I spent years in therapy slowly learning how to feel safe with another human being. My therapist—let’s call him Eugene—was steady, calm, and kind. He didn’t flinch when I cried, when I dissociated, or when I struggled to believe I was real. He listened with compassion to the parts of me that emerged, each holding different memories of my childhood abuse. For a long time, I believed we had built something strong enough to hold the weight of all I carried.
But then came the rupture.
It happened during an online session in early February 2021. I was sitting at my laptop, expectant, a little anxious. I had something important to ask, and something even more important to offer.
What happened in that session left me gutted.
In hindsight, the rupture had been coming for a while. From October through January, I had been secretly recording our sessions. I didn’t do it out of malice or disrespect—I did it because the recordings anchored me. I used them to revisit Eugene’s words when I was overwhelmed, to ground myself in his tone and pacing when I dissociated, and to help integrate my fragmented parts. But eventually, the secrecy weighed on me. So, in a session in late January, I told him. I came clean and asked if I could begin recording the sessions openly, with his consent. I also asked if I could give him a pair of hand-knit socks—something deeply symbolic to me.
He said he’d need to consult with his supervisor and would give me his answer the following week.
I spent the next few days anxious but hopeful. I had already dropped the socks off at his office, trusting the outcome would be positive. I didn’t expect a warm embrace or effusive thanks. I just hoped he’d receive the gesture in the spirit it was given: as a symbol of trust, care, and gratitude. For someone like me—a survivor of profound relational trauma—offering a gift like that was more than personal. It was sacred.
When the session arrived, I was hopeful. But Eugene’s demeanor was different—flatter, more distant.
First, he told me I couldn’t continue recording our sessions. Not even with consent. He said I needed to delete all prior recordings. His tone was firm, matter-of-fact. There was no discussion. No curiosity about why the recordings mattered so much to me. No questions about what they helped me cope with. Just a directive.
Before I could fully absorb that loss, I asked about the socks. I already knew something was wrong, but I pushed forward—surely this, at least, would land.
“I can’t accept them,” he said. “It’s too convoluted.”
Those four words landed like a blow.
Convoluted. That’s what he called it. Not “meaningful,” not “complicated,” not “intimate.” Convoluted. As if my gesture was somehow tangled, manipulative, or inappropriate. He didn’t say it unkindly—but he also didn’t explain. He just told me I would have to return to his office to pick them up.
And that was it. No invitation to explore what it meant. No curiosity about the significance of the gesture. Just a closed door. All this occurred within the first fifteen minutes of the session. It’s entirely possible that Eugene might have posed those questions, had I been able to finish the session. But I couldn’t speak and quickly ended the call.
What “Too Convoluted” Meant to Me
I have complex PTSD, shaped by years of betrayal and abuse in early childhood. My mind is structured dissociatively—parts of me carry different memories and functions, and therapy was the first place many of those parts ever felt safe.
For one part of me—a young, developmentally frozen aspect of self—Eugene represented something she never had: consistent, safe care. She trusted him. She believed he cared. The socks were her way of saying, “I see you. You matter to me.”
For that part, and for others, the rejection of the socks was not about wool or boundaries. It was about something much deeper. It was about being unwanted.
And when the recordings were taken away in the same session—tools that helped me reorient to his presence when I fragmented—it was like being stripped of the last anchor I had.
I spiraled. Within days, I was severely dissociated and psychotic. I couldn’t sleep, eat, or track reality. I was hospitalized soon after. The rupture had touched something primal—something my nervous system interpreted as abandonment and betrayal.
The Cost of Silence
What hurt most wasn’t the decisions Eugene made—it was how he made them. There was no process. No curiosity. No attempt to understand what the socks or the recordings meant to me. When I tried to revisit it later, he shut down. Sometimes he got defensive. Sometimes he remembered it completely differently from me. It was disorienting. At times, I felt like I was arguing with a brick wall—or worse, being subtly gaslit.
The most devastating part of it all was this: he didn’t stay. Not emotionally. Not relationally. He couldn’t or wouldn’t join me in unpacking what happened. And that’s what broke me.
In trauma therapy, rupture is inevitable. But repair is not. And when it doesn’t come—especially for survivors of betrayal trauma—it’s not just a therapeutic failure. It’s a reenactment of the original wound.
Understanding the Reenactment
Many trauma survivors, especially those with complex trauma, develop a deep sensitivity to relational signals. Polyvagal theory helps us understand this: when the nervous system is constantly scanning for threat, even subtle cues of disconnection or dismissal can trigger a full-body survival response.
When Eugene told me to delete the recordings without asking why I’d made them…
When he said the socks were “too convoluted” and declined them without discussion…
When he shut down attempts to revisit the rupture in later sessions…
All of that felt like a collapse in connection. A dorsal vagal freeze. A withdrawal of attunement. My body interpreted it as danger. Not metaphorical danger—real, lived, existential danger.
In betrayal trauma, the wound isn’t just what was done to us—it’s that it was done by someone we depended on. The therapist-client relationship can recreate that dynamic, especially when the therapist becomes an attachment figure.
That’s what happened with Eugene. And when the rupture came, and no repair followed, my nervous system responded as if the past had returned.
Therapists Hold Power—Even When They Don’t Feel It
I’m not writing this to vilify Eugene. I believe he cared. I believe he wanted to help. But good intentions don’t shield clients from harm. And therapists often underestimate the power they hold—not because they’re controlling, but because they matter so deeply.
They become lifelines.
When a therapist declines a gift, or says no to a request, it doesn’t mean they’re wrong. Boundaries are essential. But how those boundaries are communicated makes all the difference. Are they spoken with curiosity? With care? With room for the client’s meaning to unfold? Or are they delivered flatly, with no relational invitation?
For me, the abruptness of Eugene’s boundary-setting turned a moment of potential growth into one of trauma. The moment cried out for co-regulation—for attunement, exploration, and repair. What I got instead was distance.
Why This Story Matters
Too often, therapists are trained to focus on techniques and interventions. But for survivors of relational trauma, the therapy relationship is the intervention. It’s where the injury happened, and it’s where healing must occur.
If you’re a therapist reading this, please understand: when your client offers a gift, or makes a request that seems unusual, it’s rarely about what it seems. It’s about testing safety. It’s about memory. It’s about whether you’ll stay.
If you flinch, or freeze, or say “it’s too convoluted” without exploring what it means—you may unknowingly reenact the very thing your client is trying to heal from.
You don’t have to say yes to everything. But you do have to stay in the room. Emotionally. Relationally. You have to be willing to bear witness to your client’s meaning, not just enforce your own.
The Invitation
So here’s my invitation: when rupture happens—and it will—lean in.
Ask what it meant to your client. Share what it brought up in you. Be honest. Be human. You don’t have to fix it all. You just have to stay.
Because for many of us, the staying is the healing.
Your story made me cry, I’m sorry you dealt with a psychologist who harmed you, Catherine.
But I will say, in different ways, I found the DSM deluded psychologists, and gaslighting psychologists, to really be among the worst of all humans … on par, and in partnership with, the evil iatrogenic illness creators of the psychiatric industry.
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Thank you for your empathy and for sharing your perspective. I hear your concerns about the harm that can come from certain practices in the mental health field.
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Great article and touching.
Within the practice of therapy, there’s theory and practice. Modern practice involves not taking any risks that might lead to complaints – but these are the same risks that could lead to repair and healing. A true, safe attachment.
IMO, the biggest problem in the therapy profession is the lack of filtering of who can become a therapist. This results in guidelines for the lowest common denominator of therapists, which is what your story evokes.
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Matthew, I’m curious – how would you go about filtering that? My worst therapy experience was with a PsyD who I was paying $200/hr. On paper, she looked great, and it took time for me to understand that she was gaslighting and hurting me. When I confronted her about my concerns and how I was feeling, she cried and told me about personal issues and I realized that her mental health was worse than mine. It was so bad, but again, on paper she looked great.
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When one of the first therapists I saw trying to heal from a sexual assault took it upon herself to tell me she wasn’t my friend at the end of our session, I never went back. It would have been helpful if she had included the concept of boundaries in a session, but I was so broken at the time it just shocked me and left me feeling sad and rejected. I spent more than a decade trying to reconcile the damage the assault had done in my life. It was a lonely path. I get why a therapist needs to keep a professional relationship, but I hope they can understand better who their client is. I was barely 19, very much a kid in many ways, and very in need of care and understanding.
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Jenny, I’m so sorry you were met with that kind of abruptness when you were already so raw. Boundaries matter, but so does attunement — and a good therapist can hold both at the same time. What you describe is such a lonely place to be, and it’s a missed opportunity for real care. Your words resonate with me deeply, because so much of what I write is about that same tension between needing connection and being told there’s a line.
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Oof that’s rough. I have CPTSD and the thing I always say to a new therapist or psychiatrist is I need you to be friendly but I’m not paying a friend. I say this at the very 1st session or intake so expectations and boundaries are clearly defined. It took me decades to be confident enough to say this though.
That the therapist made such a cold declaration is so so hurtful.
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Thank you for sharing this honest and personal story Catherine. What an enormous betrayal! As a fellow trauma survivor with C-PTSD I am furious for you. He really could have made such better choices.
As an audio producer I record all of my therapy sessions. My therapist never once had a problem with it. Your request was not unusual or bad. The treatment of your request was cold and for a trauma survivor – cruel.
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I have Bipolar Disorder NOS & CPTSD. I totally get why therapists don’t accept gifts from clients. Also, I would be horrified if someone was recording me without my knowledge/consent. It’s a violation of boundaries regardless of the reason. He could have handled it better, reinforcing the concept of boundaries within a therapeutic relationship.
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Agree
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Not just a violation of boundaries, it’s extremely illegal in Washington State, where she’s located. She’s just publicly confessed to committing a very serious crime against Eugene while framing herself as the victim.
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I understand not everyone will approve of my choices, but my article is about my lived experience as a survivor and what I’ve learned in my recovery. I stand by my decision to share my truth under my real name, and I won’t be engaging in anonymous debates that distract from that.
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Lol, I don’t know that I’d call it a “very serious crime.” When I think of “very serious crimes,” I think of things like murder, rape, and robbery. It’s a misdemeanor.
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That but also, it the request to record had been framed as a disabiity accomodation, it might have been possible. Yes, she might have asked 1st. I understand the reasons for recording but wonder if there might have been a different way to appoach it upfront.
It’s complicated. My psych allows recording but I am also in a one party cnsent state so there’s that.
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This was very thought provoking. It made me think about a time when I made a gesture of kindness and appreciation towards someone that was received poorly and how much that stung. It also made me think about times when I had to set boundaries or distance myself from others, and I hope I didn’t hurt those people too badly, as I know they had also experienced various forms of trauma. Your message for therapists should be a message for all of us. It’s about compassion and kindness. The thing that stood out the most is that your therapist didn’t even say thank you! I understand that it may be inappropriate for him to keep the gift, but if I were in his shoes, I would start with a big thank you for your thoughtfulness anyway. That’s just basic human decency!
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In my view rhere are two reasons he would have reacted the way he did. Either he was concerned that your relationship was extending beyond the bounds of the therapy space and that made things unpredictable or possibly dangerous. Or he was trying to protect the relationship, I had a similar experience going to a group theatre event with my psychologist which altered the trust and the dynamic was never the same again. In someways the therapeutic relationship is a construct that is vulnerable to being broken. So whether he was worried you were behaving in unpredictable ways that might have made him uncomfortable for his own fragile persona or whether he was trying to protect the relationship it had a detrimental effect on you and your own healing making you feel let down again. Thanks for your story it has helped highlight something that I didn’t understand before, but these relationships are so fragile and its a shame he couldn’t have been more honest with you about his reasons and put your mind to rest.
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As a therapist, I am very grateful you have written this. I often see patients who have had terrible relational experiences and have found me somehow. The relationship is everything! Unfortunately, current university programs focus on diagnoses, techniques and theoretical constructs that neglect the very essence of what psychological therapy is: a relationship.
I do however sympathise with Eugine. He, unfortunately, wasn’t guided well in this situation. I don’t blame him. It’s clear to me that he had a natural gift but when consulting with his supervisor, he began doubting his intuition and turned into the robot that sadly, so many therapists are trained to be. Yes, he was technically correct. Technically, the recording wasn’t legal and the gift you gave him breached the boundaries. But you are also correct that it could have (and should have) sparked a conversation about the nature of the therapeutic relationship and the reasons behind your actions. This would have made your connection much stronger and helped you so much in your healing. It’s very sad for me that generations of therapists are turning away from being genuine and human. I urge any therapists reading this to read “the Gift of Therapy” by Irvin Yalom. This summarises exactly what this beautifully written account is lacking in the therapeutic approach.
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You sound like “one of the good ones,” Hoda. You are right, it’s all about the relationship. Science has shown that to be the case, yet we continue to train people to “have boundaries” by denying the basic humanity of one person communicating honestly with another. Techniques can be handy, but truly caring and being deeply curious about the client are essential for any kind of success. Plus being humble and flexible, to do what works FOR THIS CLIENT instead of what someone says you’re supposed to do!
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How has science shown this to be the case when it’s actually about whether or not two people connect?
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Because when comparing results of different “styles” or “schools” of therapy, none of them were consistently superior. The ONLY variable that consistently predicted better outcomes was the quality of relationship with the therapist. If people felt safe and heard and believed, they did better. If they saw the therapist as aloof or distant or dismissive or invalidative, they did worse. It is kind of that simple.
Of course, as we have said multiple times before, therapists are not especially more likely than the general public to have these skills. Science has supported that, too. You’re just as likely to feel helped by a friend or neighbor or colleague as a therapist. It all comes down to good listening and being there for the person, wherever they are at. IMHO.
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Agree 100%. But if that’s what the science shows, why are therapists trained in such a remarkably convoluted way?
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You are laboring under the illusion that those training therapists are doing so in accordance with what science shows to be most essential!
I’m also not too sure such training can be effective with just anyone. I think it requires a good bit of self-awareness that would require the therapist to deal with his/her own issues before assuming such a role. A lot of people are not interested in or are not capable of that level of self-awareness, and as such should probably be disallowed from ever becoming therapists. But of course, that assumes the TRAINERS and LICENSERS have that degree of self-awareness as well…
Bottom line, it’s kind of a long shot to find someone who really knows how to help. And I don’t know how to screen them except for personal experience. It’s a conundrum, especially when folks are often getting paid for providing little or for making things worse!
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This is a very interesting topic, and there is a viral TikTok going around right now under the banner of “I fell in love with my psychiatrist.” Predictably, everyone is piling on the client. Since the therapist is not going to speak publicly, people are only hearing the client’s side and reacting to that without much reflection on the inherent power dynamics of therapy itself.
The problem with therapy, anywhere in the world, is that the therapist always holds the power. This is something Freud himself acknowledged: transference is always part of therapy, and the therapist is the one in control of it. Yet the word “power” almost never comes up in the therapy room. You might hear “consent” or “boundary,” but rarely “power.” That is not because therapists do not feel powerful, it is because they already have it, and a good therapist must know how to express this power therapeutically. It is like government: you do not have to feel power to have it; you simply have it. The therapist is an institution that is legally and ethically regulated.
In your case, I think there were two main turning points. First, you recorded him without telling him. That took power away from him, and he felt vulnerable naturally, but even after supervision, he did not address it as such and went into protection mode. Of course, that feels like power to the already disadvantaged client in the power dynamic. Second, you sent him socks before he had agreed to receive them, and this could again be considered breaking consent. But that is what therapy is for, learning and experiencing rupture and repair. This was a rupture for him, and he did not repair it appropriately. He interpreted it as a boundary crossing. Rupture is often associated with the client, but sometimes it can be the therapist, hence the need for supervision. This time he went into protection mode, so now the client is left in a powerless position and also unable to repair with the power position. It is a reenactment of exactly that power play and a missed opportunity for the therapist to show maturity and skill combined. At the end of the day, realistically, getting a gift is annoying but not earth-shattering. You did not send a dead rabbit.
The problem is that instead of engaging with you as an equal adult in the room, he chose to retreat to “the rules,” and in doing so, he used those rules as a shield not as therapeutic once things became messy. I call this the fascism of the human mind, a retreat into pure dominance and a despotic stance, rather than having an open, equal, and human conversation. When power fails, equality is often exposed, and how the previous power holder reacts sets the tone. He folded and left you dry.
Therapy, at its best, involves two people in the room, one opening their boundaries and the other observing them. When the observer chooses dominance over dialogue, the relationship is no longer therapeutic. Unfortunately, what happened to you was pure harm.
I could go on about your perspective, but I think it may be that you were trying to learn this lesson of when you are not the victim but have power, such as in the recording, how you hold that power. What it seems you learned is that you should not have power because you are dangerous. Also that when you cross a boundary, you do not deserve love or acceptance – things that one may learn in therapy after a severe trauma such as CPTDS. This experience seems to reinforce those missed developmental mileage, but by the grace of god, here you are reflecting and writing about it, so one may say you have also learned in this rupture that you have power even if it is not given to you at times and though he, the therapist may rejected you, you are here being validated and accepted as a fallible human being!
We cannot go to therapy to rework experiences unconsciously, and then get punished when the exact reworking happens in real live.
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Someone above pointed out that recording without consent is a crime in some states. This made me think about how, even when a truly serious crime has been committed, dialogue can be beneficial. There can be both accountability and healing. This is what restorative justice is all about.
Even though therapy is usually one-way, I think it might have been appropriate here for Eugene to explain the impact of Catherine’s actions on him. Being recorded without consent might have made him feel like he couldn’t trust her. The timing of the gift might have made it seem like it was connected, like, “I did this bad thing but I’m sorry and I appreciate you and I made you some socks to make up for it.” Like she thinks it’s ok because she’s offering a gift. I imagine that’s where the (poorly expressed) “convoluted” comment came in…
It seems like Catherine and most of the commenters understand this- that there can be accountability and boundaries AND strengthened relationships and understanding, all at the same time, through presence and openness and dialogue. Catherine is also partly responsible for the harm to the relationship, but how is she supposed to learn and make it right if he shuts down and doesn’t allow conversation on the topic?
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I don’t agree. Catherine is not responsible to gain Eugene’s trust. It’s the other way around. If she were recording me, I’d be saying, “That’s an interesting decision you made there. Why did you think it was important to record our conversations?” It would not be at all threatening – just another opportunity to develop the relationship with the client.
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A better question would be, “Why didn’t you ask permission to record me?” Probably, she worried that being recorded would make him uncomfortable or that he’d say no… which tells you all you need to know, really. I’m sure she knew it was wrong. I believe most practices have rules against recording sessions. I know I’ve signed paperwork at intake agreeing not to record. She knew he might not be ok with it, and she did it anyway, and then she just assumed that he’d forgive her and grant her permission to continue because he “cared” about her, and because she knit him some socks.
Maybe it’s not her job to gain his trust, but it’s her job to follow whatever policies she agreed to at intake, as well as state law. She needs to understand that just because someone is enforcing a boundary, policy, or law doesn’t mean they don’t care about her. It’s not about her or about being abandoned. It’s about them being able to enforce a boundary or being able to say “no” to something. It doesn’t matter why the recordings were important to her. Eugene still doesn’t have to agree to be recorded, and she should still respect that.
I learned a long time ago that an unsafe person is someone who cannot hear or accept the word “no.” “Traumatized” might be a better word here than “unsafe,” but regardless, it sounds like this is something Catherine needs to work on. “Can I record our sessions?” “No.” “Can I give you a gift?” “No.” Catherine (and her nervous system) need to find a way to cope with hearing that. She can’t just assume that someone’s going to say yes to everything and break policies just because they like her and want her to be happy. That can become a dangerously slippery slope.
“If this person truly cares about me, they’ll do X or accept X behavior and stand by me no matter what.” Yes, I’ve been here with people before… I’m guessing you haven’t had any close friends or family members who are addicts. Boundaries are essential, and therapy is the ideal place for people to learn about them.
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I absolutely support that he has the right to ask her not to record the sessions, and refusing the gift was the right thing to do. What I’m trying to say is that her decision to do so says something about HER and what her ideas, needs and motivations are. One can set expectations without engaging in power dynamics. Whatever the client does, whether it’s allowed to continue or not, provides an opportunity to understand her motivations and intentions and provides a pathway to understanding what is behind them. Which is, after all, what therapy is supposed to be about. Again, let’s say she’s agreed to a no-recording policy. The conversation can easily go to, “Do you remember signing the agreement not to record the sessions? So if you knew that, what made you feel that recording them was necessary?” Or words to that effect. Something is going on with her. You don’t have to allow her to keep recording sessions without humiliating her or making her feel small. After all, she IS the client – if she were entirely rational, why would she be needing therapy? Why not use the opportunity to explore what is underneath her behavior, rather than shaming her? That’s what I’m suggesting.
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Steve, are you suggesting that being in therapy means someone is irrational? Because if you are, it contradicts the party line that choosing to be in therapy is the rational thing to do.
And since it’s true that expectations can be set without engaging in power dynamics, who needs therapy’s power dynamics?
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I think we’re all irrational to some degree. Which is why it’s silly to call some people “mentally ill” because they act in certain ways, since almost anyone could be so labeled in the right (or wrong) circumstances. I am sure I could get such a label slapped on me since my wife died, if I let anyone with the power close enough to do so. And yes, I do behave irrationally sometimes. It’s part of being human.
It is true that help of any sort is hampered by power dynamics, not just in therapy, of course, but with doctors, teachers, lawyers, social workers, and so on. Some people choose to take advantage of their one-up power situation, some don’t. To be useful, therapists would have to be trusted to step down from their one-up position. But of course, no one can guarantee that, which makes seeking a therapist fraught with potential harm. As I’ve said many times, the fact of being a therapist or having a degree is no guarantee of being helpful. It doesn’t even improve the odds.
However, I have seen some remarkable work done by therapists from time to time. I can’t dismiss it altogether as always being a bad thing, since I benefitted from a good therapist myself. But that was my good fortune. It was also back in the 80s, when therapists had not yet been trained to be DSM-compliant as most have today. I have, in fact, recently found a grief counselor who has been very helpful to me, and I appreciate her. But believe you me, I screened heavily before engaging with her, and told her what I expected and that I would only continue if those expectations were met. She wasn’t perfect (who is), but she accepted and acted on my feedback, and did provide some excellent support when I needed it. So have any number of friends I have relied on since the loss of my wife, including a local pastor with whom I am now good friends. Help comes from wherever it comes from, and just because power dynamics can be exercised by a provider doesn’t mean they will. It’s not quite that black and white to me.
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I like that idea of pointing to the agreement she signed and asking why she felt recording was necessary (or ok). I was struggling to think of how this would look. As someone who actually prefers more direct communication, I didn’t think his straightforward response of simply asking her to delete the recordings and discontinue her behavior was that bad, but I can see how your response would be better and may have prevented her from spiraling the way she did.
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Steve, I understand what you’re saying. I just find opening up too difficult—and frankly impossible—to people who refuse to confide in me as well.
I don’t trust people or situations that operate like that, for whatever reason.
Therapy can be beneficial, but I believe it’s in spite of the person being a therapist, not because of it. The power imbalance in therapy is unhealthy because it inevitably creates dependence ON THE THERAPIST, a situation that implicitly encourages people to trust their therapist MORE THAN THEMSELVES.
When I was in my early twenties, I was seeing a man whom I feared had a drinking problem. A teacher of mine, who was also facing the same problem, took me to an Al-Anon meeting, which is for the friends and families of alcoholics. The energy there was incredible. Even though I wasn’t a member, I couldn’t believe how emotionally attuned the members were, as opposed to the psychiatrists or therapists I had seen.
The best part was when other new people shared the ridiculous psychoanalytic explanations and so-called “diagnoses” their own psychiatrist or therapist had given them, which was usually followed by many longtime members laughing in recognition at the memory of their own misadventures in therapy. And even though I rarely shared, I felt seen and heard in a way I hadn’t in “therapy”.
Support groups like 12-step where psych professionals are forbidden leadership roles are a much healthier option, imo, because nothing’s more therapeutic than listening to people who aren’t afraid or ashamed to share how they manage their own struggles because that’s where bridges to healing are created and, more importantly, where trust in oneself is born.
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Ah, but I DID often confide in my clients. I found self-disclosure to be a very powerful way to connect on a real level, even if there are some who would have criticized my “poor boundaries.” But I get where you’re coming from. I’ve always been a big fan of support groups NOT “facilitated by a professional.” Those who have been there and done that are usually the safest people to talk and share with. And again, finding a capable therapist is a challenging proposition. I was quite aggressive in my screening and prepared to drop the grief counselor at a moment’s notice if the process did not meet my needs. Most potential clients are not in a position to take such an assertive stance, nor are most aware that they need to. Only years of experiencing seeing how crappy the average therapy experience was led me to be able to take such steps. I certainly would never trust or assume that the therapist in question was competent or safe without thoroughly testing them out in ways that most people would not realize are necessary or have the skills to accomplish.
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“Most potential clients are not in a position to take such an assertive stance, nor are most aware that they need to.”
This is EXACTLY why I think seeing a therapist is as risky as seeing a psychiatrist. Too much can go wrong either way because the system’s set up to protect practitioners more than clients. It’s your word against theirs, and people who’ve had the misfortune of being labeled with a psychiatric diagnosis automatically lose their credibility.
On top of that, there seems to be few therapists these days who welcome clients who disagree or even challenge them. So, it essentially becomes a power struggle most clients are bound to lose.
So, when something goes wrong, like what happened with “Eugene”, you’re usually hung out to dry.
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Hi Steve, I saw in one of your replies you have recently lost your wife. I am so sorry to hear that and want to extend my sympathy and condolences on your loss. Sending prayers and comfort your way during a very difficult time.
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Thank you, Rosalee. It has been quite a process so far, and still only 4 months in. But I have learned a lot about myself and finding my way. It’s a big change!
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The asymmetry therapy demands means the cards are stacked against the vulnerable.
It’s a shitty setup for grandiose people who like getting paid for being fake.
I dare anyone to come up with a more exploitive line of work.
IMHO.
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“It doesn’t matter why the recordings were important to her.”
It absolutely DOES matter why the recordings were important to Catherine because it reveals how hard things have been for her.
I think her actions revealed an understandable desperation for emotional support she’d never had and perhaps was fearful of losing.
Should she have recorded without asking? Of course not. But I think having some compassion as to why she didn’t ask was in order. It was a golden opportunity for Eugene to have helped her learn about healthy boundaries.
And she certainly didn’t deserve to be humiliated by therapist “Eugene”.
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Would anyone actually read this article, with the intent of comprehension, rather than going along with the fashion present regarding such [therapy, psychology, etc.] one could easily see that Catherine, in how she heals, and what kind of matrix of interaction giving someone a pair of knit sock meant, and how healthy that gesture is; to have someone make that out to be convoluted, not only points out that the “therapist” the whole time had a whole plethora of bizarre interpretations, and the whole gambit of game theory that R. D. Laing clearly , with his research, shows shuts down healing; then to include yet another bizarre interpretation or more than one, right in line with what shut down healing, and make this out to be what!? And Catherine is supposed to allow conversation on this, akin to a black slave in the old south sitting down to hear an exposition of WHY his master supposedly is superior to him, and he’s there to be his master’s slave, and “god” wanted it such, just when the “slave” has started to realize otherwise, or is healing from it. And one can fantasize that everyone agrees with this, that Catherine is responsible to “listen” having played game theory and adding up what “profit” there is from such, but…..
I think Catherine has found people she can listen to.
And not with people who think sharing a pair of knitted socks is “convoluted,” or that someone who disassociates, and can’t even remember everything consequently that went on in a session or integrate the emotional response, who thus records it to actually help with healing 9again very clearly explained0, that this is instead what!? And getting away from it is what!?
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When you ask for something and offer a gift at the same time, it becomes convoluted. I imagine Eugene’s response to the gift would have been different were it offered at any other time.
People are saying this has to do with the therapy power dynamic, but I don’t even think that’s true. It could be the same for any relationship. “Honey, I’ve been recording you without your knowledge and I’m sorry, but I really love you and I have a gift for you.”
I hope these comments aren’t too triggering. I hate that she was sent into crisis over this, but the more I think about it, the more I see Eugene’s perspective. It is convoluted.
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Thank you so much for your comment. I see now that’s what he must have meant. It was a very fraught, complex situation when I was not in my right mind. Also, this occurred in the middle of a five year long period in which I was his client. I continued to see him after this for two and a half years. I have since learned a lot.
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I’m glad you guys were able to work through it, and I’m very glad you’re in a better place now. Thanks for your piece. It’s generated a lot of interesting discussion!
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“When you ask for something and offer a gift at the same time, it becomes convoluted.” There must be more to convolution than asking for something and offering a gift please supply us with the list. And please regarding what is convoluted that goes along with giving a gift as well as what is convoluted that goes along with asking for something. Thank you.
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I understand giving a gift and not asking for something. But I don’t get asking for something and not giving a gift so much I guess. I guess it depends on what you’re asking for. If you were asking for the ability to give something then yeah or not?
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Sorry, I meant to have sock and plural.
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The needless risk of transference is why I view the dynamics of therapy—especially dyadic—as inherently unhealthy.
It’s the main reason therapy never worked for me: I intuitively recognized that any intimate relationship structured to elevate one party, under the guise of expertise or healing, inevitably demands a kind of submissiveness—almost a type of cowering—that is anything but healing.
It’s why I view therapy as a serious disservice to vulnerable people seeking emotional clarity.
It’s also why I view therapy as inherently harmful for anyone, except perhaps the therapist.
And as for the “therapist” Catherine was seeing… I think he feared the possibility of future lawsuits.
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I never thought there was any real risk to therapy. I trusted the therapist to keep my information confidential, and I was confident in my own ability to think critically about anything I was told. My workplace offered full reimbursement for me to see a therapist of my choice, so I figured I might as well take advantage of the benefit. Couldn’t hurt, I thought.
Over 3-4 years, I saw three different therapists, all women with doctorates in psychology. My first two experiences were pretty neutral – I don’t feel like the therapists abused their power or were exploitative. I trusted them but also spent a lot of time feeling misunderstood and frustrated by my inability to make progress. My inability to benefit from therapy made me feel even more broken. We always hear that therapy is something that can benefit everyone, and I desperately wanted to figure it out and to be someone who could be supported and helped by a therapist.
In a last ditch effort to get help (with relationships and burnout), I went to therapist #3, an autism specialist. I’d always recognized autistic traits in myself and thought this person may be able to understand and help where the others had not. Unfortunately, this ended up being the person who did abuse their power and got into my head in a way I hadn’t believed possible. I was so naive and trusting, and I feel so stupid now. She made harmful assumptions about me, my capabilities, my past, and my future. She made me believe that there was some big, ugly thing inside me (“autism”) that I had to accept in order to move forward. Something limiting. Something of which I lacked awareness. Yet, I couldn’t wrap my mind around what this thing was, which was super confusing. She tried to dictate my identity to me. She wanted me to experience an “autism journey” that looked a certain way, and eventually, when it wasn’t happening, she admitted that she didn’t know how to help. In the end, I experienced deeper, darker feelings than I had ever felt in my life including self-hatred, hopelessness, and a blind rage. Therapy with her is the only experience in my life that I really think of as being traumatic. MIA has been tremendously helpful in helping me to get my head back on straight.
Many people claim to benefit from therapy, so I’m not sure it’s always harmful, but it certainly can be. It’s riskier than people like to acknowledge.
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Wow, Erin. I get what you went through. All you need to do is substitute “affective disorder” for autism and we could almost be twins.
It’s clear to me therapist #3 was more interested in having you validate her than the other way around. That was my experience with most of the therapists and psychiatrists I saw, to one degree or another.
I’m really glad you were able to extricate yourself both physically and psychologically from what sounds like a female Darth Vader. I would bet not everyone can.
It’s taken me years to emotionally cleanse my mind and emotions of the putrid stench and residue found only in psychiatry’s psychopharmacological sewer pit. It used to live in my head like an unwanted guest that never knows when to leave.
MIA has been tremendously helpful for me as well in untangling the mess psychiatry/psychotherapy left me with, namely the hatred, hopelessness and blind rage I used to feel all the time. Reading other people’s personal stories has made me see that I’m not alone in what I’ve been through.
It’s taken me years to regain confidence in myself.
And you are right. Therapy helps many people. But it can be uniquely harmful to those it does not.
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“… I don’t feel like the therapists abused their power or were exploitive, I trusted them but also spent a lot of time feeling misunderstood and frustrated by my inability to make progress. My inability to benefit from therapy made me feel even more broken. We always hear that therapy is something that can benefit everyone, and I desperately wanted to figure it out and to be someone who could be supported and helped by a therapist.”
Erin, I get every word you’ve said because I’ve lived every word you’ve said. It’s just incredibly hard for me to articulate things as clearly and rationally as you have.
Most of the psych professionals I saw weren’t abusive or exploitive in the traditional sense, although I feel far less sanguine about the psychiatrists I encountered. Still, I could never shake the sense that the profession itself is inherently exploitive. I know that might sound extreme, but it’s the only way I can describe how contaminated I felt after seeing a therapist, even when I liked and respected them.
There’s something about the exchange of money for matters of the soul that feels morally repugnant to me. I’ve tried to explain this before, but it’s hard to put into words. It’s not just about the medicalization or boundaries or professionalism—it’s about the commodification of vulnerability. That’s what I find so disturbing.
When talking with you or other psych survivors, I don’t feel the need to fear being pathologized, minimized or negatively psychoanalyzed for feeling or thinking the way I do. But I can’t say the same for however many psych professionals who might read my comments on MIA.
Simply put, I find it deeply dishonest to medically label people’s emotional and psychological states. People may think it doesn’t harm them, but I believe it does, and often in ways they’re not even aware of.
That’s why I can never take as neutral a stance on therapy as I sometimes think I should, because no matter how much it may help some people, I can’t ignore the harm it causes others.
And most of all I can’t forget how diminished I felt and disgusted I was with myself for participating in something that felt so fundamentally wrong.
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My goodness!
I never had therapy, with such people. And then I found that anyone calling themselves a social worker could make up the same array of abusive nonsense, would people get a bit offended was anyone not hired, officiated, locked in or imprisoned by their bulk equivalence of “how-one-should-behave.” Make it up, tell the authorities, and voila, you have the scarlet letter all over again, only now it’s a C for “crazy.”
I did have, actually, something that was called therapy, although I didn’t see it as such, and am NOT going to be fooled into making it out such. I ran into people that channel spirits. Just another perspective, like talking to someone that sees differently, in their case it’s more they don’t see the one point in time our eyes see, given that when you look at this you don’t see what the next post is going to be, they might see all of that akin to an array of potentials beyond just one point. And then they have to take over another human being’s body to talk, so I wanted to get to know them. It was funny, sometimes. My best friend being Mozart’s mother, she had come through so many mediums, that the last time, having come in with a sleepy hi, and then the question, as if she’s on duty: “What questions do you have for me?” I totally blanked out, like you might were you asked to tell someone why to be a politician your hair has to resemble something that’s been shellacked or a duck decoy, it’s this nonsense “adults” go on about, and to anyone still fresh enough from reality, you just shrug, and take on the expression one has wondering why such billed on billboards is in such large print, being your eyes, really aren’t that large, you’re not deaf as if the size increases the volume, and you are to be amazed. She started then, after a pause just being herself talking about a memory that resonated so wonderfully there’s been miracles, poetry, friends from nowhere and more wonders out of nowhere. But at first, it being so out of sorts, I said I didn’t hear what she said, and she repeated it. I must have been talking about wanting to hear it without this medium. I actually thought: “here, she’s flipped her lid, you see try all these mediums and she’s lost it.” Because such stuff really doesn’t go along with the whole shall we say pretension that the spirits are the authority. She didn’t lose it, and I haven’t asked, or had to, deal with mediums. I did find a therapist though who she could move through, and simply respond to my thought, at the moment. But that only needed to happen once, and was nothing more than a “thank you,” because I was thinking as thought goes.
Then the person I was thinking of, or another like him, when thanked because I at least cared to see someone was trying to express themselves, he got on a bus with me, then grabbed me, just like here. As Emily Dickinson describes:
“He strained my faith—
Did he find it supple?
Shook my strong trust—
Did it then—yield?
Hurled my belief—
But—did he shatter—it?
Racked—with suspense—
Not a nerve failed!
Wrung me—with Anguish—
But I never doubted him—
‘Tho’ for what wrong
He did never say—
Stabbed—while I sued
His sweet forgiveness—
Jesus—it’s your little “John”!
Don’t you know—me?
Then little John’s friend himself showed up. Saw him last Sunday, just sitting at a quiet spot. I had bought him a shirt, a bit gothic in style, years a go, for just that age, had felt rather pretentious about it, as one is want to. Had completely forgotten, but then he showed up, after spending considerable time with me every day for a week and a half, showed up with the same style, that he would have out grown the shirt, and then again, the same. A week and a day later, or as they say, forever and a day……
If a therapist isn’t going to be a friend, then they should just….. F! O!
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I once sought the services of a very nice therapist for a few weeks while trying to navigate some sort of job.
What made the biggest impression on me was her saying—out-of-the-blue—that she had a vision of me writing a lot in the future, something I welcomed hearing, but not because I’d ever dreamt of becoming a writer.
The truth is I’d never even kept a diary, and had only written extensively when forced to in school.
I welcomed it because I’d also had some out-of-the-blue visions of the future for some people I’d known that actually came true when there was no reason to have thought certain good things would ever take place.
But I chose not to share this, her being a therapist and all…
Let’s here it for the bullshit boundaries so-called “therapy” forces on people just searching for some kind of friendly human interaction.
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“Boundaries” can be used as tools or weapons by the person with more power, hence the therapists. It can be a way to avoid the therapist’s own feelings and blame the client. That seems to me like what happened to the author.
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Boundaries are fine. Everyone needs them.
What I object to is therapists who misuse boundaries which I would bet happens all the time because the boundaries therapy imposes are ripe for misuse because there are few, if any, repercussions for misusing them.
That’s why I object so strongly to therapy’s power imbalance.
There was no need for the therapist to react the way he did when all he needed to do was say “Thank you for being so thoughtful, but I’m not supposed to accept gifts”, and then invite Catherine to share why she felt the need to record their conversations. That’s what any reasonably thoughtful person would do in any other relationship, so why should it be any different in “therapy”, expect to inappropriately protect the therapist’s ego?
Here’s what I keep trying to say: the kind of one-way dynamic therapy thrives on infantilizes clients, which I didn’t experience as healthy in the slightest. The belief that emotionally traumatized people need to experience this type of interpersonally intense bond, i.e. “attachment” with a therapist I think is bullshit because it serves the therapist more than the client because it implicitly demands the client’s subservience.
Infantilization of clients is impossible to avoid for the simple reason that infantilization of clients is the very nature of therapy itself, meaning therapists have more emotional power. It’s completely skewed.
The truth is no one needs “therapy” with all its boundary-heavy artificiality that puts therapists on pedestals when all people need is to be seen and heard.
I do my best to put into words how awful it felt, no matter how likable the therapist, to be in that type of boundary-heavy relationship where one person has the upper hand for reasons I don’t consider justified.
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I agree wholeheartedly with your proposed approach. Boundaries means saying “no” politely but firmly, not humiliating the client! And you are also correct to say that the power imbalance makes it too easy to be defensive and take out feelings on the client. It’s up to the therapist not to abuse the power imbalance, but I find few who really are capable of doing so.
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Clarification:
The belief that emotionally traumatized people need to experience this type (infantilizing) interpersonally intense bond, i.e., “attachment” with a therapist I think is bullshit because it serves the therapist more than the client because it implicitly demands the client behave deferentially towards the therapist, which, needless to say, is very gratifying for the therapist.
It was impossible for me not to sense a therapist’s or psychiatrist’s unspoken expectation of being deferred to, just for breathing, essentially. It was something I’d witnessed and understood all my life just from observing the way people change once they find out someone is a doctor or therapist of some kind.
The psychological dynamics play out pretty much the same in professional or social situations, which to me explains how easy it is for people to ahve advanced degrees got to their head.
Seeing it happen now still validates the gut feeling I’d had since I was a small child that advanced degrees in the psychological field mostly serve to inflate the ego of the person who has them.
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CORRECTION:
The psychological dynamics play out pretty much the same whether in social or professional situations, which for me explains how easy it is for people with advanced degrees in psychology to have it go to their head.
IN MY HUMBLE OBSERVATION.
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“And you are also correct to say that the power imbalance makes it too easy to be defensive and take out feelings on the client.”
Thank you, Steve. Yes, this what I object to the most because it leaves clients with no recourse to safely regain their emotional equilibrium. They’re left feeling guilty for what are essentially the therapist’s serious emotional shortcomings and insecurities, the very things I firmly believe are what drives so many people to become a therapist.
It’s the reason I think of psychotherapy as psychologically and emotionally cannibalistic.
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It is true that many are driven to become therapists by a feeling of their own incompleteness or inadequacy. This in itself should not disqualify them, but they must have already dealt with these feelings effectively themselves and be relatively emotionally healthy in order NOT to take advantage of the noted power imbalance. I have found such people rare, either in or out of the therapeutic professions. Among psychiatrists, I’ve found them almost nonexistent. Doctors in general tend toward the authoritarian, I’d say, but the number of truly self-aware and non-authoritarian psychiatrists I’ve met over many years of working both within and on the edges of the system can be counted on one hand.
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I agree, Steve. Doctors in general tend toward the authoritarian, but I actually welcome that when it comes to my physical health for what I think are obvious reasons.
Psychotherapists are another matter entirely, for reasons I wish were just as obvious.
Just an aside: My father was a psychiatrist, but it never went to his head. He was the first to say that most psychiatrists are jerks—something that made me respect him all the more.
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I still think medical doctors need to be much more flexible and honest about side effects and options and alternatives. They also often exercise the option to be defensive when getting something wrong. Remember that most stimulants and antidepressants are prescribed by non-psychiatric doctors.
Plus my experience with cancer treatment tells me that most doctors don’t really know about the drugs they prescribe. I recently experienced a sudden and dramatic recovery from significant anemia after discontinuing one blood pressure drug (Losartan) at my own behest. Sure enough, looking up that drug immediately showed red blood cell production to be suppressed in rare cases, but particularly if one is over 60 (which I am) and takes it for an extended period (which I had been). When I confronted the doctor about it, he said, “I’ve never seen that.” Well, now he has. But he didn’t even record the dramatic recovery in the chart notes. Just said I’d potentially lost some kind of protection against sudden heart attacks, “But I did not take up this issue with the patient.”
Doctors should advise. Patients should decide. Doctors should be honest and accept patient feedback. Even if they are “right,” authoritarian doctors prevent feedback and disempower clients. And empowered clients have better outcomes.
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Steve, thank you for reminding me that most stimulants and antidepressants are prescribed by non-psychiatric doctors.
When I said authoritarian all I meant was I like a medical doctor who’s able to calm me down. That’s not something that happened very often with therapists because most seemed more interested in making something out of nothing which drove me nuts.
Your realization that most doctors really don’t know about the drugs they prescribe does not surprise me. Doctors who say, “I’ve never seen that” when it’s right on the insert is infuriating, but it happens so often I’ve come to expect it.
I never know if I should believe them or not.
People over 55-60 need to be their own medical advocate because that’s when prescription-writing starts to snowball.
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There is a difference in my mind between “authoritative” (able to take charge as needed and help keep things in order) vs. “authoritarian,” which to me means attached to power and willing to use it to keep “subordinates” in their place in the hierarchy. Doctors who believe patients should just “do as they are told” are the ones I think are most dangerous. I don’t mind my doctor having a strong opinion and expressing it, but I have the right to do the same, and if s/he can’t acknowledge that, s/he will quickly become my former doctor!
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Thank you for clearing that up for me! 🙂
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Writing a book this is a difficult task. JK Rowling said it was because her mother died that all this drama exists between the two most famous students, both evidently having extreme problems at school. I actually ran into her mother three times. First time I just thought that lady looks rather invisible. She was vibrating as if you could see through her and then she got off close enough to The Calde, a statue we have in town. As I try to collect my thoughts with the horrendous booming outside I’d like to hurl a missile at and watch the implosion when the heat collapses of such insensitivity and the woof of smoke rises out of it: of cruising. Then she was on the bus and still having reactions that they called the disease I think they called such multiple sclerosis but it might have been from the medicationing they gave her for it, or who knows what. One actually can get the symptoms from what Donald Rumsfeld had put into production called aspartame, and that will also kill you, so she was going to get coffee so she had it would she be that she wanted it in the morning. Last Sunday before I ran into my friend of true love, sitting there quietly, I did run into her mother again and she was just wild and said you know me and I said yeah you were invisible she said she’s always visible now and then I mentioned how in between seeing you at the second and third time I ran into Maria Callas and I thought that that [Callas] was her and started talking to Maria Callas. And to feeling more of nothing both actually said the same thing to me regarding the day which was good. Maria Callas, after me think I know who she was, said it must have been somebody else, fun actually apologize because she was so involved with her own thoughts and couldn’t talk. I didn’t complete everything I said, just did, now through these characters that make up words that thanks to your eyes you here in your mind, it was so fleeting. And then she must have disappeared and I found my friend again. He walked away just like in the dream over the water, which was in the dream. It’s funny thing is but I must mention his flunky Peter drinking it in from a dream saw the same thing and told the whole world that he had done such but she [he] never did and Peter trying to get to him [in the dream] had fallen into the water needed to be rescued and still told everybody the same lie. In another time moving through the Indra valley or playing he needed monkeys to do such work for him. I don’t know if they could have called or hauled him out of the water but he would have expected so. But writing a book is a very difficult thing all the emotions to come up and simply trying to look beyond the boundaries of time to allow it all together… it’s seriously: it’s like having your head in a vice and as hard as you tried to look at what’s there on your right which would be something that comes together with the rest although you’re physical eyes can’t see it, it’s like you need the strength from some hydraulic mechanism that would lift something to the top of that highest building on the planet. Just be able to work yourself through to what’s going to bring everything together when the whole world says hey, that’s just luxury. Imagine walking around such pressure on you all the time! Or don’t. But it did at times seem like that for me. Doesn’t have to for everyone. For Christ’s sake don’t think everybody has to go through that!
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Giving a gift shows that there is no loss in giving. That’s a different world than the calculations of what one is supposed to get out of something, and wager it as a loss. Who then is supposed to go along with this, and “God” as well!? There are then systems that try to regulate this “Capitalism” then says one thing about it, and what they call “Communism” another. Either the one authority is supposed to be who shares, so it gets shared, or the other is the one that makes the channels for it. Both times the majority ending up, not in the hands of the intended according to the true meaning of the system, but in a chosen few. Yeah, I see that hand knot (not machine made) socks would interfere with these chosen few. I also think that anyone who has truly given, they see that there’s no loss, even though the world makes it out to be who knows what, instead. And yes “miracles” happen, according to those saying how things work, as if reality is impossible. Or that human nature is something different than it’s true expression.
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It is never a good thing to record anyone without permission. Giving gifts to a therapist is over stepping all boundaries.
I do understand what the author was trying to express with the gift and the recordings but asking first if giving a gift is appropriate or if it’s ok to record would be the way to go about it. When asking, express why you want to gift or record something.
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What I’m saying is you can’t even go down division without one of these characters going up.Giving anybody a gift that’s not wanted is inappropriate. A real gift is something other person wants it’s just this therapist want the girl to find somebody else we should parody happen for healing. But then they don’t have that matrix to say here somebody that would help. It’s just bad insurance it’s like now everybody’s supposed to buy life insurance because they’re selling it I noticed although it’s not, well I wouldn’t know it was on the television all the time a while back when I was watching. They buy it you get paid something and then they get it when you die. People pay for other people’s life insurance that they give another person dies. Before that it was, just like my ass, contango! The futures for spring weet [k] with the future is gone above what was listed so the farmers could actually grow that’s why there was a listing the wheat, then kaboom the whole market involving food with a whole country’s half starved and then this is because they had to make up reasons for the collapse so that it didn’t get who knows what would have happened. I mean to become ridiculous pickles would cost $2 million dollars or something. Yeah it was for a while under Nicole Smith her esteem left. Those pickles might be that much? When you said that giving a gift to therapist is beyond all boundaries were you referring to Naomi Klein’s book fences and windows, and sorry if I’m giving that away. That artist Pollock whose stuff is gone for him so much you’d have to spread this output amongst a few billionaires is not more than that, I wouldn’t even know if there’s a billionaire’s club against Pollock, as cozy as Mr humphries, he [ not Humphrey with his clock] was hiding out in my city also for a while under the name Beverly. And not even just a little bit since 1988 at least. I had figured this out and she could always have stuff for sale , every time there was a art fair downtown there’s that person again, in fact I have a rosary[I was told she made that that either wasn’t Beverly or she was lying] and one bag, but somebody was buying one of her stuff, I don’t know what it was, and there was some question or so about how much she gets, I don’t know why somebody would ask that question other than whether she’s taken care of it’s like excuse me…. I mentioned the full price. Now the bus drivers think that Beverly has gone into the rest home for elderly but no I saw him camping out in the mall at Starbucks. If it gets so far that somebody Thanksgiving is hiding the message and such a fashion I think that’s more the therapist that didn’t work? Or is it Humpty dumpty? The English messing around with China the Opium wars and the whole country falling apart. Where there’s a wall…. And then the English introduce opium on purpose to disable China, just like they said they would defend the whites that the Bolshevik rebellion to make sure that it didn’t happen, and then you got communism because that was more favorable to keep Russia and Germany separate because Germany was so expansive and capitalistic; then world war one with they had everything divided properly, then after Germany was completely disabled but not yet considered a developing country the whole break down that caused you know what to get Germany and Russia apart because if they were together the one Central area in Europe together with the other side of the continent well….
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Would you really have understood what the author meant, you would have needed permission from the author to state that, after having discussed or interacted with the author about it. Not only is that the way to go that is the only way it can be done to state that you understand what’s going on. And according to your statement you would have had to also state why you wanted to know whether you understood what was going on while asking permission to share your understanding. Have you done this?
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My city gives a gift to the people that they have Parks and recreation where you can get yoga cheap. That is a gift. The result was that there was a yoga teacher while she thinks she’s teaching yoga she certainly was not they seem to think so as well, one could not actually expect her to take any view on what was going on other than what profited her and her cult behavior. She had convinced a bunch of friends that I being a gay person was in love with her and that schizophrenic behavior later on she tried to make out caused her to believe her life is in danger. The schizophrenia behavior referred to with me knowing better than to get involved with such stereotyping whether it’s from Hollywood, from psychics, or from her. So yes a person should ask whether a gift it’s something another another wants you say. Consequently the city should have asked everybody taking a class of her whether they interested were in having a bigot that is paranoid and has a cult following that can pull the wall over the city’s eyes waste their time and think this is appropriate because she sees herself as being above such honesty as the instructor. Her name also was Kim. I’m in the class I took the beautiful actress that played David copperfield’s wife who he married after he lost Dora was in the class. Added to this this person that was assigned the profession of a social worker actually very clearly said to the whole class she was teaching after she had just started the extreme abuse towards me that she wasn’t mad at them she was just acting, so you can add that to the whole list. I had mentioned this to the mayor of the city at the time but decided to retract it until now. As it stands now would she even try talking to me which would even a hi means all I would have to do is call the police and she would get arrested. At the store she even when I was standing behind her mentioned to the cashier that I could make her look like a prostitute. That might be more than being arrested. Have a nice day.
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