I hope this leads to better practices.
TL;DR : My therapist was trying to groom me into thinking that my husband is abusing me. I knew better, recorded our sessions, took them to lots of lawyers, and judges, and eventually she lost her license because she was doing pretty much the same thing to 180 other women and men in Nevada and Arizona.
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Story time :
So, I had a hard life growing up, things i dont really want to go into full details but, abuse ranging from mental, physical, and sexual were done upon me from age 3 - 15. I finally began seeing a therapist when I was 21, at the desperate request of my then boyfriend (now husband) because I had hit a point to where I actually did try to kill myself.
My first therapist saved my life. I am eternally grateful for her and beyond thankful as well for my husband sticking by me, instead of leaving my crazy ass behind. She helped me get onto the right path, helped me get diagnosed (PTSD, depression, and severe anxiety as a side effect of the both, and an eating disorder which was also a side effect). I've gotten them all pretty much under control with the help of CBT therapy, and marijuanaaaaaaaaaa, and a VERY strong support system. My eating disorder is gone, and my anxiety attacks have gone from 1 every few hours, to my last one being 5 months ago and I can't remember the last time I had an auditory or visual flashback, they used to be so frequent (part of the reason I tried to kill myself).
ANYWAY. I moved out of state and was given a new therapist, after being with the saint of therapists for three years I was a bit nervous to open up to someone new, but I knew that in order to live a normal life, I can't be afraid of things like this. She looked at my case file and immediately said "Well there isn't any way you can have PTSD from a little family bullying, you've never been in the army." and tossed my entire booklet aside. THAT IS WHEN YOU SHOULD LEAVE AN OFFICE. DONT TRUST A THERAPIST THAT WONT EVEN TAKE THE TIME TO READ YOUR PREVIOUS RECORD. So we had to go over my history, which is very rough on me to spill out in 30 minutes time, led to me crying, her telling me to "suck it up its fine and over with now..." It wasn't a good first session. I chalked it up to being just a hard first time, and that the next week would be okay. Welp. It wasn't.
Over the next few sessions she kept asking me how my home life was, how my husband treated me, if I was safe in the home, what about our child. I just kept getting this nagging feeling that she wasn't happy with my answer of "If it wern't for my husband, I would be dead right now, he saved me from my own mind" or that "no I dont want any more kids, and neither does my husband" because...how on earth can you only want one child? Overall, she gave off this air of being annoyed that my current home life is my safe haven, and that my only problem is getting my abusive memories to fade away and not intrude on my life anymore.
Around appointment 8 (month two) is when I decided to start recording our sessions on my phone, in session 7, she had implied that She believes my husband is planting the idea that it was my family that abused me as a child, and that the bruises i frequent arn't from him? After all, I did have a severe concussion when I was 13, and it did impact my long and short term memory ...(I have anemia and bruise from bumping into the fridge so bruises are something that I just live with).
Well, Appointment 8, she sat down on the couch, next to me, put her hand on my shoulders to look me right in the eyes and say "Allie, You need to understand this, you wernt abused by your family, its your husband raping you, and beating you, let me help you, let me report him for you, I have a place you can stay" It felt like she was doing a poor job of hypnotizing me into believing her words. Thats when I got up, and attempted to leave the building, but she had security stop me at the door and forced me to go back into her office to finish my session. Thats when I had a bit of a fit because you shouldn't be holding people in your building against their will. After a few minutes I calmed down and realized that, I NEEDED to get the rest of the session on record. So I sat down and apologized and let her continue. Thats when she asked me if I try to run away from my husbands abuse the same way I ran from her office. I continued to say, no, my husband is amazing, and helped me get away from my abusive family, and helped me get a better relationship with my mother, he's never laid a hand on me. She was verbally huffing in annoyance, and at the end of our session said "look, if you dont just tell me that he's hurting you, I'll have to report you to CPS for putting your child in a dangerous home, we wouldn't want that now, would we?" And thats when I left. and never saw her alone again. The next time I saw her it was with a lawyer in tow.
About 18 months of court dates, invasive investigations in my own home and background, and testimonies from her other current and former clients, she was finally found guilty, had her license taken away, and ordered to pay the state $500,000 and another $500,000 to 180 clients. I felt like I was in some insane Lifetime Movie. Like...people arn't crazy like this in real life right? I wish I knew what her motive was with attempting to twist my mind into thinking my husband was hurting me and that myself and my family that he had gotten me away from were the victims. I hurt for the countless others who she did very similar things to, and actually fell for her tricks. I'm just really thankful for my first therapist who got me back the mental state to not let others tell me what I think anymore. Honestly if this crazy lady had gotten to me right after my suicide attempt, her plan would have worked.
Oh, I am getting $15,000 of the $500,000, and 10,000 I am donating to a local women's shelter. The other 5k I am using for a very much deserved vacation. Haven't decided where to yet.
**If you're uncomfortable with your health care provider, do not return. Just because they have a license does not mean they have your best interests at heart.**
