the dark side of therapy

[Eve B]

How could a few, good therapists ever make up for all the bad ones though? It's too late for those clients who have been harmed or can't afford to keep trying.

[Mary S]

18 hours ago, Eve B said:

How could a few, good therapists ever make up for all the bad ones though? It's too late for those clients who have been harmed or can't afford to keep trying.

I agree; the profession needs some very serious reform. It both saddens and angers me when I see calls for "more mental health services" -- what we need first is better mental health services. More of the current poor quality can even make the situation worse.

At this point, I guess all we can do is continue forums like this, and posting on therapist forums that need critical comments. There is also some hope that younger generations will push more for transparency, and that will help. There is also a little hope from the fact that there is increasing awareness that a lot of so-called "scientific" research in psychology is junk science. But we've still got a long way to go.

[Eve B]

And maybe when counseling is recommended by the media to the public, the emphasis should be on good, competent counseling. I'm beginning to believe that the low-cost or volunteer counselors are probably better practitioners than the over-priced PhD therapists.

[Mary S]

I was thinking about how so many therapists seem to be know-it-alls, so I tried a web search on "know-it-all therapist". I looked over the first ten pages the search returned, and only found one site that had what seemed like a decent discussion of the topic:

http://buildingfamilycounseling.com/2015/04/therapists-dont-know-you-as-well-as-you-know-you/