The Gift Of Therapy And Their Patients

Rogers worked with many others in developing the idea that clients could heal themselves, if only the therapist provided ‘facilitative’ or core conditions of, ‘empathy, congruence and unconditional positive regard.’

Throughout this course, we have learned different approaches and techniques regarding therapy and counseling. More so, multiple of these techniques are used to develop a plan for the benefit of the patient. Love’s Executioner (1989), written by Irvin D. Yalom, was a documentation of the relationship and interactions between Thelma and himself. Throughout the treatment, he used a variety of helping skills and approaches to attempt to breakthrough her within six months. Thelma’s reason for coming into therapy was that she was emotionally distressed based on a past experience. She perceived to be hopelessly in love with an old therapist of hers, Matthew. This “love” was more than an emotion felt and since it was not reciprocated, it was merely an obsession of the twenty-seven days she spent with Matthew. Through the course of this interaction, Yalom used a psychoanalytic orientation

Grold, K. (1996). How to find a good therapist: Finding & evaluating a private therapist.

One of the more puzzling aspects of therapy and one that escalates to crisis proportions is

1. Overholser, J. C. (2005). Contemporary Psychotherapy: Promoting personal responsibility for therapeutic change. Journal of Contemporary psychotherapy, 35,369-376.

Working as a therapist can be exhausting, but yet, rewarding at the same time. As a therapist we deal with daily encounters of other people’s lives, issues, problems etc. Taking multiple cases of providing therapeutic interventions has an effect on the human body and the psyche. The wear and tear over time begins to haunt us without recognizing how neglectful we can be towards ourselves because our focus is for the sake of other people’s sanity. The profession is hard, and can be detrimental to professionals who do not take care of themselves. Self-care is an important aspect when working as a therapist. Our health, mental health, spiritual values, etc. should matter just as the client’s health, mental health and spiritual values matters

It was the way Thelma approach therapy all this years what had made it so hard for any sort of improvement. She had a clear idea of what could help her get better and being truly upfront about it was not really one of them. No wonder why the therapy with the other doctors did not work out, she was hiding the biggest and most important reason of all for her obsessions. Dr. Yalom interpret this as an error on the other therapist, even imagined they had little experience in the practice and that is way they couldn’t see what was really tormenting her. By Thelma hiding her true emotions, fears and wants from Dr. Yalom it made it hard to build a relationship of trust between therapist-patient.

With these attributes, they will have the fundamentals of creating a strong therapeutic alliance with their clients. The therapists should be encouraged in “treating new cases as unique and constructing new theories to fit them, rather than depending on categories of established theory and technique” (Safran & Muran, 2000). Although this does not mean that standard techniques are useless, flexibility and creativity in application of these theories is considered the most important skill of a good therapist.

While acknowledging she understands Yalom’s limitations, Penny mentions she had seen two therapists previously. One of them had been at an alcohol clinic, where the counselor had been an alcoholic themselves. Penny remarks that perhaps she need a therapist who has lost a child that could be an expert in what Penny is experiencing. However, if it is true that a client can only be helped by someone who has experienced the same things as themselves, then that places a severe limitation on the field of psychology. Therapists could only help clients with similar experiences to themselves, which would bring the focus of therapy to the therapist’s subjective experience, and not the client’s. Each therapist would only have a narrow range of clients with which they could be effective, which I do not believe to be the case. Yalom’s work with Penny can serve of an example of two people with different experiences forming a constructive therapeutic relationship.

Irvin Yalom (2012) initiates thought-provoking moment after thought-provoking moment in his work, “The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients.” There is an authentic yet profound air in Yalom’s work and in his recorded therapy. It would be difficult to sum up the importance of what Yalom addresses in one paper, but I will attempt to note the parts of Yalom’s writing which stood out most to me. I hope to cover Yalom’s thoughts on avoiding diagnosis, letting the patient matter, using the here and now, therapist transparency, feedback, and freed & responsibility as in-depth as possible. Moreover, I hope to address how these thoughts will impact my own approach to therapy and how they interact with my faith.

This application paper will discuss my personal theory of counseling or psychotherapy in a number of different areas. Specifically, I will discuss the seven areas of interest. First, I will discuss and describe

Yet, if managed care begins to dictate what treatments have to be used, then empirically validated treatments will be used against psychologists as a form of restriction that may inhibit the success of the therapeutic process (Scaturo, 2001).However, certain artful tactics involved in psychotherapy will never be completely removed, such as the development of a therapeutic relationship (Allen, 2008). With the rise of EVTs there is a possibility that insurance or managed care may dictate the exact treatment techniques that need to be used for a particular disorder, the art of psychotherapy will not be able to thrive in the future has it once did in the past (Hopko & Hopko, 1999). One way to prevent the complete loss of the art of psychotherapy is to use both the art and science together.

Licensed professional counselors have a unique occupation in that not only do they interact with their clients on a highly personal level, but they also momentarily share their client’s burdens, worries, and concerns. This vicarious aspect of counseling creates the possibility for a counselor to continue sharing the client’s troubles long after the session has ended. According to Norcross and Guy (2007), “The person of the psychotherapist is inextricably intertwined with treatment success” (p. 2) meaning that if we desire more positive outcomes than negative ones we must figuratively become one with our clients. Due to this fact, “self-care is not simply a personal matter but also an ethical necessity, a moral imperative” (p. 6). If we fail to leave work at work at the day’s end, then other facets of our lives are in jeopardy of becoming tainted.

Yalom, Y.D. (2009). The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients: Harper Perennial

It feels as though most of the time when thinking about psychology and the great contributions that have been made to it, that most of them have been from men, but along the way there have been several influential women that have contributed to the field of psychology as well. Just like men, there were several women who were pioneers, theorists, and counselors; many of these women have contributed to the field of psychology in their own special between the years of 1850 and 1950. Of all these amazing women who are pioneers, theorists, and counselors, the one who stands out the most is Anna Freud. This paper will go on to explain Anna Freud’s