The Black Box.

Well...finally managed to tell a friend about the 'interview under caution' event. So the power of it is dissipating, thank goodness. Also I no longer care if it will show up on an enhanced DBS or not. I will simply tell my story. The more I think about the part when I was leaving the police station the more I believe that the solicitor and the police were trying to tell me that they would be happy to take this further if I wished to make a counterclaim...But I was in too much shock to take that in properly, I just wanted to get out. So all in all? This blog was over after I posted my 'victim statement' because I'd said it all. I thought I'd drop in here now and again if I decided to make a complaint to UKCP about the therapist, just to keep you updated. Think I'm off home now, back to Rings Around The Moon. All that is left to do is set the transcripts to be published here in 2064!

On the evening before Halloween I found myself within the backrooms . The summons had arrived by post, and after a night of panic filled with frantic Googling, no sleep. And a day of dissociated numbness and despair - I drove to the location in a godforsaken town, and parked my car, hardly expecting it to still be there should I ever return. I felt as if I’d been asked to attend my own execution. The building loomed before me, a stone ship adrift on a concrete sea. I entered and spoke to someone behind a wall of glass. The waiting had begun. The message was passed on and I sat down on a bench - listening to muffled sounds,  feeling the cold air around my legs as if I was in a river of ghosts and I was beginning to go into shock, the endorphin opiate state of dissociation. I was the antelope who had walked into the lion’s den going down under tooth and claw without fighting, terror without sensation. All hope, gone. Opening my eyes I noticed that my captor-not-captor had an envelope...

To hear Susie Jamieson 's account of what it is like to have a complaint made against a counsellor, please follow the link to Josephine Hughes ' podcast:  [LINK].   It is clear from Susie's account that the way complaints are dealt with can cause emotional, psychological and financial devastation to therapists . This isn't what I wanted or needed to happen to the therapist. The harm he caused could never be made any better by setting in motion a procedure that causes more harm. On the other hand, the laws around harassment state that if a person has been asked to stop all communication and they don't - they risk committing an offence. This leaves a complainant with no option other than making an official complaint...or silencing themselves. There is no way now to repair the relationship and leave it as something as iconic and relatively pointless as Stonehenge, a noble monument - it will instead be a smoking ruin in the heart of dystopia, breeding zombies and monst...

I'm listening to File on Four , ( read here ) a  BBC investigation into bad therapy ...I'm feeling hurt, frustrated, blocked.  Mostly I feel about what happened to me, as if I'm returning to a bowl of sick. Sorry...horrid image. I can't let this feeling win.. Labour MP, Geraint Davies has proposed a new law which would outlaw people calling themselves psychotherapist or counsellor without the proper training. He also wants them directly regulated by Government, much like a doctor or a dentist.  I know this sounds as if it would solve the problem, but the therapist was registered, he had a Masters in psychotherapy , and he is a member of the most prestigious of the ethical bodies, UKCP . But when I wrote to UKCP seeking advice - because I was reticent about starting a formal complaint process as it would have done to him what he did to me -  the reply from UKCP seemed to have come from an AI . The reader had ignored my meaning, and simply scanned the email f...

 [+Music - Flood by Tool] I feel as if my lungs are still coated inside with river silt and the occasional dead fish and old boot. Focusing more on not coughing than anything anyone said to me these last two days...not good.  But I have survived the flood . [+Music - Undertow by Tool] And I'm going to have to write the letter, the handing in my notice letter to the charity I work for . This could be a reaction to the last few weeks? But I am feeling increasingly compromised as a solution focused therapist .  We are good with working with people who are sent to therapy, I ask ' so what would the person who sent you here hope to see different about you'? and yes we may well negotiate the appearance of compliance. This improves a person's experiences enough for them to start making plans for themselves! But I have zero comprehension as to why young people "who may have ASD " are sent to me. Or rather, why is no one taking seriously the effect of long term - yea...

The something took place on Wednesday. I drove to the most godawful town I've ever had the misfortune to visit. And it was obvious that no one should stop there. Zero street parking. A car park with no visible entrance was my first problem, almost as if you had to be someone who knows the secret door, and not a visitor, a stranger. I mean, Innsmouth . I should have taken the bus to get the full effect! With minuites to spare before the dreaded s omething , I found a parking bay and fed the machine some coins.  No way to pay by card.  The air was so cold, I was seeing snow.  I never, ever want to be there ever again as long as I live! I've seen this in others, the people sent to see me who take counselling as the final insult. My heart breaks for them. And now I know exactly how they feel. And the godawful town, made me think of a colleague whose misfortune it was to work here, how she was offered all sorts of interesting opportunities when she accepted the job. This...

I'm still ill. Almost phoned for an ambulance yesterday. That bad, difficulty breathing in. But, got through. So, here I am. Morning routine. Three rounds of Wim Hof , following a brief panic about the wording of my insurance. Realised again that interviewed under caution isn't the same as being under caution. But I need this in writing. Verbal wasn't enough to stick in my cautious mind. So, Wim Hof, then good coffee - which I can't taste due to my COVID like, non COVID. Sitting outside, soaking up the blue of the sky, the good green around me. Listening to: Lemanis by Spaceslug Next comes the cold shower of course. Breakfast... Then I'm as done as I can be.  And today? All clients cancelled because I can't talk, only cough. Many thoughts. What to do with today, how to navigate a safe encounter with the hurt and rage that bubbles under fear and compassion. I heard someone talking to Huberman about idiot compassion ...my understanding came from Trungpa ...

Catabasis - allowing oneself to face the worst. Waves of depression. Worse than imposter syndrome, the belief that everything I've learnt is flimsy, useless, the 'sticking plaster over the wound' version of therapy that fails to address the real issues.  I just find myself crying.. Or coughing. Or staring into space, my body on fire, skin crawling with ants. Anxiety and grief, the shattering of self. So it goes. And what has saved me every time is knowing how to deconstruct reality (30 years of meditation), four years of Wim Hof method - to allow my nervous system to reset, and four years of working with clients, practicing solution focused therapy (deconstruction and reconstruction).  There is a practice in Tibetan Buddhism called Chod. Today has been something like that for me. In Chod the first step is to deconstruct the self, and then to offer the attachment to that self up - to demons, to ghosts, to monsters. To let the worst have their way, to let them feed. Because t...

14 days after the letter telling me to get in contact with the police. I remember when I was training, most of us believed that people got ill when stress stopped . So going on holiday would trigger relaxing, and relaxing would let the weight of all the hurt and all the wounds be felt. It is safe to be ill and so we are... Yesterday, perhaps it started Monday? But today, my sacred Wednesday - day off - I am so ill, and I'm feeling the bone crushing sensation of the utter and complete end. Psychologically I feel locked up in a box . The air is grey with sadness. My lungs feel full of feathers, I can't stop coughing, I cant think, and I feel so, so sick I had to make myself eat. Every part of me is poisoned with panic. The four years of my son's despair and constantly waiting to hear that he was dead, hearing suicidal intent in his voice and not knowing what to do. Powerless, an overwhelming sense of wrongness. My husband, like a wax dummy , all love drained from him. The cr...

I bought this book yesterday:  The Psychotherapist and the Professional Complaint: The Shadow Side of Therapy :    Adah Sachs (Author), Valerie Sinason (Editor) and my feelings are incredibly mixed as a result. The book confirms my worst impressions and fears of official complaints; that in the end, the outcome of the complaint process is worse. The situation is never resolved, whilst psychological and emotional damage increase to both parties as a result. I have heard a similar narrative from clients who had complaints made about them. The following disciplinary administered to an employee who has good reasons for their behaviour, who may well feel bullied by their boss leaves the employee traumatised and broken, unable to continue working. Nothing is improved by seeking fault. But a fault finding disciplinary (even when the person giving it doesn't think it is about finding fault) usually undermines and the employee so much that they go off sick, they blame themselves...

1. Find out which ethical body oversees their work, and go to their website. Examples: UKCP BACP 2. Fill in the complaint form . 3. Attach evidence to that form... So basically, as soon as I walked out of therapy, my next stop after asking myself why I wont be dead as a result of what has happened - should have been initiating a complaint. The reasons why it didn't happen rest within the complaint process itself. And in how I personally think of complaints. Add the way the therapist had handled minor 'ruptures' - with defence; telling me that I'd misunderstood him - and then going on to repeat what he'd meant me to understand. The problem is: I am not the only person who has been accidentally silenced by the complaint procedure. Nor am I the only complainant who has been reported to the police. No surprise then when I tell you that I believe that the complaint procedure itself needs to be resolved. I'm not alone in discovering that if you complain to your thera...

As part of walking out of the police station without any penalty, it seems that I agreed to something . On Wednesday I emailed the police and the something , to say, no thank you. As I was trying to remember how to breath, and how not to dissolve into a quivering wreck. I'd picked up that the something would include an assessment to support my needs. Which sounds quite nice, I could try asking for the money I need to send me back to university? I mean if they are serious about helping me...what do you think? According to the website it is 'a programme of tailored support'  to help in managing debt, health concerns, homelessness and sex work.  Hey, If I answer in the right way I might find myself sitting before someone I trained with. At first my humiliation would be complete, but then I'd stand up and tell my story. No seriously, I am so bloody boring thank goodness! No dept, health concerns, homelessness or sex work for me. Just re-traumatization by an idiot therapist...

I've been referred to a something by the police. I don't know what it is. I was asked briefly if I wanted to be referred for 'support' and I believe that I'd said no. Here comes another lesson in shame and stigma .... Sometimes the people referred to me arrive feeling as I feel now. Stigmatized , shamed, their wishes have been violated. Note  I don't feel ashamed,  I feel that an unasked for, unwanted referral is an attack on my (now very fragile) identity.. Usually the people unwillingly referred, realise when they talk to me that we are doing damage limitation . A part of that is making it clear that they don't have to see me unless they consider it helpful.. there is a specific sfbt strategy for referrals that undoes the stigma by focusing on practicalities. So I can make it ok... But I don't know if there's a way out of this referral for me. I don't want it, but if it was part of how I escaped I'm going to have to make the best of it. Se...

Shockwaves still wash through me. I am so grateful to both the police and the duty solicitor , who together navigated a way for me to avoid the lethal - to my professional identity - floating mines, as I literally began to drown in the heavy darkness of the police station. One thing I'd taken to heart through the awful no sleep of Wednesday night, as I hysterically Googled, I learnt that one thing mattered more than anything else - having a solicitor present. Words cannot express my gratitude to the solicitor who metaphorically pulled me out of the churning, cold, midnight ocean. for the waters had already gone way over my head and I was drowning. Without the solicitor things would have been much worse. Anyway, here I am. It is all OK (as far as I know - I'm still waiting for the lethal explosion). Today is a very different Monday to the worst version I was imagining as I sat, practically catatonic by the fire on Thursday, unable to eat, drink or speak, waiting until the time a...

The physiological aftermath of Thursday night has hit me like an avalanche today. It is interesting to observe yet again the physical disempowerment of severe stress . I felt like this when my son was at his most ill and in rabid psychosis . It feels like living inside a thunderstorm. Like everywhere has a layer of voltage that will cause an arc to spark across the gap, and I will be shocked with lightning leaving me shaking, speechless and broken yet again. So, what had led to all this? Why did the psychotherapist try to end my career? What did he accuse me of? And did I deserve to be accused? By September this year I was seeking his apology. But my first communication in 2024 was about building bridges after a truly horrible end to therapy. An end so bad that I was suicidal. The second stage of communication was to say that I was actively seeking to understand what had happened, because feeling so awful, plain didn't make sense.  It is important to note at this point, that it to...

A new blog. The first page after the end.  Let's rewind - This blog has history. It starts with Rings Around The Moon , it ended with The 3lack 3ox .  Rings Around The Moon  charted my family's journey as my youngest son suffered psychosis , and our experience of psychiatrists and the mental health teams. Then it follows my year of awful, life sapping days and nights as my husband's lies and cruelty broke my heart. What came next was not good either, and it was recorded as  The 3lack 3ox (now deleted) my blog about psychotherapy - in other words, what bad therapy is, and what it feels like to receive it, and how not to manage 'erotic transfer'! My experience of psychotherapy is best described as a two year plane crash. It was not healing on any level - unless you think taking heroin is helpful? In response to his flirting I'd fallen in love with the man - not the psychotherapist - and how he mismanaged this meant that when I left therapy I was suicidal. When yo...

For a conflict to be resolved through mediation certain factors need to be present. If both parties care enough about the relationship, if the power difference can be levelled out so that both parties feel safe enough, and if both parties feel as if they have some control over the process, mediation will probably be of a considerable help. The therapist and I?  A good mediation would not make! I left his room for the last time feeling that he was glad to see the back of me. And as far as I can tell he has no intention of ever addressing what went wrong. There is also a problem created by therapy culture . The complaint 'formulation' is in itself a bad start. It isn't focused on reparation . So, what am I saying? Clients can find that therapy makes their mental state worse. They feel that something was wrong, so if they make a complaint and if the therapist is working for a charity for instance, the manager investigates, and works with the complainant to get some kind of r...

The form is filled in, and posted. It doesn't contain names or details. Simply a request that my case is assessed, and I'm given advice on what will happen if I proceed with the complaint.  The rules are, that you can only expect a therapist's ethical body to investigate a complaint about the things a therapist has done while they were (and still are) a member of that specific ethical body.  And the complaint must be made within three years. It has been longer than three years. The therapist changed his ethical body.  And my complaint is, that the therapist has not responded to my victim statement.  The longer than three years could invalidate my complaint. But surely when a therapist doesn't respond to a client's request for an apology, surely that is pretty serious. Silence looks like denial, and no one thinks that ghosting is a good way to communicate. But, as I have said previously, my mind is still weaving a 100 and 1 excuses for him, and I'm still feeling ...

It has taken me four years to get enough distance on what happened to me, to begin to make sense of it. The importance of this is, now I know from the inside that it is unreasonable to think that victims instantly seek justice, or that they will be able to identify, name or explain what happened to them, straight away. The greater the impact of the emotional disturbance, the greater their bewilderment, shock and desire to just hide away. And making sense of it? Sometimes it takes decades. Sometimes it is never. It took me years to name the cause of the harm done to me during therapy as epistemic injustice . The inequality of power underlying the withholding of information was a real problem. The therapist and I both suffered because of it. But I was also risking my life. My need for him to see and hear me was so great. I felt threatened each time he became tight lipped. Each time he said 'this isn't working' it was as if acid had been poured over me. I imagine that he wa...