The Search for Identity When Clinicians Become Clients

Probst, Barbara

doi:10.1007/s10615-015-0522-9

Cited by 5 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…For example, as well as its benefits as a source of professional learning, mandatory therapy during training may be PSYCHOTHERAPISTS' EXPERIENCES FROM BEING A CLIENT 24 associated with resentment arising from lack of choice, or limited meaningfulness because the therapy has taken place at a time when the trainee may not be ready for it. Clinicians engaging in personal therapy in mid-career may find it hard to let go of their therapist identity and fully participate in the therapeutic process, or their therapist might be inhibited by working with a colleague (Probst, 2015b).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How psychotherapists make use of their experiences from being a client: Lessons from a collective autoethnography

Råbu¹,

McLeod

Haavind

et al. 2019

Counselling Psychology Quarterly

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First-hand experience of being a client is regarded by many psychotherapists as making an essential contribution to professional development. Although research has not established any direct influence on client outcome, arising from therapist participation in personal therapy, qualitative studies have explored how therapists transfer learning from one context to the other. A group of six therapists-researchers engaged in a collective autoethnography in which we shared narrative accounts of our own experiences as clients. Together we covered a wide set of therapies, sought for varied purposes, and from different stages in the life-course. Different areas of learning were identified: negative experiences could strengthen own convictions for acting differently; positive experiences worked as inspiration and support; being in therapy early in life represented a significant formative experience; working through complex personal issues in therapy gave the courage to identify similar conflicts in phantasies and realities of clients. The link between having been a client and working as a therapist is a subjective, reflective process of reworking figure and ground in the search for professional sensitivity.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How psychotherapists make use of their experiences from being a client: Lessons from a collective autoethnography

Råbu¹,

McLeod

Haavind

et al. 2019

Counselling Psychology Quarterly

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…So (2017) found that student music therapists reported that undergoing personal therapy was one of the most significant ways that they learned to empathize with their clients and be more available emotionally for them. Moreover, trainee therapists came to understand “how it had felt when they were on the receiving end” (Probst, 2015a) and were able to make a quick connection to their clients through their own personal therapy (Probst, 2015b).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Korean Music Therapy Students’ Experience of Group Music Therapy: A Qualitative Case Study

Hyejin

2019

Front. Psychol.

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The purpose of this qualitative case study is to describe the in-depth experiences of Korean students undergoing group music therapy. Seven students participated in eight consecutive weeks of group music therapy. The researcher collected and triangulated three data resources: individual interview transcripts, participant journals, and audiotaped sessions. The data were analyzed using the case study method and peer debriefing was conducted for trustworthiness. The four emergent themes and six categories were as follows: (1) Discovering one’s self (categories: what it means to be “me,” learning about self), (2) Inside group music therapy (categories: various responses to experiencing non-directive group, two different sides of experiencing silence, feeling a sense of safety and acceptance, sharing difficult experience with one’s own family), (3) Musical experience as a way to explore emotions, and (4) What learned through books became real. The results indicated that the student therapists’ experiences were linked to their personal development, unique experience of group music therapy dynamics, musical experience as an emotional container, and clinical development. Finally, it is recommended that cultural adaptations are made by providing both structure and space for Korean students to express themselves.

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Living the Language of Psychotherapy: How Therapists Use Their Experiences from Being Patients

Råbu,

Binder,

Moltu

2024

J Contemp Psychother

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Personal therapy is a requirement in several psychotherapy-training programs, and more than 80% of therapists have been psychotherapy patients. No quantitative evidence of the effects on their patients’ outcomes has been presented. However, qualitative studies and expert experiences highlight the value of therapists having been patients themselves. To investigate this further, we used in-depth qualitative methods to explore the experiences of eight early career psychologists. For our data collection, the participants wrote reflexive notes on two occasions, and met for a full day of focus groups. The notes and transcriptions of the focus groups were analyzed from the perspective of reflexive hermeneutic phenomenology. In all, the therapists had been patients in 19 courses of various psychotherapies. The core experiential themes were: (1) their own suffering had been for real; (2) ambivalence of sharing vulnerability; (3) the significance of experiencing theoretical concepts – the language of psychotherapy – in real life; (4) dealing with shame; (5) the need to know that therapists may become so important that the patient can easily be hurt; and (6) the therapist became an inner model that the patient could use. The therapists seemed to use their psychotherapy experiences in their personal development and professional lives. Therapists may have a unique opportunity to benefit from psychotherapy due to the language they have acquired for sharing experiences with their therapists.

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The Search for Identity When Clinicians Become Clients

Cited by 5 publications

References 25 publications

How psychotherapists make use of their experiences from being a client: Lessons from a collective autoethnography

How psychotherapists make use of their experiences from being a client: Lessons from a collective autoethnography

Korean Music Therapy Students’ Experience of Group Music Therapy: A Qualitative Case Study

Living the Language of Psychotherapy: How Therapists Use Their Experiences from Being Patients

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