A couple of weeks ago I reblogged a post by ‘Spacefreedomlove‘ called ‘Five things you always want to ask your therapist but are afraid to ask‘. This post, by Dr Gerald Stein, gives a therapist’s perspective on those questions and some answers. As Dr Stein notes, therapists are trained not to reveal too much of themselves – this is true of my own therapist, as it is of so many others. I therefore often find therapists’ blogs useful, as they give me more of a sense of what my own therapist might be thinking or feeling, or the approaches she might be using. Dr Stein has the advantage of being able to ‘reveal’ a little more of himself as he is retired from practice, and his blog is full of a vast array of interesting, thought provoking and humorous material!
Therapists sometimes reveal themselves despite their training not to. For example, in psychoanalytic treatment, Freud made himself a blank slate. He thought the patient’s troubles would become evident if he didn’t intrude upon the process. Remember, Freud sat behind the patient lying on the couch. Sigmund’s facial expressions and body language could not be observed. He said little, instead encouraging the analysand’s free association of thoughts. Then, if the client displayed positive or negative feelings about Herr Doktor Freud, the psychiatrist believed it due to underlying unresolved issues, usually about mom or dad. The heart of the problem having thus been uncovered, Dr. Freud could begin his “heart” surgery.
Still, patients wish to know “personal” things about the mysterious humanoid who treats them and will comment on the imbalance in unfolding that which is most intimate: the therapist gets to ask, the patient mostly does not. Spacefreedomlove, a provocative…
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Life in a Bind - BPD and me 
November 19, 2014 at 12:43 am
Many thanks for reblogging this.
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November 23, 2014 at 10:37 pm
My pleasure 🙂
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