| I am a psychotherapist as well as a developer, I'll share some of the things we mental health professionals think or suggest. Some of them have already been said here, but I thought summarising my own thoughts on the subject might help. 1) There is no magic formula. Most schools of therapy believe a sincere relationship between patient and therapist has to develop for it it work great. Therapist casting is a great suggestion, and as someone else said, if the therapist isn't comfortable with that, maybe he isn't the right fit. 2) I have studied and trained in different schools of therapy, mostly because I noticed quickly, how certain schools work better for some patients as well as for some therapists. Many times we are limited to what we are introduced to in school, masters or therapy school. It's like working with different programming paradigms, some people view of the world or way of thinking work better for some paradigms that others. We can all adapt, and learn how to work in a particular frame of mind. Certain people fit better into a therapy style/school/paradigm. Certain pathologies, illnesses, problems get better results with certain techniques. I would recommend, also asking the therapists what school / type of therapy they work with, and how would they approach your case. The first thing I always do before recommending a therapist is get to to know the person asking a little better, then about their problem and expectations.
This helps to shrink the list of possible therapists. 3) Ask the therapists if they supervise their cases and if they have gone to therapy themselves. This is vital. The good therapists know our mind and emotions are our tools of the trade. We have to able to differentiate if what we are feeling/thinking in therapy is a miss interpretation we might be having because of our own issues, or if it is a correct interpretation of what is happening to our patient. The only way to achieve this, is with our own therapy and continuous supervision. Therapy allows us to work on our own issues, be aware of them and recognise them when they pop up. Supervision allows us to have other experts help in noticing our blind spots when working with each case. A therapist that doesn't supervise, will get stuck in some therapy patterns and have a harder time noticing your particularities. A therapist that hasn't been to therapy, might be to blind to many things, feels above their patients and won't really connect with you. Most good therapists I know have been to at least 2 different therapy processes along the years (lasting several years each). 4) We always recommend the therapist as a person. I don't just recommend people from a technical/training perspective, I recommend the person, because in the end, a therapists - patient relationship is that, a relationship between two people. The therapist values, perspective on life, and life experience, will pour into the therapy, no matter how much supervision and therapy we get. I hope this helps. |