| Avoid being victimized by therapists. Research the consequences of any therapy or therapy training before you start - especially if hypnosis, belief and personality change are used. Therapist-Client Codependence Client abuse can be subtle. If you like a coach, you may be motivated to return. If you are in love with a counselor, you may be unable to stay away. If you are obsessed with a therapist, you may do anything to prolong your meetings. Lonely people may want codependent relationships. Lonely counselors, coaches or therapists may, consciously or unconsciously, manipulate you. They may cheat you - or treat you as a substitute for a friend or a lover - and you pay for this blessing. They may justify abusive behavior with: "It was all for your benefit".
| British Counselling Association (BAC): Code of Ethics, 1998 |
Counsellors must not exploit heir clients financially, sexually, emotionally or in any other way. Suggesting or engaging in sexual activity with a client is unethical. |
Friendly Solutions Probably you talk to your friends and family about your problems. Friends provide simple quality control. If a therapist or counselor demands that you not share details of your sessions with friends and family, this may prevent or sabotage your opportunity for quality control. It is manipulation and abuse. Professional Solutions If you are a codependent practitioner, you may avoid getting help because you feel good. Instead of health, you move deeper into identity loss - you become obsessive, workaholic or initiate broken marriages. Finally you burn out and risk depression. If you have abused clients, we offer professional help or supervision. An experienced Soulwork coach can help you dissolve your conflicts, transferences, identity loss, relationship bonds and trauma. We have provided this service to many therapists, coaches and counselors. Codependent Coaching People may help you for their own benefit. They may want to recruit you into some religion, training, psycho-theology or cult. Instead of helping you become independent, they may coach you to become codependent or remain dependent. A bad therapy or coaching relationship can feel good.
| Feedback |
After two Soulwork sessions, I said goodbye to my therapist of four years. She helped me do so many little things that I came to depend on her. She was so nice to me ... I somehow didn't notice that I paid her over $25,000 just to be my Mom. BC, Canada |
Therapists and coaches who want children, or who have adult children who have left home, may attempt to become your substitute parent. But if a person's pleasure or sense of life depends on helping you, he or she may sabotage your health to prolong that pleasure. Some helping professionals pride themselves on their business acumen. They may generate income streams by selling you ineffective fixes or short-term cures for complex life problems. Some professionals give advice that causes worse consequences than your problems. An ill-advised abortion or divorce can have terrible consequences for you and your children. [ Evaluating Partnership . Divorce . Divorce & Children ] Few health professionals explore or even consider the relationship consequences of healing a sick person. The obvious goal of healing unpleasant symptoms may obscure the actions and reactions within a codependent or symbiotic family. See When Disease Makes Sense. Exit Coaching Exit Coaching helps people leave cult-like groups. Such groups often teach hypnosis or hypnotherapy, using coercive control to achieve the leader's goals. You may be unduly influenced by hypnosis and suggestion, and create toxic relationship bonds with the leader. Relationship bonds are often expressed as "I can't leave" or "I must stay". Your power of choice has been displaced. Some therapies abuse transference. If a therapist takes a role of parent (or guru) to you, this can create toxic relationship bonds. If you bond to a person, you may become abnormally compliant to that person's suggestions. Toxic relationship bonds can create chaos in your relationships. Why be a Therapist? Many therapists, counselors and coaches are specialists in their own biography. They may be evangelical about whatever modality or psycho-theology helped them sort out their lives. | Feedback | At school I really didn't know what to do ... My girlfriend took psychology so I did too ... Now I have high credentials in psychology and a practice with clients that I don't even like. ... but I need the money so I'm trapped. LA, California | Common motivations for becoming a therapist: - To resolve own relationship or mental health issues
- To learn an interesting but not demanding subject at university
- To gain power and self-respect
- To attract romantic or sexual partners
- To gain professional stature and accreditation
- To create stable income opportunities
- To join a community of helping professionals
- To create models and systems for human development
- To help people survive and deal with difficult life situations
Psychological literature show that clinical training programs may ignore abuse. Alpert (1990), for example, wrote that there is "relatively little formal education and training in child sexual abuse" (p. 324). Articles about formal training in abuse emphasize the lack of prior attention (Alpert & Paulson, 1990). Abusive Clients
& Abused Therapists Some helping professionals are manipulated by abusive clients. Professional victims may search for practitioners to deflate. They may want to proclaim to a therapist, and perhaps to the world "My problem is greater than your solutions!" Some clients are excellent hypnotists, and they can tell their story so well that they can hypnotize a practitioner into believing improbable tales. "Accept everything .... and believe nothing". | Feedback | I came to fear one client, and dreaded her appointments, but either pride or masochism stopped me canceling her sessions. She would storm at me, and criticize me for everything in her life. You helped me realize that I had bonded to her as a substitute for my critical mother. AN, New York | Consequences for Abusive Therapists Some people attend coach or therapist training, and then abuse the people they were trained to assist. Such people not only hurt their clients, they experience depression and sabotage their own happiness. Don’t give up on professional help, give up on incompetent professionals.
Research the evidence. Systemic coaching can help you find simple solutions to your complicated problems.
Do you want relationship coaching or systemic coach training? We can train you to coach individuals, partners and teams to resolve emotional and relationship challenges. | 
