Why Your Therapist is Weird? Therapeutic Boundaries. (Actually a Good Thing)

Lisa Marie Bobby:

Are you in a professional relationship with a therapist? If so, maybe you’ve been surprised by some of the things your therapist has said or done, or maybe even felt a little hurt or put off by them. Well, you’re not alone and your experiences are valid. Therapists like me have a whole set of set of rules and ethical codes that most people don’t even know about, but that you kind of need to know about if you want to build a solid and effective relationship with your therapist.

Because if you don’t know why they’re acting like a weirdo sometimes, it’s going to damage your trust and also, by consequence, damage your results that you get out of the therapeutic process. So if you’ve ever wondered why your therapist is acting like Such a weirdo. This episode is for you. All will be revealed.

Today we are demystifying these odd creatures known as shrinks and diving into what makes them tick. And so trust me, by the end of this episode, you will see your therapist in a whole new light and say, Oh, that’s why. And I hope that the result of this is that you will feel more comfortable and confident in your relationship with your therapist.

Or you might also hear this and think, huh, maybe I need to get a second opinion. Could potentially be an outcome, but we’re going to have a good time together today. And I’m so glad you’re here to join me for this.

Three, two, one. If this is your first time with me, I am Dr. Lisa Marie Bobby. I myself am a therapist. I’m a licensed psychologist, a licensed marriage and family therapist. I am a board certified coach. I’m the founder of Growing Self Counseling and Coaching. And I am also an AAMFT approved clinical supervisor of other therapists.

So part of my job is actually training and mentoring developing therapists. develop their own professional skills and abilities. Um, if you are a therapist listening to this episode, hop on over to love, happiness, and success for therapists. Sometime. This is a new podcast that I launched earlier this year.

That’s all about the experience of. Being a shrink and what we all need to do professionally in order to take care of ourselves, but also be truly reliable, trustworthy and effective growth partners for our clients. So, um, hop over there if you want to get in on that conversation. But the reason that I wanted to talk about this particular topic today on why therapists can be weirdos is that I think, um, shrink.

Based on my experience in managing a big, you know, practice, we have 50 plus therapists running around growing self over the years. I have been the clinical supervisor and mentor of a number of therapists who are working towards licensure. And then these two. I’m a counselor educator. So doing, um, postgraduate training programs and certifications for therapists to develop different professional skill sets to help them be more effective.

And I can’t even tell you how many times I have seen even quite experienced therapists run into trouble with their clients and also have clients. be genuinely confused or put off or like feel bad about things that have happened between them and their therapists that lead them to prematurely exit therapy to their own detriment.

Whereas I think if there was more knowledge or awareness around how therapists actually operate and why they’re kind of weird sometimes, it would be less, um, surprising and that people wouldn’t have ruptures. There’s a clinical way of talking about this as a therapeutic rupture. If it’s something has occurred between a client and a therapist that gets in the way of, uh, of positive feeling trustworthy relationship that is the prerequisite for good therapy or growth work to be able to happen.

So we’re going to jump right into this and I hope you have a lot of insight and clarity that helps you navigate your relationship with your therapist successfully so that it’s a really positive experience for you.

Three, two, one.

So the first thing that we need to talk about, this is thing number one, is that therapists will often engage in boundary setting that can seem really strange or off putting to those not familiar with a therapeutic process or the ethical codes that therapists are mandated to live by, particularly if your therapist hasn’t explained this to you in advance.

So these practices, these different kinds of relational boundaries are designed to maintain a professional and effective therapeutic relationship. But it’s really easy to misunderstand this because they are so different than what we typically experience in normal relationships with other humans. And so one of them that might surprise you.

you is that a therapist will typically not hug you or engage in any kind of physical contact with you unless you initiate it. So, um, this is because physical touch can sometimes blur the lines of a therapeutic relationship, um, and it may be triggering for some clients. If there’s a trauma history, if there’s a history of sexual assault, assault, or having been abused by people in authority, a hug, innocent, well intentioned hug can make people feel extremely unsafe.

And so therapists will typically avoid this in order to ensure a safe and neutral place. They might not even shake your hand. unless you initiate it. Now, it’s always, you’re free to do this. If you want a hug for your therapist, bring it on in and, you know, they’ll be able to talk to you about it if it’s a problem for them.

And, you know, I will also say that there is some variability. I personally had a clinical supervisor when I was working on my licensure, um, towards my P, uh, my, uh, licensed psychologist, uh, certificate. Three, two, one. I once engaged with a clinical supervisor when I was working on my licensure as a psychologist.

I met with him in person. He was an older guy and he was very much like a 70s style, like experiential fuzzy therapist. And after every single supervision session, he would always initiate a hug with me. I didn’t really like that. I didn’t really feel like hugging him, but I felt like I had to. So there we were.

Um, but he was a nice man, well intentioned, there wasn’t anything going on. But again, like there was a power differential there and he was my clinical supervisor and he was going to have to sign off on my paperwork. So I didn’t say, I I don’t want to hug you. I just, I did it. But like that would be a great example of why therapists, I think in a more modern era have been trained and coached to not initiate that.

So anyway, just know that, um, if you’re expecting a hug or if it’s been a hard session or if you would like physical comfort and your therapist isn’t offering that, don’t take it personally. It’s It’s what we do. So just know that.

Another weird boundary thing is not talking to you in public very intentionally. So like if I, as a therapist, see my client out in public, I will not initiate a conversation. I will not acknowledge their presence. Unless they do it first. If somebody walks up to me and is like, Hey Alisa, what’s up? I’ll totally talk to them, you know.

Um, and it’s fine. And I’m, I’m happy to do that. But I would never initiate that. And I’ve been in situations where I’ve not just seen client, but like a client, but like had eye contact with somebody in the grocery store and just kept on walking. Which it feels weird. It feels weird for me because my name I’m a friendly person.

I want to talk to people, right? And it probably felt weird for them, too. But you have to understand this is to protect the client’s privacy and confidentiality. And I have to assume that they might not want anybody else to know that they’re in therapy. Um, if they witness somebody witnesses me talking to some of them and they know who I am or what I do, they might, you know, make an assumption that, oh, this is one of Lisa’s clients, or I mean, there can be so many things.

So just know that. And if you’ve had that experience where a therapist has not talked to you out in public, and it has hurt your feelings or made you think that your therapist is doesn’t like you or damage to the relationship somehow. Just know that that is also part of what we do. And the intention there is to be protective, to protect you.

So, um, just put, put that in the hopper. Okay.

Another thing that you can typically expect from therapists that is probably going to feel weird and maybe even frustrating, is that a traditionally trained, insight oriented, person centered talk therapist will not make the first move in conversations, and they will also not direct the conversation on their own.

or your therapy session. They will allow you to steer the conversation, talk about whatever you want to talk about, not have a defined goal or topic or outcome in mind. And this practice is rooted in therapeutic modalities that are of the belief that therapy is fully client centered, meaning that you as the client should be dictating the pace, the direction, talking about what you want to talk about, not talking about what you don’t want to talk about.

And the idea behind it is that this kind of non directive stance empowers you as a client. as the client to be fully responsible for what happens in therapy and also ensures that the therapist is not imposing their own agenda on you, which is really, really important because this is your work, not their work.

I will tell you that there is a very, um, Real split between a therapist with this kind of orientation. So non directive insight oriented talk therapy that is really waiting for you to decide and you to broach topics and you to like, talk about certain things. And the, the mentality here is that as you just kind of talk through stuff and free associate, you will come to your own conclusions, you will gain insight, you will figure things out.

And then, you know, that process will change you. And there is a place for this. This is very gentle. It is very safe feeling. Um, and especially people that have had this experience. serious things happen in their lives or who have had very, very unsafe relationships with other humans. This can be a very healing experience.

It’s just the, the relationship itself, the opportunity to talk about whatever you want to talk about can be extremely positive. And so I do not want to denigrate that at all. And one of the reasons why I personally, uh, moved away from, um, Operating as a therapist and shifted my career path towards coaching rather than therapy is because I was often working with clients who did not want or need that.

They were coming to me because they were having problems. Problems that they wish to solve, or they were feeling frustrated because they were struggling to get outcomes in different areas of their life. They weren’t able to get better results with their relationships. The relationships were struggling and they didn’t know why, um, they weren’t able to move past a breakup or a divorce.

They really wanted to grow and attain different outcomes, either personally and their careers and therapy, particularly Particularly that insight oriented, non directive talk therapy is not for that. The growth and goals is the realm of coaching. Therapy is about insight, coaching is about getting outcomes, and I like outcomes.

I want outcomes in my own life. My clients wanted outcomes, and so when I was just trying to operate as a therapist, my clients were getting frustrated with me, because they’re like, So what do we do with this? And as a therapist, I have to say, I don’t know, what do you think you should do with this?

Because that is what therapists do, right? But as a coach, it’s, it’s totally different. I mean, imagine going to like a, a golf coach or something. Like you are trusting that person to say, when you stick your arm out like that, the ball’s going to go to the left. So try to do it this way next time. And it’s going to go in a straight line.

You’re like, cool, thanks. I didn’t know that. Let me try that. That’s what a coach will do. If you do this in your relationship, it’s not going to end well. Try this instead and see how it goes. Okay. So that’s, that’s definitely like a, um, different way of being. But if you are in a relationship with a therapist who is not steering the conversation, who is not giving you feedback, who is not, you know, trying to get you to talk about particular things, and it does feel very passive, it is because they want you to drive.

And that might actually be a A really cool and healing thing for you to do that experience of what do I want to talk about? What is important to me? If I am not trying to please anybody else, you know, what would I explore? What do I feel ready to talk about X, Y, Z? And so, you know, look for that if you want to have that experience.

And if you are in a relationship with a therapist where they’re doing that and just frustrating you to smithereens, that might be a sign that you would get better results. By working with a coach instead, pro tip, look for a therapist who is a certified coach. That way they have the background, the expertise, the skills, the experience.

They’re a trustworthy growth partner because there is zero certification credentialing or training required for anybody to call themselves a coach, literally. Anybody can call themselves a coach. You could be a coach five minutes later, you know, like flip through a Tony Robbins book. You’re like, cool.

I’m a coach. Make a website, start taking clients. It’s, it’s actually like nobody’s going to stop you from doing that. But that’s why you need to be really cautious about who you get involved with as a coach because buyer beware. So look for a therapist who is also a certified coach. And maybe when you meet with them, you know, they may have different ways of operating.

They’re like, I could serve you as a therapist and here’s what that looks like. Or if you are interested in coaching, here’s what that relationship would look like. And so then you can decide for yourself what approach would be best for you. So, but just know that, um, you know, that’s, that’s a therapist thing.

Okay. Another thing that you can expect from a therapist that might seem a little weird.

Another thing that therapists do that may seem very weird and can often be frustrating, completely honestly, so in addition to having a passive orientation that’s waiting for you to drive, A honestly ethical therapist is not going to give you direct advice or tell you what to do, particularly around any kind of major life decision.

Like, should I leave my husband? What career should I pursue? You know, like, Should I have a baby? All of these, a therapist would never tell you what the right answer is. Rather than giving you direct advice, what therapists will do is, is guide you to explore your own thoughts, your own feelings, your own options, with the goal being that you will develop your own insights and problem solving abilities, rather than relying on.

on a therapist or anyone else for that matter, um, to, to help you make decisions because you should never substitute anyone’s judgment for your own judgment. And so, um, just expect that. And sometimes I think that that’s what people want from a therapist. Like you’re going to tell them the problem and then they’re going to tell you the answer and then you’re going to go do the thing and right.

And that is not how it works. works. And so a good therapist is going to guide you through an experience of making contact with the right answer for you so that you get clarity, you get direction, you feel confident in your own decision and can can move forward. And I will also just share, a good coach will be doing exactly the same thing.

A coach won’t tell you exactly what to do either. They will offer recommendations, like process recommendations, like you might consider experimenting with trying it this way. way. Let’s see what happens and let me know how that goes. But how do you feel about doing that? It is never a directive. And particularly when it comes to like, what should I do with my life kinds of questions or major life decisions, they are here to help you get clarity and then take that clarity, values based clarity, and then create an action plan to help you attain your outcome that is defined by you, not me.

Them, not ever them.

Three, two, one.

Possibly one of the weirdest things that we therapists do is holding of long, awkward silences. Therapists do this, coaches do it too, but intentionally allowing silences to linger. This is actually a counseling skill that we are trained to do because these moments are opportunities for you as a client to reflect maybe on what you just said.

process some emotions or bring up something important that you might not have shared otherwise. And so while these uncomfortable, sometimes silences can feel kind of weird in the moment, um, they are intended to be productive because they, They take things deeper and they also invite you to step in to that space rather than a coach kind of jumping in and, you know, now we’re talking about something else that may have derailed a trajectory that was very important to you.

So just know that this is part of the experience. We’re not being weird or strange on purpose, but this is actually a tool that we use to help deepen your experience and help. push you back into contact with yourself. We take up less space so that you can then take up more space, but you have to come towards us.

Counselors are receptive. That is how this works. And yes, we do also do this. So. socially with each other. I have been out to coffee with a group of shrinks. And if I was with anybody else, you know, somebody would have said something and somebody said, Oh, me too. Yeah. Let me tell you about this time where no, if you do that with a bunch of therapists hanging out, somebody will say something and others around the table will like nod and like hold the silence.

And so yeah that we have to step in. So party tricks of a shrink, right? We’re we’re a lot of fun.

Something that could potentially hurt your feelings if you’re not prepared for this is that your ethical therapist will not follow you on social media and will not accept friend requests on social media unless They have a dedicated, like, therapist, business, social media account. So, like, I have a professional social media account, and I have LinkedIn and all this stuff, and I’m happy to connect with anybody on LinkedIn, because we’re talking about, you know, professional, appropriate things, and I think it can be a helpful way to stay connected with clients.

They’re like, oh, Lisa has a new podcast now. I’m going to check it out. Like, that’s all fine. But I, I do have personal, private social media accounts that somebody could theoretically and, and has in the past tracked me down and, and requested, um, you know, to connect there. And, and I, I ignore those requests and, and we’ll maybe even bring it up in another conversation like, I noticed you’re trying to get in touch with me.

Here’s the account actually, to do that in an appropriate way because. Um, it is inappropriate for therapists in any dimension to be revealing too much personal information about themselves and about their lives. And additionally, a therapist will not follow you on social media in order to maintain ethical boundaries around your life.

Because you get to decide what you want to tell your therapist about, what you want to talk about. Um, And if, you know, your therapist doesn’t need to know that you went on vacation or had this life experience, unless, unless you tell us that in a session, like, whatever we know about you is on a need to know basis.

Um, but so just understand what’s going on behind that, and it, it, it is rooted in evidence. ethics. And you know, thinking being that social media interactions can really complicate a therapeutic relationship, may compromise confidentiality, and also objectivity that are needed in therapy and can blur the boundaries.

You know, if you’re, if you’re liking pictures of my family sitting around the table at Thanksgiving dinner and, you know, like making comments about, Oh, your dad, he’s in such great shape. I bet you had the best time with him. Like that is too much information for a client to have about me because it can disrupt, it can disrupt the client’s day.

process. So social media is one, but this is actually goes into another domain of therapist weirdness that should be on your radar.

Three, two, one.

And this is that therapists will not and should not reveal personal information or their own anecdotes or their own stories about their life, um, except on an exceptionally rare basis and only if it is very, very much in alignment with what you as a client are really genuinely needing. And it’s. It’s very rare.

I almost never share personal stories with my clients. It is not appropriate. It derails their process. It wastes their time. And this is not the Lisa show. Yeah, I’m taking up all the space here on the podcast and I talk a lot. That’s fine. That’s my job here in this realm. But like, when I’m with a client, you know, 99 percent of the time, they should be talking, not me.

Right. And so, um, this is really important, because we therapists, we are trained to focus on your experience, not Our experience. And so again, every once in a while sharing something personal, if it benefits the client, typically around normalizing the experience, right? Because sometimes you might be thinking, Oh, it’s wrong with me that I feel this way.

You know, I’m going through such a hard time. I think that it can be validating and helpful for somebody to hear a therapist. You might seem like they have it together. Be like, you know what? Um, I’ve been in that place before too, and I get how hard it is, right? But like, that’s also where it stops. They don’t go into like five paragraphs of story around like, this one time that my mom made this comment to me, I cried for days.

You know, like, we don’t need to go there as therapists because when we’re avoiding self disclosure, it keeps the focus on your needs. And, and we’re, we’re not, you know, your friends, it’s not, it’s not a reciprocal relationship and it shouldn’t be a reciprocal relationship. Additionally, and this is also related to that social media piece, I think that there is some.

Evolution of this, but there is a very important principle that is experiential when it comes to powerful therapy or coaching. And that is based on this idea of projection, um, and transference back in the old days where psychoanalysis This was how most therapy was conducted. A psychoanalyst, an old school psychoanalyst, like in the 40s or in the 50s, would actually sit in a chair behind a client so a client couldn’t even see the therapist.

Therapist wouldn’t even say a word most of the time. A client would just free associate. And then, like, walk out the door and do that four times a week. There was almost no human interaction. And the idea behind this is that it is actually a tool. Whatever you think about your therapist, their personality, their intentions, How your therapist feels about you, you know, what your therapist needs from you.

My therapist is mad at me, my therapist hates me, my therapist loves me, like whatever it is. Um, when you don’t have a lot of information about the other person, which you shouldn’t, it is all coming from inside of you. And you are projecting your, um, core beliefs and oftentimes your relational patterns on this blank screen.

That is a therapist that you don’t know a whole lot about personally. And so the more personal information you have about your therapist, it, uh, it obscures that things start getting, showing up on the screen that gets in the way of both you and your therapist to see what is actually a projection that’s coming from inside of you.

And then additionally, knowing too much about your therapist can create boundaries. So for example, going back to that social media idea, if you were my client and you see a picture of me hanging out with my dad, you know, having a good time and you are in a place where you had a very toxic, destructive, damaging relationship with your father where there were like a lot of trauma attached to that and you need to do that work.

Seeing me with my dad having a good time might make you feel inhibited or like I couldn’t possibly understand or have empathy for your experience. So it shuts you down or, or makes you feel like, should I be talking about this? Is this okay? Like all of a sudden there’s like, obstacles. Whereas if you didn’t know anything about me and my dad, um, blank slate, blank screen, you would hop in and be like, let me tell you how much I hate this man.

I’m like, cool, let’s go do that. Right. So there, there needs to be that distance and it is not your therapist being unfriendly or not comfortable. caring about you, and under other circumstances, maybe your therapist would love to be friends with you. I mean, I’ve had so many clients who were just so delightful and thought, you know, if I wasn’t their therapist, we would be fantastic friends.

Of course, I would never say that because that would be weird. But you know, and I care about my clients very much. I mean, there are real relationships there, but they need to be professional relationships and in order for them to be effective professional relationships. There need to be a lot of boundaries and a lot of distance and a lot of, you know, privacy and things that are not known for your benefit.

So I just wanted to say that out loud so that you don’t feel hurt by it. If your client isn’t like telling you all about their weekend or sharing their personal stories, um, it is for you. But also. It can be a warning sign if you are in a relationship with a therapist who does talk about themselves a lot.

Um, that can be a concerning sign and I do say this as a clinical supervisor. So someone who is responsible for training ethical, competent therapists. It’s like, if I found out that one of my supervisees was showing up in that way with a client, that would be a major red flag for me that I as a clinical supervisor would need to address and squash.

Like, what kinds of personal needs are you trying to get met in your relationship with your client that is leading you to behave in these really inappropriate ways? This is not a friendship. It is not respect. In a friendship, there’s an even exchange of stories and anecdotes on both sides, and this is not that.

So, um, you know, just think about that if, if you’re with a therapist who does a lot of that. Be thinking about, does this feel like it is for me? Is it for my benefit? Am I getting something out of this? Or do I need to bring this up? You are invited to share this podcast episode with your therapist or direct them over to Love, Happiness Success for Therapists because we get real over there too.

So, anyway, just know that. Okay, so let’s talk about another thing that may be weird and frustrating when it happens in your therapeutic relationship.

And that is that, especially in couples counseling or marriage counseling, your ethical marriage or family therapist will not tell you. Take sides. Even in situations where you might expect support, they are neutral. We are neutral. And I will tell you, as a marriage counselor, if you and your partner are coming to me for marriage counseling, couples therapy, relationship coaching, you are not my client.

Your relationship with each other is my client. Your partner is also not my client. Like my job is really to take a look at the space in between you and the health of the relationship itself and help you both identify what you’re each doing or not doing that is either supporting the health of that relationship or, or damaging it, quite frankly.

And so to move parts around society. Systemically for the good of the whole is what marriage and family therapists do and so that might feel frustrating Sometimes you might come in And share a situation that felt super hurtful about something that happened in your relationship And your partner is sitting there on the couch like feel, you know Yes that happened and might expect me as a marriage counselor to be like how could you you know?

And that is just not what What we do, and that is not what we are going to do. Um, and so the goal again is how do we change the relationship itself so that the wound is healed by your partner, not by me, right? Cause I’m not married to you. So what do I need to do to help that heal, but also help the system change so that that is unlikely to happen again.

I will also tell you three, two, one. Um,

just very, very directly. It is never okay for you to have a relationship with an individual therapist or coach that you’ve been seeing for a while. They are your person, you are telling them, you know, all kinds of things about yourself and your life and your history and how you feel about your partner and then have that Turn into couples counseling with said partner.

That is not okay. As a clinical supervisor of marriage and family therapists, I would go through the roof if one of my supervisees was doing that, because it immediately does. a few horrible things. It creates a dual relationship. Now you have an individual therapy relationship and a couple’s therapist relationship, which are two separate relationships.

Dual relationships are absolutely prohibited. Additionally, what does that do to confidentiality? Things that you have told that therapist and confidence. It’s like thinking that they would remain confidential. Now they, as a couple’s counselor, know all of these things about you that are salient to the relationship, but they need to maintain your confidentiality as an individual client with now your partner in the room.

So not okay. And then it will immediately and automatically. Set couples counseling up for failure. If you have an existing relationship with a therapist and then invite your partner in, you know, your therapist is going to be team. You, you have a relationship. There is an alliance that has been built and then to have this third person come and they oftentimes feel blamed.

They feel criticized. They feel like. The therapist is on your side instead of theirs and justifiably so, right? And that creates a situation. Where couples counseling will never be productive. It will probably be a very negative experience for your partner. So at best a waste of time and money, but it is highly unethical and this is a sign that if this does happen or if an individual therapist has invited you to do this with them, it is a sign that you have connected with an individual therapist who does not have the necessary background, education, expertise, training, competence to serve you as a couple’s counselor, an ethical marriage and family therapist who does have all that specialized training and experience would never ever do this.

An individual therapist who hasn’t had that training may not fully understand. how bad this is through the eyes of a marriage and family therapist, but it is a demonstration of their lack of competence to serve you in this role. So be very, very cautious. Or you could even say Well meaning, I understand, but I know that you’ve been trained for the diagnosis and treatment of mental health conditions.

You’re a clinical mental health specialist. I really need a relationship expert. I was listening to this podcast. They were talking about some of the differences. Let me send this to you. You might check out love happiness and success for therapists. as well, because, you know, your therapist may have some legitimate growth work to do in that area through no fault of their own.

It’s just they went through, they went through a training program that wasn’t designed to help them know how to help people with marriage and family therapy. So that’s what it means. But you know, that is also not the person that you want to go to when your relationship is in crisis. So again, just keep that in mind.

Okay, but that could be another weird thing that your therapist would do that might surprise you and they should be saying that out loud. Like, I’ve had lots of individual clients say, this has been so helpful to me, can we start doing this with my husband because I think you would really benefit from this?

And I say, would love to and no, I am your individual therapist only. I am not their individual therapist. I can’t do couples counseling with you, but I can give you a referral to somebody. Great. And if you would like me to consult about What’s happening with you guys and couples counseling so that we can use that for the benefit of our individual work.

I’m happy to do that, but we need to have consent forms signed on both sides because confidentiality is iron clad more on this in a minute.

One last word on neutrality before we move on is that neutrality is fundamentally important when it comes to any relational work, obviously, but the experience of neutrality is also very, very important for you to have in individual therapy or individual coaching. And so what I mean by neutrality is that your therapist’s opinions.

Preferences, um, judgments, cultural norms, societal. Socio economic, whatever lens their worldview should have zero airtime or impact on anything related to do for you. So your therapist needs to be totally open to exactly who you are, what you are, what what you want, even if it is out of alignment with their personal values or belief systems, which have no, nothing to do with your work.

Your therapist needs to be keeping that totally out of it. And that comes to their religious beliefs, their, um, you know, their, their preferences, their definition of healthy relationships, even sometimes, right? This neutrality is super crucial for helping you explore your different perspectives and find your own solutions and your own truth without feeling judged or pushed in a certain direction.

Three, two, one. Without you feeling judged. I’m going to back up again. Three, two, one. This neutrality is absolutely crucial for helping you feel comfortable in exploring different perspectives and finding your own solutions and your own truth without feeling judged or criticized or looked down on or Or pushed in a certain direction, um, a culturally competent therapist needs to do a lot of work.

And certainly when, when working with people who might be coming from very different walks of life than, than we do as a therapist, like there’s even more sensitivity, but literally with anyone, you know, the assumption is that your belief system, your political, You know, worldview, your preferences, the way you want to run your life, your personal values, the kind of person that you want to be are entirely yours to define.

A counselor never imposes their ideas on you. Our job is to seek to understand you. It is to be receptive and help you articulate and clarify yourself so that we understand you, but also through that experience, you come to understand yourself better. You get clarity around what your values are, what is important to you, why that is, and you have a lot of space to do that and feel like it is unconditionally okay to take that in literally every direction.

any direction. And if you feel that that isn’t okay with your counselor or coach, you should be talking about that openly. They may be unconsciously projecting some of their stuff on you or not realizing how they come across. I mean, we are human too. We do have our own preferences and values and belief systems.

And there might be a way of life or lifestyle, a way of being that you’re choosing for yourself that we would never choose for ourselves. But that can’t That can’t, um, we need to, like, contain that so that it’s all about you and in an authentic way, and that is a professional development skill that therapists need to work on.

Um, therapists have a, a, trajectory of growth that they need to go through. So that’s part of my job. Again, as a clinical supervisor, as a counselor educator, as a coach trainer, that’s what I help therapists do. Uh, it may be that your therapist has some work to do there, but it’s really important that you provide that feedback.

Like, I feel like what I’m saying right now is upsetting to you or maybe out of alignment with your value system. Um, it does, does this still feel okay. Um, you know, it could, it could be that if a therapist is bumping up against the limits of what they can tolerate to the degree that they are unable to be a trustworthy or helpful growth partner for you, they It is their responsibility to, to see that and then to provide a referral to help you get connected with somebody who can do the work that you need to do and that you deserve to do.

So, uh, okay to broach that if your therapist isn’t. But if you ever feel judged, criticized, blamed, put down, especially for things that are nobody else’s business, like your belief system, your politics, et cetera, um, get a second opinion. Three, two, one.

Another kind of weird thing that can happen with therapist boundaries are around things like sessions limits, like the time that they end. Also things like between session contact and some other things as well. So, for example, therapy sessions usually have very strict start and end times. Like If you are late for a session, your therapy session is probably going to end at the same time that it would have anyway.

And also, even if you’re digging into like, you know, real things, you’re feeling feelings towards the end of a therapy session, first of all, a competent therapist will help you wrap some of that back up again before they send you home. send you out the door, but your session will still end on time. And, um, this can feel impersonal.

You might wish you had a little bit more time that you might have the luck to connect with a therapist like me, who isn’t the greatest at time management skills, so we can sometimes run a little bit over, but in like a healthy way. But, um, It is important to not take that personally. If your therapist is setting strong boundaries around their time.

And we do that for a few reasons. It’s to make sure that it’s being managed fairly among all clients. Also making sure that each session is focused and effective. Like if I know that I only have 45 minutes, we’re going to make it count. Additionally, I think that it can feel so good. safe and comforting to have somebody be that kind of authority figure that can set and maintain boundaries can feel good for people.

Even if it feels kind of like, Oh, you know, there’s still like a level of respect that comes with that. But additionally, part of what’s going on is that many times as a therapist, you know, seeing clients back to back all day long and to have a session where we have 15 or even 10 minutes in between to be able to do case notes, to drink some water, to use the bathroom, like, You know, we are human and to maintain those those professional boundaries is also how we’re maintaining personal boundaries so that we can can do this.

Right. And so again, just to give you some visibility into what’s going on behind the scenes there and understanding that, um, you know, it’s just something that you can expect. It is what we do and to not, you know, turn it into something that makes you feel bad or turn into a narrative of my therapist doesn’t like me or doesn’t care about me or if they did care about me, they would spend more time with me on days that I’m feeling like particularly upset because that could actually be a projection like we talked about.

So if you have been feeling this way, broach that broach that with your therapist who then could use it to say. Yeah. You know, we’ve talked a lot about how you felt like your parents never spent enough time with you and they were always too busy to really see you and hear you. And I wonder if some of those old feelings are coming up in our relationship too, then you could say.

Yes! And then we hand you the Kleenex. Oh, actually, no, that’s another thing that therapists do that is also weird, and we are actually trained to do this. This might shock you. A therapist typically will not hand you the tissue. There is a tissue box on the end table, and you are free to take a tissue, but a therapist will not get up, stand up, grab the tissue, and give it to you when you are crying.

You have to get it yourself. This is the weirdest thing, but this is like something we are coached to do because a subtle yet powerful subconscious message is like when somebody hands you the tissue, the message is Pull it together. Okay, that’s enough. Clyde’s crying. No, a good therapist is like, Yeah, go all the way in.

Cry as much as you want. I’m here for it. Snot, mascara, all the things. Like, I am down with this. Your therapist is here for the dark emotions and you don’t have to be. contain them or stop them. We might, you know, push you deeper into them gently and hopefully appropriately. That’s part of the role. But the handing of the tissue is sort of the subtle, like shut it down and a good therapist won’t do that.

So just, just know that.

Three, two, one.

Another thing you can expect from a really good ethical therapist is that they are, sooner or later, going to try to end their relationship with you. Which might sound weird, but an ethical therapist is always trying to help you. thinking about where you are in the process and whether or not you are continuing to benefit from their work with you.

And a good coach will do this too. So once you have achieved your goals in coaching, or if you have achieved your treatment goals in therapy, and you know, now you’re just kind of coming in and talking about what’s going on. I mean, you know, yeah, we can do that. Um, yeah. But I think a really ethical therapist will say, you know what?

I feel like we did what you came here to do. You’re not really anxious or depressed anymore, or if it’s coaching, your relationship is so much better, or you are killing it in your career. You are making things happen for yourself. I’m so impressed with what you’ve been done and, you know, are these sessions still valuable for you and, you know, you know, as a client might be like, well, you know, I really enjoy having the space to process things and it could be that having like a maintenance type relationship with a therapist could be part of your self care, like once a month, once a quarter, but a really ethical, good therapist will be like, well, what if we turn our attention to helping you cultivate more emotionally intimate and supportive relationships with other people in your life?

Because I’m not your friend. Right. And to say that in a loving way, but like. Do you have friends that you can really go deep with, or can you have emotionally intimate conversations with your, your partner? Because, you know, you, you should have at least one or two people in your life that you can be really vulnerable with.

And if the only person that you can do this with is your therapist, the only emotionally safe relationship is with your therapist, like that, that’s a sign that there’s something to work on. Or, um, you know, your therapist also has an obligation to say, I don’t want to create dependence in you, on me. Right?

Like, The goal of therapy and of coaching is to come in, get benefit from it, and then close the door and allow you to go on with your life. You can always come back if there’s other stuff that you want to work on, or if, you know, you have another round of depression, or maybe if you have new goals that I can help you attain as a coach.

But just that kind of, like, ongoing, like, so, what’s going on with these days? How’s work? You know, like, maybe. That’s, that’s not, I don’t know, I, I, that needs to be more purposeful than that. So, anyway, expect an ethical therapist to be talking about that. See, like, does it make sense for us to schedule more sessions?

And interpret that as a sign of their love for you, their care for you, their loyalty to you, and their desire to really do right by you. As opposed to continuing to maintain that relationship with you when they know that it may no longer really be productive and that somebody needs to be courageous enough to say that.

So we’re going to reframe that as a positive thing. So if you’ve had a therapist say that to you and if it’s hurt your feelings or if you’ve been like, Oh, they don’t like me or was it something I said, you know, no, that’s, that’s part of what we need to do. It is for you and it’s, it’s a good thing. It’s a good thing.

Yet another weird thing that therapists do or don’t do is that therapists will typically not call you or reach out to you between sessions to check on you or how you doing unless it is either an emergency, meaning like they are literally afraid for your life or somebody else’s life, or if it’s part of an agreed upon plan that you have.

Therapy and coaching is all about mobilizing your empowerment and trusting that you will tell us what you need, that you will take the initiative to contact me If you want to talk to me or if you want or need my support, you will schedule an appointment. This fosters and builds a sense of agency and personal responsibility in you and also protects you from having unwanted outreach from a therapist that you might not wish to have a relationship with any longer.

So, as a therapist, I need to, if I haven’t heard from somebody in a while, and we don’t have any sessions scheduled, I need to get in touch to say, we don’t have any sessions. Would you like to continue working with me? If so, let’s get something on the books. If I don’t hear back from you by Friday, I’ll assume that you’re no longer in need of my services or referrals, but get back in touch with me in the future, like, and then I need to close that file.

A therapist cannot have an open ended client that they’re not really seeing, that doesn’t have any sessions. scheduled. Um, that is them not operating in an ethical way. It is a liability issue for a therapist. So there needs to be a termination of the therapeutic relationship or documentation of the fact that we’ve both agreed that we’re not going to schedule sessions anymore or documentation of the fact that I have reached out to you once to see if you want to schedule another appointment.

Never heard back. So I’m closing this file. You either need to be on. With a therapist, meaning that we have ongoing appointments scheduled or you are off and they will close your file. And so a therapist may reach out to you to check in about that, but don’t be surprised or hurt if, you know, your, your grandmother died or you’re going through a challenging time at work and like maybe you talked about that in your therapy session on Monday and really poured your heart out and then you, you don’t hear from your therapist until you see it.

See them in your session the following Monday, because your friend totally would’ve called you, be like, Hey, I’ve been thinking about you. How you doing? Hanging in there. And I totally do that all the time as a friend. I don’t do that with my therapy clients again unless I am concerned that they might be suicidal.

Or homicidal, then I need to check it. But outside of that, we’re going to leave you alone and trust that if you need to talk to us, you’re going to get in touch. And it’s also okay to update therapists. I have clients who reach out to me and who update me with different things from time to time, and that’s great, but I’m not going to initiate that.

Lastly, another thing you should know about therapists is that we don’t typically provide immediate responses to emails or messages. If you call the therapist or email a therapist, you can expect it’s going to be 24 to 48 hours before you hear back from them in absence of a response. Uh, a crisis. And if you are in a situation where you may be having a mental health crisis, they should be providing you with like an immediate support system, like a crisis hotline that you can call.

Um, And so the reason why therapists are often slow to respond is that it maintains the structure of therapy and ensures that we are focused and doing the work in our sessions. It doesn’t sort of bleed over into these interactions like between sessions. That is, um, less productive, less focused, less structured, not documented, right?

So this is part of what we need to do. And so when you’re communicating with a therapist outside of sessions, it’s typically like, Can I get in on Wednesday? Here’s a quick update of what’s going on. Here’s what I want to talk about. Great. You know, like confirming appointment times, that type of thing.

Okay. So we’re almost at the end. There are so many weird things that therapists do aren’t there, but here’s yet another great tip.

A therapist will almost never attend any personal events or celebrations, like a wedding, a birthday party, a graduation. There are rare instances where a therapist may be involved, like if you’ve been in a treatment program that perhaps they were involved in and you’re graduating from that, they may show up to support you in that professional capacity.

But if you invite them to anything personal, they will decline that invitation. Invitation, even if a strong therapeutic relationship has been built and they may even take that further. I personally have declined wedding invitations from personal friends that I happen to know Um, our personal friends with people that I have seen as a therapist.

And so I know that these former therapy clients would be in attendance or current therapy clients in attendance at a wedding. I send a nice gift. So again, there’s a lot of really firm professional boundaries to avoid dual relationships. And things that can complicate the therapeutic relationship and they are for your benefit, but they can feel hurtful if you don’t know why therapists do that.

Particularly if it’s something like, you know, a funeral. I mean, there could be times that you would really like to have your therapist involved. And if they decline to show up IRL, as the kids say, it can create some feelings. So, um, just know. That that’s something that therapists have boundaries around, but also talk to your therapist about those feelings in your next session so that it doesn’t metastasize and turn into something that ruptures your relationship.

I have so many more weird things that therapists do, but in the interest of time, I’m going to condense to just talk really briefly about a couple of other things that you can expect from therapists. A therapist, an ethical therapist, will have environmental boundaries, meaning that they’re not going to meet you out in public to have therapy sessions, unless it’s a very specific activity based form of therapy.

Walk and talk therapy is a thing, particularly with kids and adolescents, um, therapy involving horseback riding. back riding or like caring for animals. There can be kind of an environmental component. So that kind of thing happens, but it is still structured, you know, in advance what you’re getting into and it’s not meeting up at a coffee shop.

So just know that, or if like you, you’re wanting to do that and your therapist is saying, no, that is not is why. Um, and then two other things that are super important. A therapist, an ethical therapist will never have a dual relationship with you. We talked about one manifestation of that. They will never be your individual therapist and your marriage counselor.

They won’t do that. Additionally, they won’t engage in any other kind of dual relationship with you. They won’t go into business with you. They won’t, um, you. you know, uh, hire you as a babysitter. They won’t, uh, engage in other ways that are outside of the boundaries of the professional therapeutic relationship.

And certainly not, you know, any kind of romantic relationship. If there’s anything that is even whiffs of that, you get out of there fast, right? But, um, that your relationship is very clearly defined so that it is trustworthy, it is secure, and that you know what to expect. And then very lastly, going back to confidentiality, we talked about this a little bit in the beginning, but a weird, weird thing that therapists will do is that they will be like Lock down black boxes about anything relating to you and your confidential information.

And this can be frustrating, like if you have a kid that’s in therapy or coaching, like, um, that can be a little bit different because different types of consent paperwork may have been signed at the outset. But aside from that, and expecting Explicit permission, a therapist will never discuss anything about you and will never discuss your case with anyone.

I can’t confirm or deny that I’ve ever had a relationship with anybody ever, like total black box right here, including a therapist. Other therapists. So even on my team growing self, like if I had an individual therapy, a client that was then going into couples counseling with one of my colleagues, there is zero back and forth at all unless we have paperwork signed and there is explicit permission given.

And if it’s a couple’s counseling situation, that permission needs to be given from both partners in a couple in order for that, that marriage counselor to disclose any information about what was going on in couples counseling. And this confidentiality is so important. super important. I mean therapists just do not share any information with clients or anybody else or colleagues unless we have that.

The only exceptions to this rule are situations where there is an immediate risk of like life threatening harm. Suicide, Homicide, child abuse or neglect, and that’s it, basically. And this strict confidentiality ensures that your privacy is respected, that you feel safe sharing openly in therapy, and that you do not have to worry about anything that you tell me or another therapist, um, you know, being, being disclosed.

So that is part of the deal. Um, but, you know, if that isn’t happening or if you Are curious or, you know, if your therapist is consulting with a former therapist or something without your consent like that is that is a red flag. Um, So, this has been a lot. I’m going to go ahead and end, even though there are more things that I could talk about here, but I so hope that this episode has been helpful for you in like just demystifying the weird things that therapists do so that you know what’s normal and And, you know, not taking things personally or getting your feelings hurt, but also that you get some visibility into maybe like what is not normal if you’re in a relationship with a therapist who is doing some of the things or is not doing some of the things that I was describing as like, you know, things that ethical therapists should be operating.

You know, just just to get visibility into that because unfortunately in the last decade or so there’s been a proliferation of online counseling schools that churn out therapists who have degrees and they have Credentials, but that the actual training programs themselves are often not accredited and can be very variable in their quality And it can be kind of hit or miss with a therapist I If you would like even more, I did record another podcast episode a while back.

I think it was Signs That You Have a Bad Therapist that goes more into what unethical or unqualified therapists do look like so that you can check that out. Um, and if you’re still with me, thank you so much for spending this time. And Pay it forward. If you experienced benefit from these ideas, or if you’re like, Oh, I learned something important, or that’s why my therapist did that.

And there’s somebody else in your life who could also benefit from this information. You have a friend or family member who is in a relationship, maybe with a questionable person. Or you have a friend or family member who may have dropped out of therapy, uh, out of a relationship with a great therapist because they may be misinterpreted some of these things in a negative way when in fact the therapist was behaving very appropriately.

They just, they didn’t know. Um. Please share this podcast with them so that they can listen and learn and, and become educated on like what to look for in a therapist or how to manage a healthy relationship with a therapist so that they can benefit from this really important growth work that therapists do, that coaches do, and that, you know, we all know is so important.

So thanks so much for spending this time and I’ll be back in touch next week with another episode. Love, happiness and success.