Posted by Medusa on October 6, 2003, at 10:48:28
There's a systems therapy institute about an hour from me that trains therapists by means of an observation system. The trainee and the client are in one room, and five team members/supervisors/fellow trainees observe the session on a television in another room. The trainee wears an earphone so her teammates can offer suggestions. After 45 minutes, there's a break, and the trainee discusses the session so far with her teammates, and then there's another 45 minutes.
This is really appealing to me. I feel like therapists have bullied me in the past - not out of meanness, but just because they couldn't open their heads to another idea, including the idea that in some respects I was just different, not unhealthy. The most extreme case - and where trainees/observers were a huge help to me - was when I was in college. The therapist jerked me around a lot, but taught me some really helpful "self-hypnosis" exercises. He was so pleased with how I'd learned his relaxation techniques that he asked me to demonstrate for his trainees ... and while they were there, I found the courage to ask him not to use certain terms, that I felt were moralistic. He said there was nothing moralistic about his language, and his trainees sided with me. I later found out that the prior year he'd been the therapist for a girl who stabbed her roommate to death and then hanged herself. He was a real mind-job ... in front of his trainees, he accused me of absenteeism - but he'd canceled several sessions, and sometimes I'd shown up and he wasn't there. I hadn't missed one session. His trainees seemed to be the only ones who believed me.
Obviously, most therapists aren't like this, but I somehow present myself in such a way that my requests for help don't get taken seriously, and I'm interested in getting as much feedback as possible on how I provoke certain reactions.
Even in my attempt to get an appointment in this institute, I ran into this problem. I explained on the phone to the intake person that I specifically wanted the two-room observation system. A few weeks later, a therapist called me and scheduled an appointment ... and it turned out that she was a free-lancer who'd trained there and somehow was allowed (?) to fish out clients from the waiting list. I went anyway, and she was a case. Probably trying to "connect", she went on about how her son had wanted to study in Boston but it hadn't worked out. (Oh, wow lady! somebody is actually interested in studying in a town where I lived and there are hundreds of thousands of students, I'm so flattered, instant connection!) And when I said I needed help identifying goals, she decided on her own that before the next session, I should finish sewing a suit I'd mentioned I was making. I tried really hard to explain to her what I wanted, but she dismissed all my arguments. She offered me another appointment, and I said I'd call within a week if I decided I wanted it. I never called, but the kicker was that she called on the day of the appointment she'd offered me, asking where I was. So I wrote a long letter outlining my frustration with her and asking her what I could have done to get her to take me seriously. And I faxed the letter to the institute on a Tuesday, knowing that she only works there on Fridays. I felt like she would cover her tracks, and I know it was a little mean to publicly complain about her talking about her personal problems in my first session, but whatever, I'm sick of protecting therapists.
And last week, a young trainee called, and I have my first session tomorrow night.
Of course, now I'm scared, wondering who actually saw the letter I sent, even though everything is true. And I don't know how to begin in this therapy setting.
Well, that was long and rambly! I'd be interested in any thoughts you might have for gone-then-here-then-gone-then-here boardie about how to approach this ideal thing I really had my heart set on ... and am finally getting.
poster:Medusa
thread:265933
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20030925/msgs/265933.html