YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Those of you who read my posts will recall the bulk of my current emotional distress dates back to 5:30 pm, March 22 of 2012. That's when my ex-therapist abandoned me, after explaining I was complaining and not changing, and sharing other delightful, uplifting opinions about me. (The long, angry story remains posted here on the forum in an http://mentalpod.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... pen letter to my ex-therapist.) My original post is located http://mentalpod.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... =6757]here.

I've only half-jokingly come to the conclusion this incident is the instrument of extracting payment due for some karmic debt I must repay. I've developed some form of a post-traumatic stress, finding the slightest reminder of the woman brings back some aspect of the termination, or comments she made during 2.5 years of therapy. Let's just say these reminders are unhelpful. She abandoned me, blamed me for the failure of therapy, refused to meet with me, offered no help in transitioning to another therapist, threatened me with legal action when I continued to try to connect with her, then was uncommunicative with the therapist I found to take over my care for depression and what turned out to be some elements of borderline personality disorder. I've struggled to let go of this, and so far have failed. And each such reminder sends me into a paroxysm of emotion -- extended periods of sobbing and confusion, or violent outbursts of rage.

After this happened, I began frequenting sites like CrazyMeds -- looking for support, and trying to offer some in return. This and other sites and blogs have become places of comfort. But I find that comfort is fading, as a consequence of random triggers within the site in the form of advertisements for the clinic where my ex-therapist (and the psychiatrist who conspired with her) are employed. I mean, really? Can there be no place where I can go without fear of being reminded of this painful affair?

I understand how it works. I visit sites dedicated to mental illness, I search for information about therapy, termination, counter transference, ethics and more. The Internet remembers, and helpfully tells me about resources that will aid my quest for recovery. Including, apparently my ex-therapist. My ex-therapist needs to find new patients to victimize. The site needs to gather funds on which to operate. There's not really anything to be done. Except to say Dear Universe: Thanks. You've made your point. Please stop now?

I hear you, in_media_res. I haven't suffered from a therapist to the degree that you have, but I have found professional therapists to be anything but professional.

It is probably a sign of an unethical site to accept advertisement from an unethical clinic. My two cents.

We here honor your pain. You most definitely don't deserve it - please stop punishing yourself with your joke about "karmic debt". Through no fault of your own, you were abused by a person in a position of trust and power.

Please take care, all the best, we here are all cheering for your greatest today and tomorrow!

Hi, in_media_res:

I responded to your initial posting. I recently returned from a conference and spoke to a really wonderful psychiatrist there. I told her your story (no names and I didn't name the site). She was APPALLED! Then I told her my story about Deborah Nadel, my prescribing psychiatrist and she said she knew Deborah professionally and said that she had had very negative experiences with Deborah Nadel as well. She had experienced (as a peer) almost exactly what I had experienced, and what my own therapist had experienced with Deborah Nadel -- that she is troubled, unfeeling, and unethical.

It is very, very likely that you are not alone in your experience of your therapist. I can guarantee that she is doing it to her other patients. What concerns me and I think others here on this site is that you are feeling as if something is wrong with you -- well, of course, you would, you're DEPRESSED!! Which is why it's so incredibly fucked up what your therapist did, because she is supposed to protect you, since you really can't protect yourself right now, and instead, she took advantage of you. But all of us here know that she messed up big time and you didn't.

Can the karma shit. Once you get better (much better), you will have a much clearer spiritual sense of how karma works, but I can tell you, it doesn't work like that. Forgive me for being blunt, but right now, you don't have a clue about karma -- you can't -- you're DEPRESSED!!). You're taking on someone else's bad karma and calling it your own, and believe me it doesn't work like that at all.

You're job right now is to get better -- any old way you can, bit by bit. That woman is a nut job. It'll take you a couple of years to get over this, but you will get over it, I promise.

Thank you both for your responses. I appreciate it greatly.

You're right she's doing this to other patients. I'm aware of one other case (friend of a friend kind of thing) where she abruptly terminated care for a patient. I don't know that she engaged in some of the hurtful behavior she exhibited toward me, but there is precedent with her for sudden and capricious terminations. In that case, the patient was also difficult to treat -- she has a debilitating depression, and has undergone ECT -- among several other treatments -- without much success.

So it seems clear that's probably my ex-therapist's approach to terminations. I think I'm being honest when I say I'm over that part of it. It's painful, and difficult, but I can see that as perhaps a failing in her training or some lack of compassion. I can even understand why she felt she had to do it. And in that I can forgive that part of it. But the rest is much harder. The way she chose to carry out her decision is unacceptable. WIthout reiterating my history, the way she's gone about it has reinforced and validated all my own self-doubt and criticisms. And that's the part I can't understand. I alternate between rage at her, and contemptuous self-loathing. But enough.

On the comment about Karma, I'm partly joking - but only partly. I do think I have a greater understanding of it than my post may suggest. I do think it's true, and that we ultimately pay some price for the pain and suffering we inflict on others. Whether that's through the agency of the universe, or a consequence of our own personalities and behavior is harder to say. As the bible says, you reap what you sow. And I don't have to go back to some theoretical past life for evidence of the validity of that belief. This incident has helped me see how my behavior has hurt others. But I believe in it for much the same reasons as others might believe in heaven or hell. It's comforting to think that at some point there will be some justice. That she'll come to see how her actions have hurt others. Because that's not happening now. A complaint to the state was dismissed out of hand, and complaints to the clinic director have revealed he's perfectly content with how she handled the situation. I came across a blog posting she wrote a few months ago which describes a rather idyllic life. She's not paying any price for what she did. I can only hope someday she does, and she'll understand exactly what she's doing.

Thanks again. I appreciate the support.

ps: After submitting my original post, I saw a number of errors. It would be nice to be able to edit our posts to correct things we got wrong.