The time I quit therapy
I’ve had 5 therapists over the course of my adult life, some of whom have been more influential to me (in both personal and professional ways, now that I’m also a therapist) than others, but each of them has taught me something really important. I could talk about the one that helped me reclaim my agency to walk away from a marriage, or the one that taught me how to find more peace through mindfulness, or the one that continues to teach me how to live an embodied life, but instead, I want to tell you about the one I only saw for a few weeks before I decided to quit therapy.
This is not a horror story. In fact, it’s really not even that much about the therapist I fired. To be sure, we were not a good fit for one another. I had just moved to California from Ohio, where I had been seeing my first therapist, and asked my new primary doctor if she knew of a good therapist. As it turned out, she was also new to the Bay Area, so asked a colleague for a referral. A few months into the move, I found myself in an office in the FiDi of San Francisco to meet with my new therapist. We were not a great fit, although I didn’t know why. I don’t remember a ton from that time, but I can remember a few key things:
She called me by the wrong name.
It was probably our third session, and my therapist called me Erica. I’m honestly not sure if I even corrected her—I was that stunned. I felt deeply unsafe—how was I supposed to tell this woman everything about me and my deepest worries if she couldn’t even remember my name? It seemed like a really bad sign.
Therapist me looks back on this experience a bit differently. This isn’t to say it’s ok to be called the wrong thing by your therapist—it’s definitely not a great sign—but rather that it is ok for humans to make mistakes, and had I let her know that she called me by the wrong name, we likely could have had a reparative conversation. She might have said something like, “Oh my goodness, I am so sorry. I could imagine that it might feel difficult for you to open up to me when I call you by the wrong name.” Or maybe something like, “I am so sorry, my memory is not what it used to be. I wonder what might be coming up for you right now?” Or perhaps, “Oh! Erin! I am so sorry. Given how new our relationship is, I could imagine my mistake might make you question my care for you.” That might’ve been a really healing experience in and of itself, but it didn’t happen. My therapist made a mistake that was impossible to come back from because of where I was in my own healing journey, and we hadn’t yet built enough trust for me to feel safe enough to risk telling her she got it wrong.
She didn’t get up to walk me out.
My first therapist in Ohio always walked me to the door—it was part of the therapy process. And, reflecting back, it has been part of the process with every other in-person therapist I’ve seen since as well. This particular therapist, though, remained seated as I stood up, walked to the door, opened it, and exited. It felt so cold and foreign to me, a far cry from the warmth I really needed.
Older me sees this as a sign that perhaps my therapist simply wasn’t physically able to perform this little ritual. She was a bit older, and it’s entirely possible (even likely) that there’s a really good reason for her to remain seated that has to do with physical ability, mobility, or comfort level. And a conversation about that fact would probably have been useful at the time. (I wish I could remember if she greeted me standing, but I simply don’t know.) Regardless, each time I walked myself to the door, my sense of safety took a hit.
She asked me questions that made me begin to realize things in my life were terribly off.
(Do you see how this isn’t really about the therapist?) I was describing some important people in my life and used a particular positive descriptor for one. “What makes [name] a [descriptor] person? What does it mean to be a [descriptor] person?” she asked me. I immediately felt like I was on trial. I began to describe what I thought that meant and brainstormed famous people who share that trait. As I did this, I began to realize that, actually, the person I was talking about didn’t embody that positive descriptor. But that could not be true, because my narrative about both myself and this person revolved around that descriptor. At that moment, I experienced massive cognitive dissonance and was extremely distressed. I either masked the distress well (this is difficult to believe) or my therapist simply did not comment on how emotional I was becoming as I tried to talk myself into believing what I thought I already believed.
But that wasn’t the only time I found myself twisted in knots with this therapist. It also happened when I spoke about my then (now ex) husband. I described him to her, and what we’d gone through in moving out to California. She said, “It sounds like you two are really close.” I think she was genuinely trying to connect with me, but the problem was that something deep down inside me wasn’t so sure. Hearing, out loud, that we were close made me wonder… were we actually that close? Again, I was trapped between a quiet whisper of uncertainty and the words coming out of my mouth. Admitting that we, perhaps, weren’t as close as I wanted was unthinkable at that time. I simply was not ready to acknowledge that anything about my marriage wasn’t working for me. And again, I was shaken by cognitive dissonance. I was distressed.
I thought, “Going to therapy is making me unhappier.” Why would I want to go to therapy to be less happy? I decided to quit therapy and didn’t start again for another 5 years. It would be 7 or 8 years before I was ready to acknowledge all wasn’t well at home.
Was leaving therapy the right move?
Here’s what I know to be true. That particular therapist was not the right fit for me, for a variety of reasons. Yes, there was the whole name debacle and the whole not walking me out thing, but the much more important piece was that I probably needed a more relational therapist with a gentle, slow, curious approach to the work. I think leaving that therapist was unquestionably the right move for me. However, a different therapist might have first built up my foundational trust in myself and then helped me examine these relationships gently and with curiosity at a slow pace. I might have come to the same conclusions I came to 8 years later much sooner had I simply found a new therapist.
But that’s not always how life works. I was terrified of the glimpses I got in those sessions of what my gut was trying to tell me. I was not ready to acknowledge or explore my true feelings and fears about life. My life was pretty good, and I was reasonably content. Why would I want to blow up my life by digging beneath the surface?
A lot of times therapists say we wish our clients came to us when they’re doing well so that we have a chance to build rapport and start doing work outside of a crisis. But the truth is, therapy does have a way of surfacing things that are difficult to look at. When you’re feeling miserable, it’s a lot easier to commit to doing that work because you’re already suffering. Doing this type of work when you are reasonably content requires a lot of bravery and a commitment to seeking your truth, wherever that truth may take you. Some people are reasonably content and also ready to do the work. I wasn’t ready. That’s ok. Eventually, I was.
Sometimes therapy can make you feel a bit worse before you feel better
My last post was all about the short-term bias of society, and how tempting (and understandable) it is to want to feel better as quickly as humanly possible. But, as you can see from my own experience, starting therapy can sometimes make you feel worse in the short term. When we look at tough things, when we start processing grief and trauma and whatever else is coming up, it often impacts the rest of our week. I was absolutely right when I said I was feeling less happy because of therapy—it was stirring things up for me, like a bunch of sediment that had settled to the bottom was all of a sudden floating in the liquid of my everyday. At the time, I did not know or have faith that therapy could have helped me break down all of that newly stirred-up sediment to be finer, more evenly distributed, and less disruptive. (But it can, and it does.)
It’s ok if you’re not ready for therapy yet. And it’s also ok to tell your therapist when you’re moving a little too fast. Therapy should go at your pace, so if you’re feeling distressed and overwhelmed by what’s going on in therapy and feel safe enough to do so, let your therapist know what’s going on. It could be as simple as, “I’m not ready to talk about my relationship yet.” Or perhaps you might say, “I just wanted to let you know that I struggled a bit after our last session.” That’s really important information for your therapist to know. You might not feel better immediately after starting therapy, but we do want to make sure we’re going at a pace that’s right for you and are resourcing you enough to function throughout your week.
Therapy is worth trying again
If you quit therapy in the past for whatever reason (maybe your therapist also called you by the wrong name), it’s ok to come back and give it another try. Perhaps you weren’t ready before. Maybe you didn’t have a therapist that fit you and your needs. Maybe the modality of therapy just didn’t work for you. Whatever the reason, it’s ok to give it another chance. There are so many different therapists out there who feel different to sit with and who practice therapy in wildly different ways. You don’t have to find THE ONE, you just have to find one that fits right now. I can’t tell you how thankful I am to have found therapists who have helped me along on my journey. I can’t tell you how impactful therapy has been in my personal life, once I was ready for it. It has been absolutely life-altering. I wish the same for you.
If you feel ready to try therapy (or try therapy again) and are looking for a therapist, I’m currently accepting new clients anywhere in California. Reach out, and we’ll chat.
