteria to be diagnosed. She agreed I should get an evaluation, but mostly so I could find out other disorders I might have.

Anyway, I got the diagnosis. She of course spun it like she’d been sure it was going to happen the whole time. She made sure to assure me that no one could tell, and again how extremely high-functioning I was. She’s still afraid to say autistic, and will jump through hoops to avoid saying the word.

It’s so frustrating to me just how stigmatized autism is, even in the mental health field. Professionals fail to understand the spectrum part of autism.

[maddiviner]

It's been many, many years since my interactions with Betterhelp. You can read about them, and a bit of other stuff I've posted regarding that dumpster fire of a "service," in my tag about it here.

I received the above email a bit ago; I cropped it a bunch to take out my personal info, but yeah... thanks, I guess? $10 is $10, I suppose, but I'm mostly just curious if other folks got a similar email.

To be fair, back then, I did get a certain (large) amount of my money back from Betterhelp simply by filing a complaint with my credit card company following the incident where the therapist started pushily quoting the Bible and telling me to submit to my husband, but anyways...

[high-quality-tiktoks]

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One of the many ways generational trauma is passed down.

[misscammiedawn]

Check to see if you have a 'bring your hair dryer to work with you' therapist.

I'm serious. I've been in and out of the mental healthcare system in the UK and US for over 20 years and if I have learned anything about clinicians it is that they divide care into "want to make the client "sane"" and "make the client able to live a comfortable/happy life" categories.

Let me explain.

There's a really good post that can be found here: http://benedante.blogspot.com/2016/12/the-hair-dryer-incident.html

The long and short is a person was struggling with obsessive compulsive disorder who worried that if they left their hair dryer plugged in then they would burn down their house. This had them disrupt their life to check on their fear and their clinician told them to bring the hair dryer to work with them so when the panic set in they could see the hair dryer was with them and it would soothe their fear with minimal disruption.

The blog post above goes into it. Mental healthcare professionals arguing over whether this was "enabling" and a detriment to healing and coping versus those who saw that the life disruption had been solved and it's okay for the client to not be healed if they can live their life.

-

So. Get a 'take your hair dryer to work' therapist. Ask yours about the hypothetical and see where their priorities lie. Are they trying to help you or heal you? They may sound like the same thing but they're not always. Ask yourself what you want from your circumstances?

We have DID and our therapist always treats us as individuals (something the DSM-V specifically warns clinicians against) because she saw how much damage it was doing for us to try and shift and change our behavior to be socially accepteable. It's better for our mental health to embrace "being insane" (my words, not hers) than to repress ourselves to the point of denying anyone the chance to get to know us.

Every clinician will carry baggage with them. That's just normal. But you got to know where their priorities lie. There's a lot of stigma in the mental health field. Knowing if they'd encourage you to act a little crazy for the sake of your peace and comfort helps.

At least. That's our opinion.

[sailoreuterpe]

Please feel free to post why you do or don't go to therapy, experiences with different therapists, or anything else that might give more data.

[bl0w-m3]

How am I supposed to get better all by myself.

No therapist will take me. And if they do they drop me within a month. Every time.

They don’t know how to deal with a comorbidity of the OCD, BPD, and PTSD.

They say THEYRE not equipped to handle it. I’m like what about me!!!!!! HOW DO YOU THINK I FEEL!!!!

[asharestupid]

I will not name names but *stares at allistic people* some people *stares specifically at allistic therapists and other mental health area allistics* need to learn how annoying it is to be labeled by how tolerable your autism is.

One cannot be *mildly* autistic. One cannot have *a touch* of the tism. Your autistic or your not. If someone came up to you and said to your face "your mildly annoying" would you be offended? Because that's what you're saying. I don't care if my symptoms annoy you, I care about how it feels like the clothes I'm wearing are strangling me.

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Gabby Deutch

When someone posted in a private Facebook group for Chicago therapists in March, asking whether anyone would be willing to work with a Zionist client, several Jewish therapists quickly responded, saying they would be happy to be connected to this person. 

What happened next sparked fear and outrage among Jewish therapists in Chicago and across the country, and illuminated the atmosphere of intimidation and harassment faced by many Jews in the mental health world who won’t disavow Zionism. Those who replied, offering their services to this unnamed client, soon found themselves added to a list of supposedly Zionist therapists that was shared in a group called “Chicago Anti-Racist Therapists.”

“I’ve put together a list of therapists/practices with Zionist affiliations that we should avoid referring clients to,” Heba Ibrahim Joudeh, the document’s author, wrote. (A request for comment sent to the practice she runs with her husband did not receive a response.) The administrator of the anti-racist group chimed in, praising the list as a way “to be transparent about clinicians who promote and facilitate White supremacy via Zionism.” The comments came quickly: “Amazing, thank you,” one person wrote. “Omg a place I was looking at is on here,” another wrote, with angry emojis. 

The only trait shared by the 26 therapists on the list is that they are Jewish. “When I saw this whole list created and my name on the list, I was so confused and in disbelief about how, in 2024, this is considered OK. It was a list of Jews,” said Anna Finkelshtein, a licensed clinical social worker in Chicago who immigrated from Russia as a child. “I do not post publicly about the conflict or about Israel at all, ever. It feels like the only way to feel safe as a Jew in the mental health field is to publically speak out against Israel and condemn it and call it a genocide.”

The anti-Zionist blacklist is the most extreme example of an anti-Israel wave that has swept the mental health field since the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks and the resulting war in Gaza, which has seen the deaths of thousands of Palestinian civilians. More than a dozen Jewish therapists from across the country who spoke to Jewish Insider described a profession ostensibly rooted in compassion, understanding and sensitivity that has too often dropped those values when it comes to Jewish and Israeli providers and clients. 

At best, these therapists say their field has been willing to turn a blind eye to the antisemitism that they think is too rampant to avoid. At worst, they worry the mental health profession is becoming inhospitable to Jewish practitioners whose support for Israel puts them outside the prevailing progressive views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“The goal in therapy is to provide compassionate care to whoever walks through your door,” Dean McKay, a professor of psychology at Fordham University, told JI. “As part of our training — I don’t remember in my own training, and it’s not the way that I train anybody else, to ever say, ‘Look, here are the people who are worthy of our care.’”

“We all worried that it could get this bad, but I don’t think any of us were actually expecting it to happen,” said Halina Brooke, a licensed professional counselor in Phoenix, Ariz. Four years ago, she created an organization called the Jewish Therapist Collective to build community among Jewish professionals and raise the alarm about an undercurrent of antisemitism in the field. “Once Oct. 7 hit, we’ve all been in crisis mode since literally that morning, and the stories that have come in from colleagues and about their clients have been horrifying.”

*****

The antisemitism problem in the mental health profession is more than just workplace gossip. Jewish therapists — and Jewish clients — worry about how the growing anti-Israel orthodoxy will show up in clients’ sessions, and if it will affect their care, especially at a time when more people than ever are seeking therapy. A Gallup survey showed that in 2022, 23% of American adults had visited a mental health professional in the prior year, compared to 13% in 2004. 

[sillygerblin]

thinking about the time my therapist saved a magnus archives TikTok because it reminded her of me.

[lastsecondsquirrel]

NORMALIZE VOICING HOW HOPELESS LIFE FEELS WITHOUT FEAR OF INSTITUTIONALIZATION

[myfandomrealitea]

https://www.tumblr.com/myfandomrealitea/751477314025586688/people-are-not-obligated-to-be-your-dumping-ground?source=share

Dumping to strangers could backfire - its why i can't do helplines, they don't know me and I cannot trust them to say mostly the right things.

Helplines when done correctly, efficiently and safely can save lives.

Unfortunately the majority of helplines available right now aren't those things. Employees are often volunteers or lowly paid people with no actual education in psychology or therapy and people trying to push religion as a solution or aid even to the detriment of the caller are simply allowed to do so freely.

The helplines and online websites that are staffed properly and by qualified, trusted employees are usually ones you have to pay to access. Which is fair, but does also mean they're inaccessible to many people.

But also, its worth noting that "saying mostly the right things" will always vary individual to individual. Its why I recommend a 1:1 therapist over things like helplines and support groups, because it gives your therapist the opportunity to learn and evolve to your needs over time. It allows them to learn how to impart information and advice to you, and what structures you need in order to benefit.

This is not to demean or undervalue the people who volunteer at or work at a helpline at all. It can be incredibly valuable work, but it is also incredibly precarious and risky work. Saying the wrong thing could quite literally mean the difference between life and death.

[d4rkerthanbl4ck]

Real

[sophieinwonderland]

I also need to say this:

I get really bad vibes from doctors describing their patients as "attractive" and having a "seductive presentation" in a paper that describes these same patients as "highly likely to file a complaint or make up stories of malpractice."

I can't be the only one, right?

[high-quality-tiktoks]

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Brain going a hundred miles a minute to make sure I heard that right