I Am Best Friends With My Therapist, Is That A Bad Thing?

[Zagup]

What do you mean by it is intense?

We have a lot of deep conversations, we talk everyday, several times a day, we say I love you to each other everyday (but I say that to most of my friends), I feel like I need to see her and talk to her and I want to see and talk to her as much as I can.

 

[Ucu]

Thank you for your replies.
I know she is getting her needs met too but that is what a friendship is.

No real friendships don't come out of a therapist deciding she wants to be friends with a client.
No real friendships don't come out of a therapist deciding she wants her needs to be met by a "friend" who is currently a client.
Real friendships occur when two people from relatively equal power positions as adults decide that they have a common interest or somesuch.

What your therapist/friend has done is illegal in some countries, and for good reasons.

You are in denial about how serious this is. I was too. I gave exactly the same answers and justifications that you are giving. I really understand what it is like when someone taps into one of your core deprivations or needs. It is so overwhelming.

When it blows up in your face. Don't blame yourself and get help then. Put that in the back of your head. Get help and don't blame yourself - when the time comes.

 

[Ovu]

No real friendships come out of being in therapy and suddenly the therapist decides to be "friends" with you. That is really crazy thinking and crazy talk on a number of levels. No one who has a therapist initiate a 'friendship' during therapy has a real friendship and relationship. That is off the planet thinking. For a therapist to decide to make you a "friend" - that is an exploitation. It is very, very, very dangerous territory to be sailing into.

 

[Wazi]

No real friendships don't come out of a therapist deciding she wants to be friends with a client.
No real friendships don...

Wow, pretty angry and not very helpful and supportive. It may not be a good situation but she is here for advice and support. You can make recommendations, talk about your own experience. But ultimately she must make her own way.

 

[Zagup]

When you say "blow up in your face", what do you mean by that?
Because it started the way it did, does that mean it will blow up? Or could it just be a friendship?

These are just a few questions I have.

 

[Anewe]

Wow, pretty angry and not very helpful and supportive. It may not be a good situation but she is here for advice and support. You can make recommendations, talk about your own experience. But ultimately she must make her own way.

That is your opinion. You chose to read it as angry. It can also be read as being blunt and real as well, and from a range of other points of view as well. I am giving advice and support in a realistic way. One of my friend's sisters killed herself after she found out she was pregnant to her psychiatrist, because she felt so ashamed. I have been where this person is right now. I have seen these types of exploitative relationships play out over three decades. There are reasons why there is professional conduct and certain relationships are illegal and/or taboo. More often than not the person offs themselves - not sure why it works out that way, but it is a pattern. These situations don't go well - and suicide prevention - in the form of honestly saying how it is - can be useful - because even if the person doesn't take anything on that you say at the time - they have a point to come back to and reassess later on, if need be. I am being supportive. I am just not being enabling. I am also not going to lie about something as serious as this. At some point this person's understanding of what is going on in this "friendship" may be the insight that saves her life. That might not be namby pamby there, there, it is okay advice, but it is advice and support in a forthright and upfront manner.

But ultimately she must make her own way.

Of course - but having a wider range of points of view gives her more choices to select from and disregard, as the case maybe.

 

[Oji]

Take time away from the relationship. Invest in other friendships for a season. If you are able to easily do that, then this light not be imminently harmful right now.

If you start struggling weigh anxiety and don't connect with others this deeply, then this relationship is about a lot more than a friendship.

 

[Gidi]

*start struggling with anxiety
(Sorry for the typo)

You already recognize this is intense and possibly enmeshed relationship. Is this true of other friendships you have?

The danger of enmeshed relationships is that people lose themselves and end up isolated from deep connections with others.

I also worry that there is counter transference and other issues on her part kicking in to prompt her to want to break professional boundaries to be friends with a client. A well supported and resourced therapist with good relationship skills and self awareness wouldn't be drawn risking losing her practice to be friends with a client, but she was. This friendship may actually be enabling her to avoid doing the work she needs on her own stuff.

Your husband is friends with her husband, and knows her, and yet even he is concerned how intense it has become.

So take a break for a bit, and see how it feels. Good healthy friendships can take time apart and invest in other relationships and it won't destabilize either party. Make sure you have a well rounded and healthy support system outside of her.

 

[Ohi]

My therapist feels like my best friend but he isn't. He advised me (talking about other patients as I have never done this) that he refuses facebook friend requests from patients. He doesn't give out his cell number and he doesn't advise of his place of worship. We speak about churches a lot as that is part of my trauma and though I have wanted to ask what church he goes to (because it sounds nice) I haven't as I know that is a boundry.

He has done an amazing job setting boundries. He holds strong to them as well. And that helps me. Seeing what is ok and what isnt by hitting against those boundries.

He feels like a father figure to me and he feels like a best friend because of the level of trust, the level of vulernabilty, and how much I know about his family as he used his own family as a model of a normal family to help me see the difference. But I recongize that there would be something wrong if I hung out with him and his wife and kids and grand daughter. I have googled him out of curosity and saw a cute picture of him and his grand daughter and starred at it thinking of my childhood. I told him about that and he didnt seem to care about it as I knew asking him to be friends on facebook is crossing a boundry.

Boundries in therapy as so very important to me and it is how my therapist gauges me and points me and helps me move in the right direction. I use the boundries as like railings on stairs. I couldnt picture crossing them today 8 years later. Not that i have never thought of it. My therapist plays lead role in my erotic transference and my daydreams but i would never actually cross them today. In the early years i did constantly but it was his strict adherence to those boundries that helped me the most.

Is there an issue with a friend that started as a therapist? I would say yes but thats my opinion. Id feel super weird as well. But as long as she isnt a therapist anymore and it works then i suppose its fine. Only you and her will know this answer. Have you expressed this worry to her and if so what has she said?

 

[Zagup]

I do have other friends. I am really close to them too and we talk about pretty much everything. This one is different because I really would rather hang out with her rather than anyone else.
We have talked and she has told me the only way this will work is if I am open and honest with her. I feel I am am mostly open and honest with her. She knows how i worry about her leaving and she says that won't happen.

 

[Azumo]

This one is different because I really would rather hang out with her rather than anyone else.

This here pokes out at me as a problem. If you only want to hang out with just her, in my opinion, points to a possible issue.

Its said that something is a problem if it interfers with your normal life. If you are only wanting to hang out with her and no one else, she is saying to be totally open (which isn't a requirement for friendship) and fear abandonment (which by itself is just fear of abandonment but it isnt by itself) all points to a problem to me.

We have talked and she has told me the only way this will work is if I am open and honest with her

My next question would be "why? I am not fully open and honest with other friends!" It is not a requirement for friendship, it's a requirement for a therapy relationship. So if those are being mixed up, that's an issue.

 

[Zagup]

Your right it probably is an issue. But I am caught in it and I don't want to stop it. I am being pulled towards it, if that makes sense. I can't let go and I really don't want to.