Wish I Could Be Friends With My Therapist

[1127sg]

My therapist and I get along really well. We have laughs sometimes, and she's commented that one of the things she feels is most endearing about me is my ability to make a joke in the middle of a serious topic I'm talking about. And not in a way some people do when they're nervous or trying to avoid the subject.
I asked her one day if I could ask her a few questions about herself. Not intrusive ones, just general ones. She said sure and if they were too personal she would tell me.
Now I know certain things that make me feel like I am her friend.
Also, she's shared with me some events in her past that relate to things I've been through. So that makes me feel close to her as well.
We have had the friend discussion, how ethics come into play and there have to be boundaries. But I still can't help wishing she was my friend.
Do I come out and say "I wish we were friends", or just keep it to myself?

 

[Queen Boudica]

It isn't appropriate for your therapist to be your friend. There are strict rules. I wouldn't. I know a lot about my therapist too and there are things about him I really admire, like how much he cares for his family and respects his wife and he would be the type of man I would love to have as a friend, but he is a professional, and by asking him, that is like compromising him and that would also risk the therapeutic relationship. And I just wouldn't.

 

[digger]

We have had the friend discussion, how ethics come into play and there have to be boundaries. But I still can't help wishing she was my friend.
Do I come out and say "I wish we were friends", or just keep it to myself?

If you've already had the friends discussion, and she's been clear on where the boundaries are in the therapeutic relationship and why they are necessary, then what are you hoping to gain from revisiting it by telling her you wish you were friends? I would hope that she would clearly reassert those boundaries with you, but it sounds like you might be hoping for a different outcome?

 

[Friday]

I sometimes think of good therapists as that really great friend, who is hugely knowledgeable in exactly what you're going through that moment, that you just didn't happen to meet on the street 5 years earlier ;). And as such? Am thrilled to be able to have a professional relationship with them, since a personal relationship is impossible at this point. Besides, if I had met them on the street 5 years earlier? I'd sure as hell want them to be paid for their outstanding work, and I'd know their clients were lucky to have them!

Spoiler: Extra

I've been lucky enough to have those great friends from time to time in my life. People who made therapy irrelevant & unnecessary, because I had people who were hugely knowledgeable in exactly what I was dealing with in my life, and what they could offer me was exactly what I needed in that moment.

Professionals fill a vacuum.

Whether they're auto mechanics, teachers, therapists, coworkers, farmers, maids, doctors, etc. They have something we need, that we cannot (or am choosing not to) do on our own. So we pay them, or someone else does, to fill a role for us or provide us wih something.

There didn't used to be ethical considerations. Over the past century, one of the things that has been learned time & again, is that unequal relationships have a strong tendency for abuse / becoming abusive relationships / abuses of power. Conversely? When a professional is too close to their client/patient? It clouds their judgement. Which is why doctors are not allowed to treat their own families. Mistakes are made. Things are missed. In nearly all cases? Both parties are harmed. When even 1 is being harmed? That's too many.

Some personal & professional relationships blend perfectly fine. Others are like shaking nitroglycerin, or are like slow acting poison.

 

[Justmehere]

It's really great that you have such a good relationship with your therapist and that you want to be friends. This kind of feeling towards a therapist is often something called positive transference and many therapists see it as a good sign that the therapy is going well.

Good therapists also know that they can't ethically be friends, but it's very ok to want that. It's ok to share it with her too. You are not alone in this feeling at all, and it's quite common in therapy.

On the general topic of friendships with therapists, as others have mentioned, it's a big ethical no no for a therapist to have a friendship with a client. There are some really good reasons why that are not always immediately obvious.

I had a therapist that I was friends with. (Actually, my family was friends with her too, so it was doubly weird.) I had just started therapy, and I didn't really have a clue what was ok and not ok in therapy, and I didn't know there would be a problem with it. The therapy was good, but when we moved into being friends, the entire relationship self destructed in a pretty profound way.

There is something strange about having dinner at a restaurant and your therapist sits down and says hi wants to talk about her crazy conversation she just had with your uncle/her neighbor. I freaked. I didn't think anything like that would make me feel so bad. But it was like the person who knew all my trauma just showed up in public with all her own problems and needs in friendships and I freaked out. I didn't think I would. She didn't say anything about my trauma, but it just screwed up everything. (Yeah, she eventually lost her license too...)

Part of why therapy works is that it is a one way relationship. We are able to come to the room with all our needs, and we don't have to give back to the therapist in the same way we do in healthy friendships. We are able to project onto our therapist all kinds of stuff to work through it. The therapist can self disclose, but if they are doing it right, they seek to do it in a way to help us connect with them and feel connected enough to work through our own stuff, rather than to work through their own stuff and get their needs met.

In my life offline, I have two friends who are therapists. They have never been my therapist and we keep very strong boundaries around them even acting "therapist-y." Occasionally one of us will say, "ah, I think we need to take the therapist hat off." They are very wonderful people. I bet that some of their clients want to be friends with them. As friends... well, I couldn't ever do effective therapy with them. Ever. I just can't seem them in that way, because I know them like friends. In friendships, the relationship is two ways. There isn't the safety of privacy, and the normal non-therapist needs of my friends changes the way we relate than if we were in a therapist-client relationship. I see them on their own worst days. I can't process past trauma very well with someone who I know just broke up with their boyfriend or spent the whole night crying over their mother-in-law being insulting of their cooking again.

In therapy, we are in a place where we are listened to, heard, respected, safe, validated, understood, where we can laugh and connect in safety and where therapists often can relate to things we are going through (much more than many therapy clients realize)... who wouldn't want to be friends with someone who is like that? This pull to want to be friends with someone like that can be especially strong if we didn't get these normal natural healthy needs met as kids or we were otherwise wounded or traumatized in relationships.

I think it's a good idea to talk to her about how you do know the boundaries of therapy, you respect them, and that you still wish you could be friends. The fact that you wish for friendship where you can connect with someone in the same ways the two of you jive together so well - this is a legitimate and healthy thing to want. Maybe she can help you find that with other people in your life where you can be friends and get those needs and desires met.

 

[DogwoodTree]

In addition to what others here have said...I think there are a lot of people "out there" somewhere who have similar characteristics to the things we admire in our Ts. And the healthier we become as individuals, the more likely we'll be able to attract those kinds of relationships into our lives.

I'm not looking for someone to be my friend who can be my "free" therapist...but I would like to find people who have done this difficult, painful, inner work that helps them to be better, healthier friends. And in order to function well in friendships like that, I have to do the work, too...and I'm glad to have a T like I have who can help model that kind of relationship for me, albeit in the therapy room, and is helping me to get there so I can find friends with qualities that remind of the things I like about my T as a person.