Harmed by Healers

[Not Alone]

I am grateful to the many professionals in my life who have come along side me with compassion to help me to deal with my trauma. They are all human and have their own issues and make mistakes. The mistakes still cause pain, even if the intent was not evil. I've spent many sessions processing issues from previous professionals. Others on OOTS have also shared that they've been hurt by professionals, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

I'm starting this post, not as a place to bash therapist/psychiatrists/etc., but, if it would be helpful, an opportunity to share about being harmed by a healer.

[Jazzy]

Unfortunately, I could share a few examples. The latest one was when I tried to check myself in to the hospital, but instead ended up being literally, physically, dragged away from the admittance desk and out of the building by 3 "police officers". I've nowhere near processed it / dealt with it / recovered from it, so I don't want to go in to all the details right now.

Thank you though, for starting this thread, and providing this space. It helps me feel not so alone.

[Not Alone]

Jazzy, I'm so sorry that happened to you. It sounds horrendous and terrifying.

[Bermuda]

I just kind of wanted to bump this. I think I shared briefly in my journal about my experiences and sprinkled it in elsewhere. I find it difficult to talk about. As someone with "my brand" of CPTSD, I tend to be very skittish, flighty, and distrusting. It makes it difficult for me to look back on my experiences impartially and see what was my C-PTSD vs. what were my therapist's issues. ...But whoever's issues they were, there were a lot of them!

This one is certainly the issue of my therapist: religious paraphernalia has no place in a trauma therapist's office. My therapist's room was filled with alternative religious symbols, and was situated on the fourth floor of a building with only one door to leave, and the seat I was to sit in was in the corner next to the windows, while her seat was across from me directly blocking the direction of the door. I would think that a trauma therapist should know that is not a good layout.

Also, I mentioned that it almost felt like she was trying to guide my experiences in a direction to fit her own assumptions about people with C-PTSD. She tried so tell me how angry I must be, and how I must have fits of rage, and when I told her several times that I don't it was almost as if she tried to get me angry. Which, with "my brand" of C-PTSD, just doesn't happen. (Feel like my brand of C-PTSD needs a name, I'm open to suggestions.) Outbursts of rage wasn't her only presumption, but she also made presumptions about me relationship and tried to steer the conversation in that direction so many times instead of letting me just continue.

She also had the habit of telling me to take my shoes off and sit in the room, alone, for ten minutes before she came in (late). Meanwhile, I would be getting anxious while sat in the corner, wishing I had my shoes on, and then she would come in and correct my sitting posture, put a pillow under my feet to help me feel grounded and put a pillow behind my back. Every time. Honestly, I am a tiny person, and this did not make me feel more comfortable or normal. It made me feel small and unable to move.

I know these are quite minor, but they were very significant at the time.

[CactusFlower]

Bermuda, I'm sorry you went through that. I don't think those things are minor at all. That person sounds very controlling and unprofessional to me, and I've worked in healthcare for decades.

While I really click with and like my therapist now, I had one for a short time about 20-25 years ago (I can't remember exactly when) that was not a good experience. With all the information and research now available, I realize that she didn't do EMDR well, and she did EFT incorrectly. I'm just now starting to research EFT and I'm surprised at how well it works when done RIGHT. This brings up frustration that if she'd done things correctly, maybe some stuff would have been better, earlier.

Physically, I had an experience where I had a primary care provider on an insurance for a short time that didn't listen to me. I'd had bronchitis several times before and knew exactly what it felt like. I tried to tell her that and she insisted it was just a cold, even prescribing some cough capsules that (of course) didn't work. I ended up in the ER that night doing 3 nebulizer treatments and lo and behold, I had bronchitis. I called my insurance the moment I was better and switched doctors. I made sure to tell them I'd been misdiagnosed too. I no longer put up with PCPs that don't listen to me. I know my body.

Sage

[Bella]

I'm sorry Jazzy, Bermuda and Sage, you had to experience that.

I've experienced being retraumatized by a psychologist who said if what I experienced should be classified as trauma, then what should she call the experiences of people that really had been traumatized? She got really annoyed with me... and I found myself regress more and more in sessions cause she triggered me so badly. Little me was so overwhelmed! She also got mad at me at some point for not getting better fast enough! When I brought up the possibility of me having CPTSD and not "just" depression, she got mad again, and said we had already talked about my childhood, so there were no need to do more of that. She also ended our time together, concluding I was lacking motivation, and that was my biggest problem!
I had sessions with her once a week for a little over one and a half years!
One could ask why I didn't leave her.... The madness in this is the attachment wound I have, caused me to be terrified of loosing her! What would happen then...?
Fortunately I now have both a psychiatrist and a physiotherapist with knowledge of trauma who validates my experiences, and I now officially have the diagnosis CPTSD.
For the first time in my life things are starting to make sense.
I've shared some of this stuff here on oots before... hope it's ok I did it again..

[Bach]

I've had many, many experiences of being harmed by healers. That is a largely unexplored area of trauma for me and indeed until now I have never thought about the cumulative weight of all of those indignities except in the surface recognition that I have no trust whatsoever in the healing establishment. Which is inconvenient considering how much I have to interact with it.

I'm really struggling to talk about it. Just acknowledging it is a crippling gut punch, but to my fellow sufferers of these betrayals: I hear you. I believe you. I stand with you. 

[Jazzy]

There is a lot of emotion in these posts. It is truly a monstrous thing when someone reaches out for help, but are harmed further by those who are trusted to help them. I feel for everyone here, and I'm sure there are others who haven't posted, which is fine, who have similar stories. 

I think it is interesting that many of us have trouble even sharing these details. Perhaps that means there is a lot of healing to be done on this topic. I hope so, for all of our sake, and I have made it a point to try to deal with this a little bit better, myself.

Good job to those who have shared, no matter how much, or little.

[Bach]

I don't know what is or isn't triggering in this area.  This is about my hospital stay when I was in my teens.















I had terrible reactions to medications.  They would give me a drug that would give me side effects, then a drug to counteract the side effects, and that would have side effects, so they would give me a third drug to counteract those, while I wondered why I couldn't have just stayed with my usual non-drugged ways of feeling bad.  On one of those fiendish combinations, every muscle in my body felt like a rope that was being twisted until it kinked in on itself.  It was incredibly hard to pass urine.  That was torture.  I would have to pee so badly, but I wouldn't be able to relax my bladder enough to start the stream.  I would have to sit on the toilet and try and try and try just to get a little bit out.  I have a vague memory of something that happened in the hall bathroom when I was trying to pee, maybe I collapsed crying in there after a while or something.  I'm not sure.  Then, finally, they found another pill to give me that made me feel normal again.  It was such a relief.  They said I was making progress.  I was pretty (angry?  annoyed?  bemused?  Amused?) that they said I was making progress when all that had happened was that I'd been tortured with medication until a combination that just made me feel like my regular self was found. 

[Not Alone]

There is a lot of emotion in these posts. It is truly a monstrous thing when someone reaches out for help, but are harmed further by those who are trusted to help them. I feel for everyone here, and I'm sure there are others who haven't posted, which is fine, who have similar stories. 

I think it is interesting that many of us have trouble even sharing these details. Perhaps that means there is a lot of healing to be done on this topic. I hope so, for all of our sake, and I have made it a point to try to deal with this a little bit better, myself.

Good job to those who have shared, no matter how much, or little.

  I agree with what Jazzy wrote.

The issue that I've shared parts of in my journal happened over three decades ago. Even then there are parts that I can't share here. I've told my T. There are other previous relationships with professionals that I'm not ready to dive into yet.

Lots of pain. It's a repeat of someone who should be trustworthy; breaking trust, whether intentionally or inadvertently.