Trauma Therapy: Boundaries, Not Authority

A therapist tells a 42-year-old woman to cut off her mother in the second session and she does it. That story hit the Wall Street Journal, lit up the internet, and quickly turned into a bigger accusation: trauma therapists are “detachment brokers” who use their authority to dissolve guilt and obligation and, in the worst case, break families apart.

We don’t dodge the heat. We name what’s real (yes, family estrangement is more visible, and yes, bad therapy exists) and then get precise about what ethical, trauma-informed therapy is actually supposed to do. Melissa, a licensed clinical social worker and trauma specialist trained in EMDR, IFS, polyvagal and somatic approaches, explains why no therapist should be telling clients what to do, why one-sided stories are structurally unavoidable in individual therapy, and how good clinicians compensate by challenging narratives, exploring motivations, and building personal accountability.

We also get practical: boundaries versus control, when no-contact may be appropriate in abuse dynamics, and why casual labels like “narcissist” are both overused and ethically risky when the clinician has never met the person being judged. We close with five concrete signs of a strong therapist plus what to do if your own therapist starts making you nervous, especially in the age of TikTok therapy speak and AI “diagnoses.”

If this hit a nerve, share the episode with someone navigating family conflict, then subscribe and leave a review so more people can find nuance instead of outrage. What’s your biggest therapy red flag?

Transcript

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Unmentionables Setup And Ground Rules

Host 0:34

They say there are three things you don't talk about in polite company

Melissa 0:37

And we just made a podcast about all of them

Host 0:39

Politics, religion, sex, and a few other things that'll get you uninvited from Thanksgiving dinner. So grab a drink, loosen your belt, maybe hide this one from your boss. Welcome to The Unmentionables Hey everyone, I'm Evan, the guy with way too many questions and just enough nerve to ask them.

Melissa 0:59

And I'm Melissa, therapist, mom. I'm here to answer those questions before the arguments start.

Host 1:05

So here's how it works. I bring the curiosity, the wait, why is that a thing energy, and Melissa keeps us from setting the whole conversation on fire.

Melissa 1:14

Most of the time

Host 1:16

Second session, not the 20th, not after a year of history-taking and careful work, the second session. A 42-year-old woman sits down with a therapist she was referred to by someone she trusted. Good credentials, good reputation, and before that therapist has heard a single word from anyone else in her life, she's told to cut off her mother, and she does it. And then she told The Wall Street Journal it was an argument made from authority, and so she followed it. That ran on July 22nd alongside a survey of 7,000 estranged parents, a third of whom believe their child's therapist is the reason that they didn't get phone calls anymore. Within two days, there were a dozen shows on it, one of which used the words "destroying families" in the title I'm gonna be honest about that survey up front. It's 7,000 people describing a room they were never in. It measures what parents believe, not what therapists did. Set that down. That's not the interesting part. The interesting part is people making the strongest version of this argument aren't pundits. They're therapists.

The Wall Street Journal Estrangement Story

Host 2:26

One of them trains other therapists on this exact subject for the American Psychological Association. And my guest today is a licensed clinical social worker with decades in the field. She's a trauma specialist, EMDR certified, IFS, polyvagal, somatic work, which is to say she's precisely the therapist that they're describing as the enemy. She's also my wife.

Melissa 2:49

Melissa, they're talking shit about you. Are they wrong? No, I think they're all wrong. And not talking from, you know, a deep knowledge of the world that I live in, for sure

Host 3:04

I want you to say more, and I think we will over the course of this episode. Before you decide what you think about this, you probably need to know who's saying it. So we'll start with Bill Doherty. Doherty, Doherty, whatever.

Melissa 3:18

Professor heard of him

Host 3:19

Professor emeritus of family social science at the University of Minnesota, 40 years as a practicing family therapist. He built a modality called discernment counseling specifically to slow down couples who are about to end a marriage too fast. And in 2016, he co-founded Braver Angels, the nonprofit that gets Republicans and Democrats in a room to stop them from hating each other. His day job is depolarization. This isn't a man with a culture war agenda. Now, I will just caveat this by saying I'm relatively comfortable in political circles, and I've never heard of Braver Angels

Melissa 3:56

Well, and I don't think he's doing such a great job if his job is to get people to work together in rooms. Yeah

Host 4:03

I- feel like we might be at the height of polarization between the political parties at this point

Melissa 4:09

Causes me to question

Host 4:11

I think a lot less bipartisan work being done

Melissa 4:16

I absolutely agree

Host 4:17

than ever before. I don't, I don't really know how good his team's doing over there, but

Melissa 4:24

Right.

Host 4:24

whatever Uh, and then there's Josh Coleman, a practicing psychologist, trains clinicians on family estrangement for the APA. He says he gets letters constantly from adult children whose therapist told them their parent wasn't ready for family therapy, a parent that therapist has never really spoken to, and who, in Coleman's own caseload, often is ready.

Melissa 4:48

How he know that if he doesn't meet them 'cause they're not ready? Asking asking for a friend

Host 4:56

great question.

Melissa 4:58

And I, I say that 'cause I've sat in rooms when parents are ready, and I've, I've sat in those rooms with-

Host 5:03

Why are they talking?

Melissa 5:05

Well, first of all, these are not my people, because how old are they? Do we know that? He's been in practice for 40 years I mean, if he's been in practice for 40 years

Host 5:12

I would say that Dougherty's probably you know, Methuselah,

Track2-Combo 2 5:17

He's...He's

Melissa 5:17

probably the age of my parents and, or our parents, right? And that's the generation of people that are struggling here with navigating adult relationships with their adult children. So I would go out on a limb and say he's probably had some of these struggles with his own children if he has them. I don't know about the second one that you named. Not sure how old he is

Host 5:40

Josh Coleman. I know nothing about Josh Coleman, the psy- the psychologist. I, I think,

Melissa 5:45

Sure

Host 5:46

uh, probably about our age is where I would put him, maybe a little bit older than us

Melissa 5:51

Sure. And I think it's important to note that neither of them are trauma trained, trauma s- and trauma certified or trauma specialists. And so for them to speak on behalf of what they believe is happening in a trauma therapy room, I also think is, is pretty wild

Host 6:13

I mean, we should probably put it in context. This guy's an Oprah guy, so he goes on Oprah and Sesame Street

Melissa 6:19

Oh, gotcha

Who’s Making The Claim

Host 6:20

he does all of the, you know- Okay woe is me type stuff. I suppose, I, I'm just going off of his website. I'm being a little unfair to Josh Coleman, but you know, Josh, if you hear this and you would like to I would love to- h Would love that respond or debate- or even Bill. Bill, I, you, you might have some free time, because I don't think that AOC and... Well, MTG is gone, so I... Well. She, she lost her mind. But I don't think AOC and Rand Paul are having any great discussions these days so- let's- figure that one out. But anyway, w- where's your bar? Not, not in principle. Give, give me a case that sits under that bar and, and one that maybe sits over top of that bar.

Melissa 7:05

You know, I, I get cases like this all the time actually. And most often, most often, there are gonna be a lot of exceptions to this, but it's someone about our age, I'm gonna go with somebody in their 40s, and they're struggling with relationship with their parent. And we start out by just kind of sorting through what are the issues going on here. And when we look at what those issues are, most of what we find is the older adult is struggling with control. They want to control how their child is now parenting their own children, and it's different from how the older parent did. So there's issues with wanting open access and wanting things to follow the same paths and patterns that they did because of how they grew up. And we really are in a generation that's saying, "Hey, look, there are things that my parents did well, and there are things that they, oh my goodness, they didn't do so well," and that's okay. We wanna do them differently. And when you have a parent come in and say, "You're doing this wrong. You're not parenting right. What's wrong, you know, with your kid, and they're having these problems, and you should do this, that, and the other thing," yeah, I think as actual grown-ass adults, we are not responding well to that. And we're actually willing to say, "Uh, that's not how I'm gonna choose to do things, so you can accept that and take a step back, or you can not accept that and keep coming at me, and then I'm not gonna wanna be around you."

Host 9:01

Yeah. No, I, I hear that, uh, quite clearly. I, I guess the, there's a, there's a question, right? So the, there is a, uh, an apparent... I'll give the, the 7,000 parents from the survey the benefit of the doubt. There is an apparent increase in the number of family estrangements. I think just in general, in our own lives, we've seen that kind of activity.

Melissa 9:32

Do you wanna know what it is though?

Host 9:33

I would love to

Melissa 9:34

It's, it is adults recognizing that we are not bound to be in relationship with people just because we are related by blood So blood is not a tie, and unfortunately, generations that have come before us believe, you know, blood means everything, and you can't ever disagree with or go against

Why Adult Kids Pull Away

Melissa 10:10

or even call out people. You just need to make peace and suck it up and respect your elders and sit down and be quiet and do what you're told. And it doesn't matter if we are 42-year-old adults or if we're five-year-old children. Respect your parents.

Host 10:28

Yeah. No, and that's a, that's a big part of this too, and, and I wanted to ask about this Are we at a stage where our parents or parents are just, they're unable to change their ways? They're unable to l- allow us to be different or allow the kids to be different that are, that are parenting, and i- isn't that more on the older generation than it is the younger generation in terms of that? Doesn't that make it more difficult?

Melissa 11:07

So like I said, you know, well, A, I believe everybody can change. They just have to want to. And what I run into the most is this older generation going, "I don't need to change anything. I'm old. You can't teach an old dog new tricks, so you, child, just need to do what you're told." And what we see is children standing up and saying, "No, you are the one that wants relationship here, and this is what I need to feel safe and secure and sane." And there's a huge difference between boundaries and control, okay? And it is all about how we frame it. So a boundary is about me and what I need and what I am willing to do for myself. So for example, "Hey Mom, you know, I hear that you have some really strong opinions on how I'm raising my kids, and I will hear you out, and then I'm gonna make my own decisions. And if you continue to keep coming at me about how wrong I am, I'm going to limit how much I am engaging with you." Control would be, "Mom, you're not allowed to talk about this with me anymore." Control is me trying to dictate what you do or don't do. Boundaries are me limiting my own circle. And I, I mean, honestly, and this is sessions and sessions and sessions in, the conversations that we're having in an actual trauma therapy room is boundaries are flexible, boundaries ebb and flow and shift and change as somebody else, um, engages with them or denies that they exist, and unhealthy people don't like boundaries. They see them as punishment and consequence. So inevitably, when you're working with somebody who's willing to grow and change and adapt, and I have many of these older people that come through my office, and sometimes it's just as simple as, "Is me saying this gonna build relationship with my child or is it gonna damage relationship with my child? Maybe I should keep my mouth shut."

Host 13:27

No, that's great. And I, and I appreciate you bringing it into the therapy room because that's where this really needs to go, right? Um, we have a sociologist, Alison Pugh, she has a term that, uh, Joshua Coleman borrowed called detachment brokers. And the idea is that trauma therapists essentially, I mean, I'm just putting it out there. He didn't say this maybe directly or exactly, but I, I got it from what I heard and from what I've read, uh, that he said that, that professionals, trauma professionals who lend their authority to dissolve someone's guilt and obligation. So as a trauma therapist, would you accept that label or would you reject it as, as a whole directed at trauma therapists in general?

Melissa 14:14

So uh, I don't know. And maybe I'll, I'll share with you and then you can tell me where I land on it. But as a trauma therapist, our focus is on healing and growing and building healthy relationships. So first of all, no therapist should be telling you what to do. Uh, let's just start there. It is not my job to tell you to cut anybody off. It's my job to help you explore what that relationship looks like, how that relationship has become what it is, and to look at you as my client, what can you do to shift this dynamic? Because often when my client shifts the way they're seeing something, perceiving something, or handling something, which is out of reaction, out of a response to things that have been done throughout their lifetime, but when they can re-look at how they're engaging, most often the other person will shift right along with them, and it opens dialogue. We want family support. I am the queen of it takes a village. Takes a village to raise those kids, and Lord knows as parents, sometimes we need to get away from them and let somebody else do some heavy lifting for a little while. Um, and to have that family support would be amazing. It just needs to be healthy. And when we can't have a conversation with somebody without it turning into conflict, when we can't address something that is maybe bothering us or that we wanna do differently, that the other person is so shut down to that, it shuts down communication.

Host 15:59

It, it does, I think you're hitting on something that kind of s- it,

Blood Ties Versus Chosen Contact

Host 16:06

it strikes itself out to me, uh, or stands out to me. It, it... I keep seeing this term, and the, and the, the woman who, uh, spoke to, to Wall Street Journal said it, and then in, you know, in this question I, I asked it. The... We keep referring to therapists as having this authority, quote-unquote. And it, uh, it... Yes, they're, you're professionals, right? Um, you, you have maybe more insight into how the brain works and how the body reacts to how the brain is processing certain things. And I, I'm not a therapist, but sometimes I talk like I'm in the room with one. Um-

Melissa 16:46

You're often in the room with one, just for the record

Host 16:50

Um but I.. I've ever heard, being involved with, with what you do and, and around, you know, trauma therapists and, and this, you know, Office at Heart for Change, I've never heard you guys really speak of yourselves as some authoritarian or a, a, a person who's making decisions for their clients. It's always been sort of you're a guide on a journey. You're not, you know, a director.

Melissa 17:21

Correct. Is that- I'm a guide along for the ride. Yeah. And, and where,

Host 17:26

and where people are going, uh, down a destructive route, you might nudge and say, "Hey, can we think about this can we look at this from some other perspectives? But you don't go tell them what to do, right?

Melissa 17:37

No, because if it doesn't go well, then it's my fault. And I often have people say, "Just tell me what to do," and I, I can't tell you what to do. I can help you explore the different pathways. I can help you evaluate the quality of a relationship, whether it's bringing you peace or whether it's bringing you conflict. We can... I, I constantly, I work with people who say, "I really wanna have a relationship with this person, and every time we interact, I walk away just feeling defeated." And what does that do to someone's overall mental health? And the answer, at least in my office, would very rarely be to put up a brick wall. In fact, we talk a lot about how it doesn't have to be all or nothing. All or nothing thinking is unhealthy. So l- even if we're leaving the door cracked, we're still connecting with someone on holidays or responding to that text that they might occasionally send. Even if all they do is talk about themselves and never actually try to have a full relationship, the door's still open. So when we talk about therapists telling people to cut people off, I struggle with that ethically because it's just not ethical. Um, I just had an experience where another therapist allegedly told someone to promise her that she would not go back to her parents' home until issues were resolved. And those issues are really just about communication, and it's caused a greater divide because instead of now moving towards healing with two adults that really are working on, you know, making some changes and, and being healthier as individuals, this other clinician is pulling that child away from that healing process, and that's not okay.

Host 19:53

Yeah. So you, uh, you brought up the ethics, and I wanna get to that, uh, in the next segment here, but I do have a couple of other things that I wanted to touch on with you. And one of them you kinda just brought up as well with this, this more, uh, recent case or this, this case you just cited. W-one-sided data is structurally unavoidable in these kinds of sessions, right? You get your client's viewpoint. You almost never get the viewpoint of the other people. Now, I will say that with a caveat, when you do family therapy or you do some of the more holistic family-centered therapy practices that you and this office engage in, you do get to have a little bit more of a sense of who's telling who what, and it's na-maybe not always the same therapist. But like in this office, I know there are some families that come, and, uh, each individual family member will see somebody else in the office. But then you as clinicians have an opportunity to sort of discuss what the dynamics are and maybe get a better sense of what that looks like. Not everybody has that, um, you know, not every therapist has that, uh, ability. So what... As a therapist, what compensates for the fact that you're almost always getting that one-sided data?

Melissa 21:10

Well, we have to know that. And being in this field, as you said, it makes me feel old, but for decades, um, I-

Host 21:18

it's only been 21

Melissa 21:19

am yeah, it's like, it's, it's like brand new then, 21. Um, it's the beginning. So I have a very strong understanding that I am getting one side of a story. There's a whole other side, and truth is gonna be somewhere in the middle. And that is why it's so important to question perspectives, and motivations, and intentions, and look outside this box with compassion for the other person

Boundaries Versus Control

Melissa 21:55

and say, "Where might I have gone wrong?" Because really, the, that old adage that when you point the finger at somebody else, the other three more are pointing back at you, and that's something huge that we talk about in our offices is I need to first look at myself before I look to blame somebody else. What is my role in this? It's something that we like to call personal accountability

Host 22:20

That's an interesting, that's an interesting concept. I don't know that this country's ever heard of that before.

Melissa 22:26

Not sure.

Host 22:27

Um, I wanna touch on another thing, uh, before we, we go move on to the ethics piece, and I think this is something that, um, maybe comes with the territory. Um, clients coming in here that are pre-diagnosed by social media. They've been on social media or AI now, and they've asked ChatGPT about their scenario, and they've gotten some kind of a, uh, I don't know, therapy speak response that's probably not even remotely accurate. Uh, how do you deal with that kind of a situation? Is it a lot of rewinding and unpacking to get them back to basics? Or how do you, how do you deal with those kinds of clients that come in here already knowing what's wrong with them, quote unquote, but probably not knowing what's wrong with themselves?

Melissa 23:18

You, you might wanna just fill people in on, like, all the facial expressions you just saw me walk through.

Host 23:24

Yeah She pretty much answered all of it with a bunch of, uh... There wasn't an eye roll, but it almost got to that point

Melissa 23:30

I, I, becau- mm, yes. Because AI does not replace clinicians, and when you have a really good clinician, awesome. You think that this is what you have, but I'm gonna travel down all the differential diagnostic paths to see what else is there and what else might be masking for something that you don't even know to ask your AI

Host 24:04

That's, that's a great point. And, and, and that brings me to sort of going into the ethics piece as we transition here. You know, uh, Joshua Coleman, again, he, he, he says a lot of this has to do with career stage, and his early work was really bad because he hadn't lived enough yet. Um, you're talking about a really good clinician. I can only assume that you become a really good clinician through practice and repetition and doing the work and doing the job. You don't generally start the... I mean, maybe you did 'cause you're awesome and amazing at everything, but not everybody can be you. So they probably start out making some mistakes. And along those lines, like, what did you get wrong in your first five years that you would handle differently now?

Melissa 24:55

Well, I think first I want to address the fact that you, you missed a piece of becoming an excellent clinician, and what you missed was doing the work on ourselves or with an- another clinician, right? Is diving through our own issues so that they do not impact someone in the therapy room. And those of us that are doing trauma work that are really great at what we do have been through therapy or in therapy or in and out of therapy. We're addressing our own stuff, and when we talk about that younger generation of clinicians, you're talking about a shift in the education as well, and just a lack of insight into what their own issues are that I think are then being put out. And I've, I've worked with many, many interns over the years, and I got to a point where I'm just, I haven't even been willing to take any anymore because this generation is, is on a struggle bus. So I can see that perspective of maybe we're talking about brand-new baby clinicians that are not at all good at what they're doing and have a lot of learning to do. But again, that really is on the client to know who am I seeing? And I will... I'll tell you, I have had people say, "But I can't get into your schedule on Thursday nights at 7:00 only." And I'm like, "Well, you're either gonna pick the availability or you're gonna pick the quality." And there are plenty of people who end up going to a huge practice with brand-new baby clinicians, and who knows what they're told from there

Host 26:57

Yeah. Yep. So I wanna talk about the ethics. I wanna get into where the lines really are drawn, and I wanna be ex- as exact as possible about where the line is, 'cause I think everybody's sort of arguing past it right now. The, everybody's arguing that the therapist discussed going no contact with the parents, and sometimes that's the right call, I think, based on what said. And, and maybe even the only call. If it's destructive, right, that's maybe the only thing you can do is, is sever ties, cut contact, and hopefully that distance resolves things. Or at least calms them down right?

Melissa 27:36

When we're talking about abuse, and we're talking especially about one party not taking accountability, then sometimes no contact absolutely can be the right call. And unfortunately, a lot of people who are abusive, w- they, this might shock you, but they're not gonna take accountability for what they're doing. They're gonna blame the other person, and they're gonna play the victim.

Host 28:02

Yeah, what is the, the thing you always say, "Narcissists won't be, uh, won't ever be fixed in therapy 'cause they won't ever show up"?

Melissa 28:09

Correct. They might show up for a couple sessions, but that'll be the extent of it. for a couple sessions, but that'll be the extent of it. Uh, the, so the violation here really isn't that. It's, it's rendering a clinical judgment about a person who isn't even your client, who you've never even assessed- and doing it in such a short period of time. And the APA ethics code says that opinions about individuals require an examination adequate to support them.

Host 28:32

In fact, I, again, I'm not a therapist, but I know that I've watched enough court TV to know that's pretty much what therapists say when you are asked to render a judgment about somebody that you haven't... You're like, That we've never treated Yeah. "My ethics say I can't do that. I've never

Melissa 28:47

Which is exactly why my focus is on my client and what my client has control over and what their choices are

Host 28:57

Right. And the NASW code says the decision belongs to the client, as you say, which cuts both ways really, by the way. Uh, steering someone towards a cutoff violates

Therapist Authority And The “Detachment Broker” Idea

Host 29:10

it exactly as much as steering them towards reconciliation. And Coleman's example is, is one sentence, "Narcissists can't change." That's- Can said, said about a mother that the clinician had never met. Right. That's used to shut down family therapy before it started.

Melissa 29:27

Right. And so A, narcissists can change if they choose to engage in the process. They just most often will not choose to engage 'cause they don't believe they're the problem. Everybody else is the problem. You won't find them most often in that therapy

Host 29:41

they're not Morgan Wallen.

Melissa 29:43

not Morgan Wallen. N- huh?

Host 29:45

I'm the problem.

Melissa 29:45

Oh. Correct. Um, but, well, the other piece of, of what you're saying there is we can't call somebody that, and that's why the narcissism term has gotten such a bad rap because of people just using it flagrantly instead of recognizing maybe this is somebody that has some narcissistic traits. But we can't go in and lay labels on people that we've never met or interacted with.

Host 30:18

Yeah, you know, it, it, it's so, so funny that you say that 'cause I think about, you know, people that I've known or, or you see online, the, the influencers that are out there yelling narcissist or fascist or whatever they're yelling. They're calling people names they've never met, they've never talked to, they don't know them. they're using some of the therapy terms, a lot of the therapy terms especially, that come out of, of, um, the, the type of therapy that you, that They're misusing misusing. them. They're mislabeling a lot of the, the, the trauma therapy that they're hearing it somewhere. I don't know where. Maybe it's the trauma therapy influencers or something on TikTok And they're like, "Oh, that sounds like a fun word. I should use that." And they really don't understand what it means, and I think that's a dangerous component of this, and it's, it's broader and broader. But second session, like should that... What, what... We know that. she shouldn't have said that. That was wild. But

Melissa 31:18

that That is wild

Host 31:19

should the therapist have said instead of c- contact

Melissa 31:23

Can you read it again? What was said

Host 31:27

Uh, yes. I have to find it. It's at the beginning of our work here. Um, a 42-year-old woman sat down with her therapist that she was referred to by someone she trusted. Good cred- good credentials, good reputation, and before that therapist has heard a single word from anyone else in her life, she's told, uh, she's told to cut off her mother. And so we're getting this... We're obviously not getting the case notes from the therapist. We don't know exactly the words that were used. But this 42-year-old woman is saying that the therapist on session two said, "I've heard enough. Cut her off."

Melissa 32:05

Which is unfathomable to me because you're telling that client what to do, first of all. So what should she have done? Maybe walked through how, you know, 'cause we don't know what was disclosed, and we don't know the validity of what was disclosed. So if a client comes in convinced that they're gonna cut somebody off, and they walk in saying, "These are all the horrendous things that my parent has done to me. I'm over it, I'm done." Okay, well, what are your options? Where, where do you feel like, you know, you can maybe explore this more? What, what's my role here as your therapist? 'Cause it sounds like you've already made a decision. Or they're gonna come in and they're gonna say, which is most often the case, is they know something's wrong, they know it doesn't feel good, but most people walk in saying adamantly they do not want to cut somebody off. They're blaming themselves for the problems. They're, uh, taking way too much accountability and trying to deflect everything because that's what they learned throughout childhood, is keep quiet, deflect, just go with it. And so they're trying to figure out, "How do I make my world better?" And eventually we circle around to, you can fix all of this inside of you, and we still have this external factor that's gonna come at you. And that's when we need to decide, am I going to engage in this process with this other person, see if they'll come to therapy, see if they'll talk through things? Am I gonna just change how I feel about their behaviors? Am I just gonna radically go from being annoyed and agitated and angry to being okay with things 'cause this is just the way they are? Am I going to increase my distress tolerance, just teach myself to handle more and more and more, and that happens through exposure? Or am I just gonna blow things up and make everything worse? Those are the four options that you really have in any situation, and it's a DBT concept, dialectical behavioral therapy, and it's often what I go back to with many of my clients, is we have these four options. What are you currently doing, and what might you wanna choose differently?

Host 34:29

Yeah. So Where's the line between this is a boundary and cut 'em off? And does a good clinician put an expiration date on one? Don't come back to me until this is done?

Melissa 34:44

Uh, no. No, that would be bad. Um, we have an unconditional regard for our, our clients, and I say this regularly actually. Like, "Hey, I know this is what you're working toward, and I recognize that you might make a baby step or you might take a step back between now and the next session. Either way, it's okay. There's no judgment in this space because that's how this stuff works." And that's why I say it's, it's a super red flag when somebody comes in saying they wanna cut somebody off. That tells me a lot about who they are actually, um, not necessarily about who the parent is. So again, control is I'm putting restrictions or, or, um, requirements on what you must do. Boundaries are me navigating myself and what I will do. So again, if I'm struggling because my mother is showing up at my house unannounced

One-Sided Stories And Personal Accountability

Melissa 35:56

and just walking in the front door, right? The first step would probably be to lock the front door and have a conversation with my mom that says, "Mom, I'm really not comfortable with this, so I need you to let me know if you wanna come over because I might be busy." "Oh, I don't care if you're busy or not, I'll just swing by anyway." "Okay, but Mom, if, if I don't know you're coming, I'm not gonna be available." And then Mom might show up and find a door locked, and then we're gonna have to have that conversation again. "Hey, Mom, that's 'cause I let you know. I need that heads-up from you." And we try to re-teach boundaries because our parents' generation is not a generation of boundaries. They don't understand them. They don't know them. They were not taught them. This is something really fairly new in our generation So I want you all to consider these five things in your own therapist if you have one, and it's how to spot a really great therapist. Um, and this one kind of is, or maybe not a great therapist. Does your therapist use diagnostic labels for people they've never met? Because that would not be a great one. Uh, number two is have they ever asked what the other person would say? That's looking at different perspectives, and that is a positive thing. Have they ever suggested you might be wrong about something? Again, you know, we need to question our own logic and why we've arrived where we've arrived. Have they offered family work or ruled it out on your behalf? We should be willing to do the family work. We should be offering the family work or referring out for the family work. And are you leaving sessions capable or more certain? Um, are you better able to navigate through your life? Are you gaining a better understanding of yourself?

Host 37:55

What does someone do if that list made them nervous about their own therapist?

Melissa 38:01

Run Run fast and Run. Run fast. And just know you can interview therapists. You can ask therapists how they work, and if something doesn't feel right, bring it up with your therapist, because a lot of them aren't great and have their own bias.

Host 38:18

Well, yeah, and I think a lot of them would welcome the opportunity to understand you better, because if they can do that with you, they could use that with the next one that comes in, right?

Melissa 38:28

Absolutely

Host 38:28

It's a learning process. So listen, this has been a great discussion. I think the easy ending here is therapy good, bad therapist bad. Still go get help

Melissa 38:38

Yes, from a good one, not a bad one

Host 38:42

But that's both true and useless, really. So here's what I actually took from this discussion. The people making the strongest version of this argument, they're not really trying to shut down therapy. They are therapists. One of them spends his weekends trying to get politicians in a room to stop them from hating each other. They love this work, and they're saying that somewhere along the way, the job quietly changed from helping you carry it to telling you to put it down and walk. However, they're also saying that from a position of a, a lack of understanding about the type of therapy that you do. And I think that it's important to understand that not all therapists are the same, that not all therapists think the same way. It's just like pretty much anybody else in this world. They have their own opinions, they have their own biases, they have their own approaches They are not as trauma-informed. They don't quite understand the work that you do and their, your office does, and maybe their way of therapy, their way of work, their way of doing things works for certain people. I think that you would probably, correct me if I'm wrong, say the same about your business. It doesn't work for everyone, and not every therapist is a perfect fit for everybody that comes in as,

Melissa 40:03

They aren't. Yeah

Host 40:06

Trauma therapy is a specific and very- Specialized. Specialized uh, you know, uh, form of therapy. There's lots different methodologies. There's lots of different modalities that are used across the therapeutic spectrum, okay? And what I don't typically hear, maybe it happens and I just haven't heard it, but what I don't typically hear is trauma therapists going out on a limb and telling everybody that the, I don't know, old school therapist, whatever we might call those people who aren't trauma-informed- are horrible. We don't hear that. It's just that trauma therapy is for a certain kind of individual. It's a niche a niche it's, for a certain- a certain- Mm-hmm you know, niche e- element of people out there. It's not, it's not for everybody. Sometimes there's a deep level of trauma, hurt, pain that's been caused, and it doesn't have to be physical abuse, but some kind of abuse is generally associated with this. Yes Right That's where trauma therapy comes in. If you just need somebody to work through your, I don't know, your neuroses, your internal neuroses, I think you could probably just go, you know, find, find Mr. Coleman.

Melissa 41:25

It's, it's a generalist

Host 41:26

And and it's a generalist. And, and just have a discussion. It's, you know, it's the therapist from, uh, uh, Designated Survivor. Yes. Right? Dr. see Dr. Loudon- Yeah and, and he'll talk with you about things, and, you know, there's no, there's no deeper diving there. Mmhmm But for someone who's been wounded, someone who's been, you know, uh, abused in some way, rape victims, or people who have just been in a narcissistic relationship or, you know, taught from an early age through much of their life that their value is less than, those are trauma areas where it's important that you talk about things in a certain way, that you dive into, to certain areas of the brain and how it works, and I think you would probably say, and I'll let you say it, but I think that's the, that's... It's very true that there are, there are different ways to look at this, and different things work for different people.

Melissa 42:24

It's very true, and, uh, some of what you're talking about is complex developmental trauma. And especially there, when we talk about healing, we're talking about going back to the sources of those hurts and restoring relationship and healing those fractures that happened. We're not talking about cutting off and walking away. Yeah, and I think, again, we gotta

Host 42:51

back to what is a therapist really at its, at their core, right? therapist isn't a judge for your family. They're a referee. Time out. Hold on. Let's talk about this. Let's figure it out. They're, they're a guide. They're, they're a, a, a, an arbitrator. They're somebody who's there to, to try to create harmony, but don't manufacture it

Melissa 43:13

challenge your own narrative. Because sometimes, often we create a narrative in our mind, we fill in the gaps to support what we want to believe, and a good therapist is gonna challenge that narrative and look for alternatives to it

Host 43:32

Yeah, so their job is to make you strong enough to decide, and even harder than that, to leave you as someone who can still be wrong about your own story- and be okay with being wrong. Yeah.

Melissa 43:43

a good one gives

Host 43:43

truly is to challenge how you're thinking. Yeah. and a good one gives you that judgment. A bad one gives you theirs, and then they call it healing. Right. So Melissa, last one, not for the audience, but for you. What's the standard you hold yourself to that if you broke it, I could call you out on it?

Melissa 44:03

Sure. I don't ever tell anybody what to do. I am there to help you figure out what you want, what's gonna help you move forward because something's not going well, and, uh, that line is very clear. It is never my job to tell you what to do