The Therapy Box

There's something vulnerable about him from the moment we meet. He has an age defying quality, not quite a baby face, more like a young soul. His qualifications are solid, his experience impressive. I find myself with an instinctive trust for this man who seems so earnest and unjaded by the world even though he is more than old enough to have been touched by the worst of it.

He speaks gently, softly, sometimes so quietly I can't make out the words. He asks me what has bought me to therapy. I tell him many things. I tell him how I have seen other therapists, but have been left cold by their approaches which seem to skim the surface of everything and address nothing. One has stared at me with wide, deer in the headlights eyes as I described my feelings. The other twisted himself into such a sideways contortion as I spoke that I thought he might actually fall over on the couch where he sat.
 
“How would you like me to respond to you?” The final nail in the coffin of a therapeutic relationship. When the therapist no longer has any idea what to say or how to say it, the client can hardly feel safe.
 
The man in front of me, the new therapist, seems less confused when I explain the source of my pain. Adult child of an alcoholic. Unable to form deep, intimate connections. Adrift in a world and universe which I consider to be inherently uncaring. Bored by everyday interactions which seem meaningless and hollow. Oh, and with a dash of neurosis thrown in just to make things more interesting.
 
We agree to work together....

(This is a snippet of a piece written by an anonymous client of Lucid Psychotherapy & Counselling. This piece is a part of a new series of writings on counselling/psychotherapy; a client's perspective.)

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