What if Your Therapist Reads Your Online Content

My response to a story that infuriated me.

It appalled me to read My Therapist Dumped Me Today by Lisa Beth Wright about how her therapist ended their relationship after reading some of her stories on Medium. It’s shocking that someone who is supposed to help with the care of another person’s mental health would treat that person in such a horrific manner.

I wanted to post a response directly on Lisa’s article, but she’s turned off comments. Still, I want to show my solidarity and support.

Lisa, she did you a favor. You deserve better. What follows is my immediate internal response to reading your tale.

Is it unethical for a therapist to read your writing?

Not necessarily. While it does feel like it’s going outside the boundaries of a healthy patient-therapist relationship, everything that we post online is public fodder, and it can’t surprise us if someone reads it — even if that someone is our therapist.

It seems a little extreme for a therapist to purchase a Medium membership just so she could read all of a patient’s posts, but I can see some value in a therapist looking at the stories their patient is writing.

For instance, a therapist has an ethical responsibility to keep the person they are treating from harm. If they were to glance through their social media accounts and see that they were talking about hurting themselves or others, there would be a need for them to sound the alarm. In such a case, the therapist might even have to notify the authorities.

However, in Lisa’s story, it appears her therapist was nothing more than a wounded child. She was following everything Lisa wrote with the sole purpose of validating her own feelings. She seems to have had no regard for her client’s care or emotions.

That is unacceptable.

But does a bad therapist mean you should give up on therapy?

Should you give up on therapy?

Absolutely not! As I’ve written before, the best therapist for you is often not the first one. I went through several before I found a good one.

One man I saw was so wrapped up in his own addiction struggle that he wanted to work through his cravings during every session with me. Fortunately, I wised up quickly, and I only saw him a few times. However, had I stopped searching for a therapist after him, I would have missed out on so much.

When you finally find a quality therapist, the value is unmistakable. When I found a skilled caregiver, I saw her for six years. She taught me coping skills I’ve used every day since. She also helped me work through all the chaos in my head, to come to terms with childhood trauma, and to learn to see my parents as imperfect individuals rather than monsters who set out to hurt me.

The value I got from therapy is priceless.

Even the bad therapist can teach you something

In Lisa’s article, she worries that the four years she spent seeing a terrible therapist were a waste of her time. She’s afraid she accomplished nothing of value.

I disagree.

If Lisa learned any coping skills during that time, or if she learned how to look deeper inside herself and make sense of her emotions, then at least some of her therapy was a success.

One woman I saw few times used to cry through our every session. It made me extremely uncomfortable, but her intense emotions eventually made me dive deeper into the stories I was telling her. Things that I was passing off as having no meaning were affecting her so severely that she couldn’t hold back her tears.

When I found a talented therapist, we unpacked those stories so I could work through the details. It turned out the things that I didn’t think touched me were affecting me in ways I hadn’t imagined.

Working through those traumatic memories with a kind therapist helped me to move past them. Yet, without the bad therapist, I’m not sure I would have ever brought them up again.

Therapy can be a gift

There’s no denying there are some awful therapists out there. And I mean truly awful. I’ve got more stories to tell, but they are best saved for another post.

Don’t give up on the concept of therapy. Among the dozens of bad eggs, there are a few golden ones in the mix. Those are the gems worth holding out for.

Therapy can be a wonderful gift that helps you to understand yourself, your experiences, and the world around you. Everyone should be in therapy for at least a year or more.

If you’ve had a poor therapy experience, please don’t give up. Keep looking until you find a good one, and then watch yourself grow.

To Lisa, I leave this closing comment: You did nothing wrong. You are not a bad person, and you deserve so much better. Don’t let the actions of a damaged person damage you. You are stronger than that.

Until next time, keep fighting.

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