Shades After page 82
Yeeeesh, remember that therapy is only as good as the therapist involved. Anyone else ever had their sexuality/gender explained away as a psychological issue?
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I had a psychiatrist actively sabotage my transition to male- ended up adding about 18 months to the wait for testosterone.
Counsellors, though, I have had FANTASTIC luck with. It inspired me to want to become one myself. I agree though- counselling only works if the counsellor works with you.
I’ve always wanted to ask — what is the difference between a counsellor and a therapist? I thought all this time I was going to therapy sessions that my school provided (limited number for each semester though) but it turned out they were considered more counselors than therapists.
I sort of thought if you went into a room and bawled for 50 minutes in front of a person who helped you break down why you’re feeling in such-and-such way and who gave you steps to help yourself out was what therapy was ._.
According to my counsellor-turned-therapist ( :D ), it’s the same thing, but counselling is typically a shorter-term thing, focusing on specific problems a person is currently struggling with, while therapy is longer-term and its purpose is to resolve long-standing “background” issues the person might not even be aware when they start seeing the counsellor/therapist, eg. harmful internalised beliefs that originate from earlier in life.
This, and also I believe a psychiatrist can prescribe medication whereas a therapist cannot. (Depends on the therapist and the level of their medical training of course).
Might be a cultural use of the terms, but here, counselling can be short or long term, depending on the goal. There are different types of counselling; one is much more short-term, the other long-term.
I have never heard the term “therapy” used to describe these counselling practices- but that may just be me.
Yeah its effectively just a language term. Psychologist and Psychiatrists are the specific things listed in the post below this.
A counselor and a therapist are effectively just the same thing that require the same education. Its mostly just a matter of terminology and choice of language.
A psychologist is someone who has a PhD or PsyD in Psychology. A psychiatrist is a medical doctor who has gone on to specialize in psychological disorders. A counselor typically has a master’s degree and is not licensed to practice as a psychologist, they may have a background in social work. Before seeing a psychologist, you should make sure that they are licensed to practice and specialize in the type of issue that you have. Find out what the licensing authority is in your region (here it’s the OPQ) and give them a call, they will tell you who in your area specializes in your type of issue and what their approach is. The psychologist will refer you to a medical doctor or psychiatrist if they think it’s needed.
I really think it’s a cultural thing- here a therapist (I believe) is basically someone you go and talk to about your issues, whereas a counsellor is trained to guide you into dissecting those issues. Therefore counsellors tend to be for huge stuff that’s stopping you from living your life fully.
Psychiatrists are totally different- they’re much more medical. Counsellors are a treatment for certain mental illnesses, whereas psychiatrists are more the diagnoser. They’re doctors trained in a specific field- counsellors and therapists are not doctors.
That’s possible. I’m only aware of how the profession is regulated in Canada and the US.
Apparently I’m a lesbian because my dad abused my mom. Apparently my mom has no anxiety issues at all about her divorce and should just be left alone. Apparently my brother is crazy for developing OCD and should be on pills forever.
These were all different therapists. Seems like we have bad luck in my family.
I apparently ‘think your trans because you have aspbergers’ according to my mother…. Which I don’t even have according to actual psychologists. The whole thing was incredibly convoluted. I was then told by the therapist she sees (we tried the whole talk to each others psych things to work things out and it just didn’t go well,) that I was just depressed and should go on prozac and see how I feel after that. Yeaaaah. No.
My therapist has never said anything bad, really. I told her at one point I was sue I’m bisexual (which I am), but a few sessions later I told her my (fairly homophobic parents) were getting upset with me because they suspected I was a lesbian and she said, “but you know you’re definitely straight though, right?” and all I could do was smile and agree.
Get a new therapist. If you can’t be honest with her, it’s not working out.
“My therapist has never said anything bad” “but you know you’re definitely straight though, right?'”
These are contradictory statements. Either your therapist forgot your orientation or they’re trying to force heteronormativity on you. I’m not sure which is worse.
I’d say trying to force it is worse. I can understand forgetting info about patients here and there when there’s just so much to keep track of. Not that I think that’s acceptable, especially considering that’s why you keep medical records, but it’s a comprehensible failing.
Hasn’t happened in reference to my gender or sexuality, but I’m familiar with the “this is all because of your dead parent!” thing. That therapist just would not take “but I had symptoms of depression way before she died” for an answer. Set my recovery back years.
“Your mileage may vary” indeed. I have had such positive experiences with therapy, and then some mediocre-bordering-on-shitty experiences, but no one has ever come out and asserted random shit about me like that. Ugh.
I suppose it’s like teaching, or any other role where you’re coming to someone for help…someone who’s skillful and a good match for you is priceless. Someone who’s not competent may well do more harm than good.
I’ve been told a bunch of times that my asexuality is a phase I’ll grow out of. Granted, this probably partly because I had already told my parents I was bisexual (a bunch of reasons for that. Partly because I appreciate the physical form of both men and women, and I was convinced I was a late bloomer because I didn’t know you could *be* asexual). Took me a *really* long time to get over that.
I haven’t been to a therapist yet (I’m considering doing so, -just- to make sure that my issues with romance and sex are just who I am and not actually caused by something else), but I’ve done the same thing were I told friends/family I was bisexual or possibly homosexual.
I knew about asexuality when I was 13, but even then I thought ‘well, I’m too young, I haven’t had chance to experiment and try’. And now at 21, having tried forcing myself to play through the motions courting guys and girls, I’m beginning to feel more confident in my assessment that I’m probably asexual, and even aromantic.
Only my close friends know though. I’ve yet to tell my family. Most of my friends are the well informed sort who easily accepted when I drunkenly confessed that “I lied about my sexuality, I don’t want to sleep with anyone”. A few support me, but still insist I try to explore my sexuality (or lack thereof).
I’m a huge fan of therapy. Not every therapist is right for every patient, but I think it’s a great thing.
I knew about homosexuality as a young kid. My godmother’s a lesbian, and one of my mom’s closest friends is gay. I learned about transgendered folk in middle school, and it made loads of sense to me. But the rest of the QUILTBAG didn’t really come to me until a couple years ago.
I’ve had a couple of those drunken Outings. Kind of on the line of drunkenly muttering “I would snuggle the *shit* out of you.”
My brother is super supportive. My mom continues to try to get me to look. “Can’t you just pretend?!” was her most recent irritated utterance when she was talking about how sexy someone was and I just said “meh”. A couple of my friends are also really supportive. One of them, though, is convinced I just haven’t met the right man/woman. It slipped out in conversation, and I had to explain the reasons I am not looking for a partner at present, and that I have no interest in sex.
She told me I just hadn’t had the right kind. I explained I’d had plenty of kinds, and never really saw the thrill. I also had to explain that when I’d dated my ex-boyfriend, making him happy was emotionally and psychologically exhausting for me. I enjoyed seeing him happy, but I REALLY had to prep for it. And I had to do it in a way where he was unaware of my process, because we hung out a lot.
It’s frustrating, because even though at this point I more-or-less know who I am, I’m still constantly plagued by the fear that there’s somehow something wrong with me, rather than me just being at the far end of the sex-drive spectrum.
I’ve definitely had the gambit, though, in terms of therapists. I had a great one as a kid. Very supportive, and fascinated by the fact that a kid of five got super confused every time she tried to use puppets to talk through an issue. I told her I’d rather just talk about it.
I stopped after middle school, but my mom made me go back when I was in college when she found scars on my arm. I ended up trying to explain why I self-injured to one, and then had to spend the next month and a half explaining to her that, no, I didn’t think I had superpowers.
My snark-monster nearly came out in that a couple times, but I desperately wanted to appease my mother because my education was on the line, so I decided against saying “My superpower is that I can stop a bullet. Once.”
your words are moving and gorgeous. thank you for sharing!
When I was in the hospital after a suicide attempt, the psychiatrist I saw there told me “bisexuality doesn’t exist in men”. When I disagreed he was extremely patronizing and waved my questions away, saying “studies have proven it”. That was one of a couple bad interactions there. For the most part the staff was wonderfully supportive, but some people adopt such a superior attitude around the mentally ill. I think it’s especially important for doctors to show respect for patients who are so vulnerable.
Wow, I would have told that psychiatrist to fuck off. There has been no conclusive studies to disprove bisexuality in men, mainly because it’s a thing that exists. So this “profesional” read about that one experiment they did in that one college and took it as pure proof that it can never exist. What a hack.
Ugh, was that the study that went “no (cis) men are bisexual and all (cis) women are”? Biggest load of bullshit I’ve ever read.
The one I’m referring too was one where in one college they got a bunch of guys who identified as bisexual, had them watch straight and gay porn, and hooked them up to something that, to my understanding, tracked when they got erections. That seems like a pretty stupid study to me, and not conclusive at all.
People respond to porn in different ways. Also, the porn differs. By all accounts, the majority of straight porn is includes some amount of power play, often degrading the woman. So a bi person who wasn’t into that would likely respond better to gay porn.
And some people aren’t into porn at all.
And some people don’t really respond sexually to people they don’t have a relationship with.
And some bi people find gender irrelevant, but others respond differently to men and women.
And those are just the concerns off the top of my head. No doubt there are many others. Any study which didn’t account for these is barely worthy of the name.
TRiG.
I’ve had issues with the kink aspect of my sexuality (degradation kinks, specifically) for a long time and have had a couple of attempts of briefly mentioning it to passing in therapy because I very obviously have trouble dealing with that aspect of myself. I was told those desires were just because of my unresolved tension with my mother (I guess as some kind of guilt-ridden self-harm)… by someone who specializes in gender identity related therapy, by the way. She also confidentially assured me twice that “I find that most transmen are attracted to women” when I tried to say that I was bisexual. It was fun. I didn’t go back there.
I’ve also been told by my primary care doctor my gender identity is a product of my OCD, being an invasive, obsessive thought I can’t get rid of or move past.
And see, with very limited exception, my therapists have all been very good at separating my actual psych issues from my gender/sexuality/etc… I had a single therapist who was certain that being poly was why my partner and I were seeking marriage counseling and that it had nothing to do with him not getting any help when losing his best friend in a car accident and thus sinking into a deep depression and self medicating with liquor. However, that was the only one and I’ve been to dozens in my twenty years in therapy.
I have depression, anxiety, and little-to-no sexual desire. No idea if that last thing is because of the first two or if it’s completely unrelated.
Still, none of my therapists have been bad about it. I suppose the most recent one has made comments that implied the asexuality was related to my anxiety issues,but at the time I was asking for advice on how to enjoy sex more so… I guess I can’t blame/critique the therapist?
(If you’re curious why I wanted to like sex more, it’s very important to my partner that they be able to give me pleasure.)
Decreased sex drive is a typical symptom of both depression and anxiety disorders, so you’re not going to know (and your therapist can’t tell) whether your lack of sex drive is due to those other problems until they are resolved. (I’m not pulling this out of my ass, I’m a psychology student and it’s right here in my textbook, 2015 edition, quoting the DSM-5.) In any case, depression is a much more pressing problem than lack of sex drive, so it would make sense to prioritize that, imho.
You are absolutely right on both counts.
The lack of a sex drive is the least of my problems, but I give it more attention than it deserves because it displeases my partner.
Sorry. I don’t mean to make my partner sound like some kind of sex-demanding monster. When I asked them what they most wanted me to get out of therapy, they explicitly stated that what they wanted most was for me to get less depressed. The sex drive thing was last on the list, and it was mostly “it would be nice if you wanted sex, but it’s not necessary.” Which I feel is very reasonable.
Sounds like you’re in good hands, then. I hope you feel better soon : )
Wow, after reading all these comments (I WAS JUST CURIOUS, NOT TRYING TO BE A SNOOP, SORRY IF I OFFEND ANYONE,) I realized that crazy grandpas and uncles are right; therapists and doctors are big QUACKS! Like, who the fuck are you to degrade someone and their inner selves by some half-brained theory about them being this and that because of some traumatic event in their lives that GUESS WHAT everyone goes through everyday? If they really just do that the moment you start talking, then they are fucking lazy and just bad at this job. Like, I can tell you stories of my close friends who went through this and just one little event they tell these quacks are literally analyzed too much and are the cause of everything that’s wrong with you. Fuck man, this type of shit gets me so mad, no one should be waved off like this, no one. I thankfully stopped going to therapists ever since the last incident screwed me up badly and my mom wouldn’t let that happen again. But I am still in high school and have a counselor I see from time to time and she really helps me with my issues like a more qualified therapist even though she wasn’t one.
By the Great Universe, we are made of great Star stuff and survived through so much shit throughout our entire existence. We are grand and awesome and so unique. For someone to just have the guts to say that to another human being, how can they live with themselves waving people’s problems off as their own fault or someone else’s in a negative way?
“Oh, you’re only gay because your dad wasn’t around enough, you’re full of anger because it’s generic and your dad was also an angry guy, you’re only dressing like a guy because that’s the only way you feel closer to your dad” (Yeah, ALOT of the bullshit they tried to shut down my throat was mostly about my dad and tried to “fix me”)
So yeah.
I’m going to quote my psychology textbook here : “…scientific research has failed to indentify any aspect of parenting that has a significant impact on sexual orientation (Bell, Weinberg & Hammersmith, 1981). Indeed, children raised by homosexual couples and hereosexual couples are equally likely to become heterosexual adults (Patterson, 1995). There is also little support for the idea that a person’s early sexual encounters have a lasting impact on his or her sexual orientation (Bohan, 1996). On the other hand, there is mounting evidence that genes and biology play an important role in determining sexual orientation.” Psychologists are NOT currently taught that sexual orientation is due to early traumas or any type of family issue. We are taught that homosexuality is not a disorder and that we mustn’t discriminate against people on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, culture, etc. Psychology doesn’t pay as much as some of the other health professions while still requiring lots of study, and the burnout rate is high – the majority of psychologists chose that profession because they wanted to help others. Now, some people are bad at their jobs and this is true in any field. I’m sure we’ve all had a bad experience with a medical doctor, dentist or school teacher, but these people are still valuable resources.
You’re generalizing from the experiences of people who are posting specifically because they had bad experiences. That’s a flawed process. Therapists, like all people, are biased by personal experience and beliefs. It would be nice if the education process eliminated that bias, but that’s not always possible. With the right therapist, great things are possible, but with the wrong one, the experience can be very upsetting, particularly because we are meant to trust them and are unable to. Your best bet is generally to ask around, do a lot of research, and if you’re not comfortable with a therapist then ask for a referral to someone who has “more experience” with your particular issues. If they take it badly, that’s on them, but it can be a wake-up call for the therapist to do more research and examine their biases.
Please don’t assume that the few cases here of bad therapists mean all of them are terrible. I’ve seen more therapist than I managed to keep count of and only one ever looked down on an aspect of my orientation (being poly.) Bear in mind, therapists are people too, which means they can be awful and biased but there are a lot of good ones out there too.
I’ve had a mixed bag. My current therapist is awesome at gender, sexuality, kink, support, trauma, and religion. Her biggest thing is not shaming patients for any reason. Just throwing this out there that there are good ones in existence. Sadly, it is hard to find them.
On the other hand I’ve been told that I’m queer because of my parents divorce, that I’m trans because of PTSD, that I was a lesbian because of PTSD, that I shouldn’t be interested in men because of PTSD, that I’m poly because of PTSD, that I was submissive because of PTSD… yeah I’ve heard just about every aspect of my gender and sexuality explained away by PTSD. Usually in a self-contradictory manner. Not to mention depression, anxiety, ADHD and the rest.
Heck, even my mom (a social worker) once tried to tell me that someone with mental health issues couldn’t know that they were trans. She didn’t understand why I found that deeply hurtful.
First councilor I saw told me that “she didn’t think I was asexual” I was getting help for depression and anxiety. Well 5 years later I still ID as asexual, with no doubt.
I was in patient when I was a teenager, and one of the nurses or techs, whomever it was told me that I should look into why I was trans, and it probably had to do with the trauma I had when I was a kid, and that stuck with me even nowadays and makes me question myself over and over again.
I’m having really good luck with the therapist I have now though. Very informative, very respectful of boundaries, understands a hell of a lot more than other ones I had prior. Actually knows how to pick my brain in a way that doesn’t irritate me.
Ugh what? Forgive me if I’m wrong, but literally every trans person I have ever met knew they were trans even if they didn’t have a word for it for as long as they could remember. If there is a why for you are trans, unless you have a background in genetics I don’t think you’re gonna find an answer
I mean there is adopting aspects of the opposite gender in order to compensate for something, (which I admit is something I do but since I rather enjoy being a tomboy I don’t care) and there is genuinely feeling like your gender doesn’t match you’re body. It’s a freaking big difference.
I’ve had a good experience with therapists. Me being trans hasn’t been questioned by therapists. I guess it’s because where I live therapists and psychologists are heavily regulated. You can’t even be a hypnotist without a licence.
But for some people their sexual orientation/gender identity CAN be influenced by reasons like death or trauma, but that doesn’t make it invalid, just that those things are a factor, never the sole reason.
As a person only attracted to girls and feminine non-binaries, my orientation was influenced by abuse from my step-father. That’s not to say everyone’s orientation was influenced by something like mine was, just that it is possible. I believe many straight/cis people also have had their sexuality influenced by similar things.
tl;dr: Some people’s sexuality are influenced by stuff like abuse and trauma. That doesn’t make it less valid.
I think everyone’s sexuality is shaped by outside factors to some degree. Doesn’t make it invalid.
Me, I have only ever been attracted to males who act rather feminine, and I am quite sure that is a result of me being harmed by masculinity pretty early in life. Trying to “cure” that would be like trying to cure someone who lives in Australia (and will continue to live there) from the fear to get sunburned.
No one can ‘cure’ someone of their sexuality or gender identity, but therapy for any trauma or abuse can help the person cope, although I’ve known an ace person who was ace for those reasons, and they became more grey-ace after some therapy. It can happen, but there’s no ‘cure’ for sexual orientations/gender identities because it’s not an illness.
At first when I came out to my grief counselor, she tried to convince me I’m not ace. I have a feeling she did some more research, because she did a 180 on our next session.
See that is important. I hate it when they think because they have a degree then they know everything, but a counselor who goes out and does the research before they say anything more stupid is the mark of a good counselor. I’m glad you found a good one.
Dunno if my therapist does research, I think she just let’s me educate her, which is good enough.
I’ve dumped a therapist before after one session where he said ace people didn’t exist after I said my orientation, and I got to spend the rest of the session with him treating me like a research subject rather than a patient. :( I’m sorry your therapist had a bad session, but really glad to hear/impressed that she did a 180 and her own research. :)
Good therapist matches are hard.
Yup! She’s a good listener, and she helped.
Whereas, I recently had the misfortune of being lectured by someone who didn’t know the difference between celibacy and asexuality, but still saw fit to condescend to me.
What is it with bars that brings the assholes out?
Probably the alcohol–it’s great at bringing out the asshole in everyone.
No argument here, but this snob hadn’t actually had any alcohol -_-
I have had mixed experiences with therapists. The first two I tried I didn’t really click with, but the third one was the charm and I ended up seeing them for over a year. They helped me tremendously with all kinds of childhood stuff, and probably was one of the things that saved my life when I was suicidally depressed.
On the other hand while they were on board with LGBA stuff (being part of the community themself), they didn’t really know too much about trans things further than a Trans 101. Whenever a new issue came up for discussion, they often guessed that me being trans somehow interplays with it, which usually wasn’t the case. At least they did accept when I said so :)
I’ve actually had good experiences with the real psychologists I’ve seen (people with psych PhDs, or working on them). My grandmother sent me to see one when I was caught writing kinky stories of a sexual nature with my friends (all girls, all 3 of us ~14). She felt something was clearly wrong with me to be writing sexual things involving whips/chains/etc. The psychologist determined that there was totally nothing wrong with me in that department (we spent one session on it and she figured out I felt extremely uncomfortable/turned off with “real people porn” in general, and especially if it had the kinky themes I was perfectly fine reading/writing about. Drawn or written porn only for me, still that way today.) and that the only problem I had was actually depression.
She wanted to work on what I would later learn are “negative core beliefs” but realized that she couldn’t help me if all my grandmother (who I lived with) was doing was reinforcing them the whole time. She called my grandmother in for a session to talk to her about it (and very likely realized my grandmother was emotionally abusive) and I saw the therapist just one more time (during which she said that she couldn’t get a word in edgewise with my grandmother {as I thought, despite my grandmother’s claims that “your therapist said ___”}) and then never again.
I didn’t go to a psychologist again until a year after I had graduated with a Bachelor’s degree (in Psychology, no less) and my best friend got it through my thick skull that my year of wishing I could just stop existing qualified as “suicidal thoughts.” I went to my university’s psych clinic, so the people I saw were people studying to be professional psychologists/therapists. And each year would be a new person as the last one graduated or otherwise moved on to the next stage of their studies. They worked with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help me dismantle those “negative core beliefs,” which was actually possible because I was no longer living with their source. After that was mostly handled, I got a guy I didn’t really care for who helped me with exposure therapy to get over my phobia of driving that had developed, in part, due to a negative core belief that I always make bad decisions. I’m still not sure if I didn’t care for him because his “bedside manner” sucked or if I just began to associate him with the anxiety of the exposure therapy. XD “Bedside manner” or not, he helped me get over my phobia a lot faster than I think anyone expected, so I wouldn’t say he was a bad psychologist, just not a particularly pleasant one.
I love my therapist, and while I don’t think she completely buys the whole asexuality thing, she’s nice enough to keep that to herself and not try and tell me how I feel. When I first told her she admitted she never heard it before and asked me to tell her more about it, and she did ask if it was possible that I wasn’t asexual and just had intimacy issues and I’m like “you mean from the time I was twelve and I never had something bad happen to me?” And she’s like “okay fair enough”, and has never tried to convince me I wasn’t ace. I do agree with her that anxiety gets in the way of forming relationships but at least she doesn’t harp on me about having no interest in sex.
I’ve met a lot of folks like Anwar who have one bad experience and then refuse to try it again—which is really sad, because more than a couple of those folks really could have benefited from some kind of outside help.
Never had my sexuality/gender explained away, but encountered lots of other rudeness. It’s so very important to have a consultation with a couple therapists before committing to make sure your values/beliefs mesh and not be afraid to fire them if they make you feel worse leaving their office than before you started seeing them. I’ve had one bring her religion into it and another call my husband’s and I’s decision to let our baby sleep in our bedroom “perverted.” But I needed help. After having consultations about about 6 people, I finally found someone who was amazing. She was free through a county-paid program, and I saw her for about a year. It really made a positive difference in my life.
Just to contrast with all the bad stories, when I told my psychologist that I identify as pansexual, she said “I’ve never heard the term, can you define it for me?” and “I’m going to do some research on pansexuality, but if you like after we’re done I could also refer you to some of our other psychologists who specialize in LGBT.”
When I first told my mum about being asexual (and aromantic, too), she thought that it might be because I was born three months early. She’d researched a bit and apparently every other premature baby born in the same timeframe ish as me had severe autism, social issues, all sorts of stuff like that. There’ve been loads of studies on it, I haven’t looked it up myself. I did have a few little issues growing up – apparently until I was about five I couldn’t see myself as part of a group of people, teachers would have to refer to me specifically to get me to do anything – and I’ve always been very introverted and sort of antisocial, preferring books and films, suchlike, to loud parties (which were my parents’ speciality) and things like that. But I’m not autistic, just like I’m not blind, deaf and paralysed with severe brain and nerve damage, like the doctors said I would be when I was still in hospital. I’m absolutely normal, as much as I hate that word. The only issue I have now is mild Raynaud’s, which is just a sort of circulation problem. And even if I was borderline autistic like mum said once I might be, it wouldn’t affect my sexuality at all – I am ace, stop trying to explain it away!
Needless to say, I’ve been fairly reticent in explaining my gender to her (I’m genderqueer).
And this has become fairly long-winded, so I’ll stop here.
*high fives another preemie*
I was born 4 months early and when I ID’d as ace (I don’t anymore for varying reasons) my mum reacted similarly and tried to put it down to my supposed development issues and supposed immaturity.
I had one psychologist tell me that a lot of his Aspergers patients had similar gender amorphous experiences, but that didn’t make me uncomfortable at all. It just means that it’s not something I need to worry about unless it starts actually bothering me when people use a pronoun that doesn’t feel right. I like having an explanation for why I feel weird in my body sometimes, particularly an explanation that doesn’t require me to make any changes.
Wow, this morning I was like “I must be quite lucky as I don’t have had any bad experience with shrinks, even if I haven’t seen lots of them”, but well, this afternoon it’s not true anymore -_- My psychiatrist told me that “in homosexual relationship, the relationship tends to be quite blurry, the link between both partners being not quite definite between “friendship”, “brotherhood”, “sexual attraction”… And when I told her I disagreed and that I wasn’t confused at all, she replied that “it’s not a judgment, it’s just what I can tell you, as a psychiatrist.” Like it’s “science” you know, so shut up and listen to my bullshit which isn’t “judgmental”… >___>
I don’t even wanna elaborate on the trans topic… (when she told me it wasn’t meaningless I dreamt a lot of fights with my sisters and fights with my boyfriend – who is a transguy, like me….. wtf is the link here ?! >__<)
I never went to therapist, but I went to psychologist specialized in LGBT and two nurses specialized in youth psychology, and thankfully they NEVER suggested my gender or body dysphoria was caused by relentless bullying I experienced in school. Not even once. None of them even asked if there was anything I suspected was causing it.
Perhaps people will think this is not quite the same issue since I’m hetero, but therapist #4 pretty much blamed everything wrong with my mental health on the fact that I was married. She then wasted 20 minutes of our 1 hour session telling me how she had been a battered wife and urging me to open up to her… EVERY WEEK she did this routine, telling me her sob story over and over again, all but outright saying that marriage is the bane of all women and I need to cast away all “dependency on men.” (I should mention, I have had issues with depression, OCD, and agoraphobia since I was 9, but at the time I had been married for only about 5 months. My issues were obviously not due to my husband.)
She urged me to gain self-confidence by flirting with people behind my husband’s back and looking into the possibility of a female lover. I tried to explain that I am definitely hetero, and monogamy is my personal choice, but she would say this was all part of me wanting to fit in with social expectations.
Yep… according to her, heterosexuality was a “choice,” not how I was born.
Anyway, this went on for 6 weeks of therapy before I stopped going to her. I felt like she thought I was foolish for “falling into the social expectation” of a hetero-monogamous marriage. I was offended that she ignored me when I explained that this marriage was something my husband and I contemplated for 7 years because we wanted to be sure it was right. With her urging me to go behind my husband’s back and flirt with women, I almost felt like she was trying to “convert” me into becoming bi-/pansexual and non-monogamous, so I sympathize with others who have had similar pressure due to their sexuality.
Side Note: 10 years later, my husband and I are still happily married, and he fights right by my side when the phobia overwhelms me or when the depression gets bad.
My second therapist was great! My first…
I was told I can’t be aromantic because I’ve dated people, and maybe my anxiety is just making me pull away from social situations! (Never mind that I don’t have social anxiety…) Which has always felt vaguely like saying that someone can’t be gay if they’ve dated a person of a different gender, but I guess it is always phrased as compulsory *heterosexuality*, eh?
(I’m aromantic pansexual, for the curious.)
The psychotherapist I had when I was younger ignored the majority of my actual issues and made so many assumptions it was impossible to tell what he thought was going on by the end of it. When I landed in hospital after a suicide attempt and specifically requested not to see him, my father went behind my back, got him, and told him I’d made it all up. The shrink went with that, whilst admitting he couldn’t help me, but refused to let me see anyone else, because in his mind if he couldn’t help, no one could. It didn’t matter that I came out of those sessions feeling so bad, and the school nurse who used to take me would call me to check I was still okay in the evening after she was so worried.
It was only when I got to the GIC and the doctor asked why he hadn’t referred me back then when he knew I had gender issues that I realised just how much he’d messed me about. I was so scared of having to see him because of the effect he had on me that I waited until after I was out of his area before going back to my GP and getting a referral.
Thankfully my GIC psychotherapist is great and makes sure he’s understood correctly rather than just making assumptions.
I’ve had pretty good experiences with counselors and therapists in general. An old psychiatrist got kind of awkward after I told them that I was gay but didn’t press and that’s the worst it’s been. My current therapist of four years is amazing. He occasionally asks if there have been any girls I’ve had my eye on, and he’s been super supportive of me starting to identify on the asexual spectrum, too. He’s also very respectful of the pronouns of my non-binary friends when I talk about them, and has taken to asking for the pronouns of any new people I bring up. I know it definitely helps that he’s LGBTQ+ too, that helps a great deal. He asks questions and takes notes when I bring up terms or identities he hasn’t heard before and is always respectful and supportive.
Therapy can be a really great experience if you have the right professional, is what I’m getting at.
My APRN dismisses my top dysphoria and asexuality as a side effect of my prozac that I’m not managing correctly.
Pfft, therapists making assumptions, creating problems and ignoring your own, been there. This has nothing to do with gender or sexuality, but still, everyone’s sharing stories so here we go: The first time I was sent to therapy my biggest problem was that I was really fucking lonely. This is what I told my therapist, but the dude just went on about meaning of life. I wasn’t suicidal. I don’t know why he insisted on talking about it. In a short amount of time I decided I was done and said life has no meaning pretty much just to fuck with him. Childish maybe, but in my defense, I was 14.
Best part: I got to read his notes about me years later. Apparently I wore very boyish clothes during the first meeting, for example a leather jacket which I never owned in my entire life, but on the last meeting I looked fairly girly so he decided everything is good again (even though I basically refused to talk to him that day and my problems were no closer to being solved).
No, fucking really. He wrote a lot about my clothes. Not much about my personality though. It was both funny and sad at the same time.
My friend went to the same guy for a while… To this day we both agree that he was a horrible therapist. He just wouldn’t listen, at all.
After him, it was better, though I never came across any GREAT therapists. I think maybe therapy simply isn’t the thing for me; I do well enough with just meds, at least for now.
I plan on going into psychology in college and becoming an identity therapist. I hope I become a good one
I have fired so many therapists.
I would just like to note that therapy is also not effective for everyone. Even if it is respectful. There are plenty of people like myself who spent a long time in therapy with a large variety of different therapists and didn’t feel like it made any impact on them at all.
I plan to start seeing a therapist soon, and this is something that I am very worried about… I want to find someone who is going to be worth my time. Because I’m not looking to have someone do that with me. I want someone who can actually help me with some issues that I have. Not with something that I have established, and am perfectly happy with. Aka, my sexuality, and so on. I don’t know if a therapist will be what is best for me, but I would like to at least try.
I’ve only had experiences with councellors so far. My first one, when i told her i was pan, was very supportive, helped with my depression so much. My scond one, on the other hand, spent 15 minutes talking about how divorce can influence a children way of processing affection, even after i had told her my parents have been separated since i can even remember. Not to mention, she acted as if my depression was nothing to be concerned about, even after i had confided that i was feeling suicidal again.
I had this weird anxiety attack thing in 2009 and i went to one counseling session. the counselor kept trying to connect the anxiety with my gender, even though I knew it was about school/job. She also kept trying to interpret my dreams. I didn’t go back.
I never realized how lucky I was to get the child psychiatrist I did until I was an adult. I’m autistic and she was a wonderful person who helped me SO MUCH. She would even go a half hour over time without charging us because she knew I needed the help and we couldn’t afford it. (I made her a gift of a mason jar with rocks and little knick-knacks in it, with a couple large rocks with nice things written on them that she helped me with.) The more horror stories I hear, the more I’m thankful I had a good psychiatrist.
Well fuck that guy
I’ve been really lucky with my psychologist. I see her for my anxiety but we also talk about other stuff going on in my life and sexuality has come up a few times. I came out to her as asexual as biromantic seperately, asexual while talking about relationships and biromantic when talking about a friend who had a crush on me and I basically talked myself into thinking I might like her back because I wanted to be in a relationship so badly (she did ask me if I’d liked girls before then, but it was more in a ‘are you beginning to question you sexuality’ way than a ‘you tricked yourself into thinking you liked her so therefore you were also wrong about liking girls altogether’ way). She’s never tried to relate my asexuality to my anxiety or anything else, and I suspect that she thoroughly researched asexuality after I came out to her.
The guy I saw (once) before her, though, was pretty terrible. As part of his first session questionnaire, he flat out asked me if I was attracted to men or women. Which, apart from assuming people can only be either gay or straight and male or female, I didn’t exactly trust him enough at that point to come out to him, having known him for like half an hour at most. He seemed the type to try to ‘cure’ me of my asexuality, or to at least not believe me if I later said I liked people of both same and other gender/s because I’d already told him I liked men. That and that fact that he seemed to think that my anxiety could be fixed by cutting back my time online and going outside (because of course the internet couldn’t possibly be a form of de-stressing from keeping up my ‘public face’ outside the house, and I could never feel more comfortable speaking to people online when my anxiety sometimes makes me freeze up face-to-face) meant that I knew before I even left his office that I was never going back there again.
Maybe its just me, but I feel like Chris asking that seems out of place?
I know hes trying to be nice and helpful but it doesn’t seem like it quite fits in the situation?
I haven’t had a professional tell me anything like that, but I have had my parents and some of their friends tell me I originally came out as a lesbian because I was sexually assaulted in uni. When I finally came out as trans they had all sorts of explanations (none of which were true haha).
Thankfully my therapist is really sweet and I identify as Homosexual Panromantic and my Therapist was actually really shocked when I told her I was dating a boy, I had actually previously forgot to tell her about being panromantic before telling her about my boyfriend. So I can promise you that there are good therapists out there who understand sexuality isn’t tied to trauma.
I haven’t had any more luck with counselors than therapists, they are all quacks, if you don’t know what your problem is they can’t figure it out either. It’s even more annoying than going to a regular dr. and saying “I have this weird rash”, and they tell you you have dermatitis- like no shit Sherlock, you just told me I have a weird rash in latin thanks so much. If you go to a counselor/therapist without any idea why you are unhappy they’ll just make shit up (at least I haven’t had one other then the first one insist their made-up bullshit Must be right… but I didn’t have any choice about that one who was nothing but a traitorous spy for my parents). Things up North are a little better, I at least found a psychiatrist to proscribe my meds who doesn’t bother me otherwise. I’ve long ago come to the conclusion that I do know what’s wrong with me- I have a chemical imbalance, I take pills and it’s pretty much all better. I don’t have to talk about my birth mother abandoning me or my a-dad being a control-freak. I see it as- no one makes a diabetic go to therapy to talk about how their pancreas not working makes them feel. Just because there is something wrong with my brain, and the brain is the thinking organ, doesn’t at all follow that you can think yourself better (anymore than a diabetic can think their pancreas into working).
Just because YOU haven’t had good luck with them, doesn’t mean they are all bad. i could make broad sweeping statements about the terribleness of all parents based on my personal experiences, but that would be kinda dickish of me.
Yes, if you have depression for purely physical reasons, seeing a counsellor WOULD be useless. But a lot of people need them. And if there is something disruptive causing you issues (which I believe is the case for many if not most people) a counsellor’s job isn’t to find it- it’s to guide YOU into finding and resolving it. It’s useless if you’re not willing and able to do the soul searching to dredge everything up, work through it, and find peace with it.
Didn’t have any luck with it? Fine. But frankly, as a wannabe-counsellor who has had two amazing counsellors and one perfectly-fine-but-wrong-for-me one, I’m honestly offended by someone saying they’re all quacks, completely missing the point or saying there is no point. Counselling has changed my life- I have PTSD which has completely altered how my brain works and which doctors agree I will never completely recover from, but without counselling I wouldn’t have come half as far as I’ve managed to. I may have done that- but THEY showed me how.
Oh sorry, I just object to being forced to pay $100 per hour for some pretentious ass to repeat what I told them back to me in a condescending and overbearing manner like I can’t understand the words coming out of my own mouth.
Therapist- “You have Abandonment issue because your mother abandoned you. You have trust issues because of the rape and those guys trying to drown you.”
Me- “Way to go Captian-fucking-Obvious!”
Therapist/counselor ranks #2 behind “priest” as “jobs for condescending assholes who don’t want to do real work” IMHO.
Again, you’re painting ALL counsellors/therapists as useless asshats because YOU had a bad experience and don’t feel it’s right for you. They fill a very important need in mental health. Doesn’t work for you? Fine. Don’t act like its a useless profession just because it doesn’t benefit you personally. There are a lot of people who have benefitted greatly from it- it is a treatment option, and for some mental illnesses and problems it is the ONLY treatment that will do any lasting good.
I do agree that you shouldn’t have to pay $100 per session, but that’s the fault of your country’s health care system and views towards mental health.
There are a lot of different styles of therapy. My favorite is cognitive behavioral therapy. They basically stick to educating people about what the research says regarding how emotions work and giving them tools to identify and challenge the unhelpful thought patterns they have. The idea is to help the patient develop safe and effective experiments to test the hypotheses they have about the world. For example, if you were to believe that you can’t talk about problems to friends because they would turn on you, the therapist would help you figure out which friend would be best to test it on and how you could go about it.
The condescending assholes exist, but if all a therapist is doing is telling you what category of issues you have, they are doing a piss-poor job by the standards of their profession.
Oh sorry I thought this was a space where we could talk about our experiences with therapists- but I guess that only applies to people who had wonderful experiences and shit glitter and rainbows after one magical session in which the heavens open up and all your problems are revealed to be straightforward and easily explained away. I didn’t even mention the religious nut who told me I only thought I was a lesbian because of the rape (because the only reason to not be attracted to men is trauma right?)
Will it assuage your your hurted feelings if I disclaim that the only therapists I have been to were in the bible-belt of the states? I imagine the ones in the North are better/more enlightened but I have no money to throw at that so… I guess pity the poor Americans with no Universal care who have to choose between medical care and keeping lights on and food on the table.
Lots of people have ranted about poor experiences. You, however, made broad statements about all therapists, rather than commenting on the ones you’ve experienced. You actually said the profession was “for condescending assholes who don’t want to do real work” and said they were all quacks. Essentially you said it’s a load of useless bull, because it didn’t work for you personally.
Huge, huge difference between complaining about your experiences and attacking a legitimate and necessary treatment for people who still experience social stigma.
Saying your experiences were bad is one thing, but denigrating the whole profession is insulting to anyone who has been helped by therapy and anyone who is, or aspires to become, a therapist. I am trying to communicate that your statements reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of the diversity of therapeutic styles, the effort that goes into learning and applying them, and their effectiveness when used well. I get that your understanding is based on personal experience, and I’m sorry you’ve had those experiences, but the current trends in research and education are moving away from the type of treatment you’re describing.
Fortunately, I’ve not experienced that. I have been told my bisexuality is a phase to which I responded ‘it’s a damn long phase!’ but I think she knows how silly a thing that was to say now. I hope.
When I told my therapist I was questioning, not only my sexual and romantic orientations, but also my gender identity and mostly thought of myself as non-binary, they told me about the Kinsey scale and I just ??? It is incredible the amount of “professionals” we have to educate…
I’ve had a psychologist tell me my gender dysphoria was a lack of self confidence. I had another tell me I should ‘try presenting male and see how that goes’ despite all forms of legal and school identification blatantly stating my assigned gender. And a third say that binders are bad for one’s skin and hormones cause cancer. It took about five years for me to find one that actually knew what they were talking about in that regard, even though I went into each place specifically stating I needed help with FTM gender issues. But I’m in the USA and the whole healthcare scam (‘system’) is notorious in general. On the plus side, I have now found a sane and informed one!
The pathologization of asexuality: something that needs to be talked about more, because although now if you say you’re asexual that’s supposed to be an exception, to those who are asexual and just don’t know the term yet will be told they have an illness that needs to be cured. Plus many clinical psychs/doctors/counsellors etc still either haven’t heard of asexuality or don’t think it’s valid and will think you need curing anyway.