A story of an unethical therapist
I am a licensed therapist in the heartland. As we all must know that when someone finds out our field of work, theres a chance they have a question or want some advice. This story is a conversation I had a few years back with someone in a personal context.
I matched with someone on a dating app and during conversation, our respective jobs came up. I told them I was a therapist and they asked if they could ask me a question. Fantastic, go for it.
They proceed to regale me with a story about a therapist they had in the past who was very closed off, cold, but all around professional (or so I thought). The person I talked to eventually broke up with their partner and said the therapist demeanor with them completely changed. Warm, would send non-therapy related texts outside of session hours (songs, book recommendations, etc), more engaged. The person I spoke with said they developed strong feelings for the therapist. They had full conversations about the ethics of dating each other, consequences, and other possibilities. They said they actively felt their therapist flirting with them and accepted it and sees nothing wrong with being in a relationship with them. (side note, the irony of meeting someone on a dating app and them talking about wanting to date someone else is not lost on me)
So I explained to them that while its not explicitly illegal, its horrifically unethical and a massive violation of the oath a therapist takes when getting into this field. It was very clear that this person was in a vulnerable place, and obvious the therapist abused their position. I responded with as much kindness as possible, validated their emotions, but also tried to ensure they understood the power dynamics of the relationship and how it could be hurtful to her long term.
And thats about where it wrapped up. It was really unfortunate to hear someone in this field act this way and I genuinely feel bad for them having been taken advantage of.
Funny enough I was able to get the therapist's information and reported them for this behavior. I dont have a follow up to it but I really hope that they wont be in a position to do something like this again.
EDIT: I spoke with the mods about this post and they stressed the importance of as providing as minimal detail as possible. This post is heavily sanitized, so use your imagination about how much worse it actually was. I really do wish I could explain further details, but its also about a very vulnerable person and want to be as respectful as possible while still sharing the story. But based on what was actually said to me, reporting the therapist genuinely felt like the right decision. Was I wrong? Maybe. But I saw this similar to calling ACS, better safe than sorry.
EDIT 2: This conversation was NOT a therapy session. It was very much a "oh, youre a therapist? Let me get your thoughts on this". I can assume we can all tell when a conversation is going from casual talk to free therapy. Part of me kept the conversation open because I was sort of in disbelief over what I was reading.
I am recognizing that there is so much context missed in this because I cant post or quote the original conversation so probably best to leave it alone at this point. But just for an example, book recommendations and songs were not what were sent to them and they also send me screen shots of their conversations. Unless this person I spoke with is in an extremely dark place, there was no reason for me to doubt they werent legitimate.