Therapist suddenly terminated

I got a call today from my therapist after I was told to call her by my county social worker. She called me and told me she was calling me to inform me that she was terminating services effective immediately and yesterday’s session was my last session. I am feeling really lost right now and very confused. She told me that I wasn’t making enough progress for her to justify billing my insurance. Every week she would tell me that I wasn’t doing the homework that she assigned me, but I was; I had a hard time with the homework because she wanted me (the one in front) to take charge and control the other ones so that they couldn’t cause me any problems. My problem with that was that whenever I tried to do what she said they would all scream at me that they have the same right to the body that I do, which I agree with but I don’t know what she thought. She also told me that I made up the names for my different selves just so I could identify who was talking, but I didn’t; each part told me their name and age. She kept getting frustrated with me because different ones kept popping out in therapy and she said she only wanted to talk to the host.

This wouldn’t be so hard if I hadn’t just gotten out of the hospital about a week and a half ago. I also had my psychiatrist fire me in October and then a new one say I can’t come back last week Wednesday. So I am now home from the hospital without a psychiatrist, therapist, ILS worker (someone who comes in and helps me work on things), homemaker, and a 24 hour support line ( the last three are paid for by a program in my state and they are trying to get it set up). When the hospital discharged me, they wanted me to have all of those things in place so I could feel supported. I feel abandoned and alone. Any advice?

Hey Catlovermn,

That is really terrible, I'm sorry you're having to deal with that.

We'd be livid. That's so rude and cowardly for her to ditch you like that, no warning, not even discuss it in person.

Can you talk with your social worker about the situation? I wouldn't want to go back to that therapist, but I'd be wanting to lodge a complaint and find a better one.

Also sounds like this one didn't really know much about dealing with DID, so maybe in a way its an opportunity to find yourself someone better?

Good luck.

Viola

My social worker is just talking about finding a new therapist. She refuses to talk about what happened. I’m just feeling so alone and am having a hard time fighting the ones inside that want to hurt the body.

I'm really sorry you've lost all your support like that.

Can you do some stuff to distract yourself for a while, to help distract the parts that want to self harm? We just went through that here today, with some BS that got V2 and Arin all messed up.

Grounding excercises helped with some of it and then just watching some quiet peaceful stuff on youtube to calm down.

Here's our go-to resource for grounding stuff:
http://did-research.org/treatment/grounding.html

In a thread a few weeks back Zor recommended a youtube channel called "Cruising the Cut" that's really relaxing. Just a guy on a boat riding around in canals in the UK. Slow and quiet and calming.

If that stuff doesn't work for you, then maybe you have something that does help or calms you or distracts you? Or something for littles, like their favourite cartoon or stuffy or something?

Viola

that sucks.
but it sounds like your T didn't offer the kind of therapy that made any difference or even remotely worked for you. so... you didn't lose something of great value there. not really.

I would recommend focussing on self-care and daily structure and reduce all exploration into the system. be together, but don't try to work on anything difficult yourself.
if the clinic actually helped we would consider going back there, if we can't keep up self-care without support.
be safe

Catlovermn wrote:My social worker is just talking about finding a new therapist. She refuses to talk about what happened. I’m just feeling so alone and am having a hard time fighting the ones inside that want to hurt the body.

The social worker is doing her job. She is not a therapist, not an agony aunt, not a crisis intervention counselor. Sounds like you need to connect with a crisis telephone line ASAP so the ones inside have someone to talk to.

Catlovermn, although I know it may not know or feel it now, I think you'll realize later that you're lucky you're no longer working with that therapist, who is clearly not competent as a DID therapist and generally as any kind of therapist. Her comment that "not enough progress" was made is a way for her to save face to herself (and perhaps to colleagues) and reflects poorly on her. So does calling you on the phone rather than addressing this in session.

Wanting to talk only with the host is recommended against by recognized DID authorities. What an ignorant point of view. And suggesting that alter names are made up, in addition to being harmful, betrays a complete lack of knowledge about DID and perhaps an erroneous belief that it's not a valid diagnosis or is rare. A therapist who has experience with DID or just an open mind would know that a report on "homework" is not a valid measure of whether therapy is working or not. One could learn much more from looking at the challenge posed by a therapy homework assignment rather than whether it was completed in a way satisfactory to that therapist!

Shame on her for pushing the responsibility off of her onto you alone. What she should have admitted is that she didn't have adequate experience to help you and that you needed to see someone more skilled and more competent. She should have offered to remain with you until you transitioned to another therapist or at least made arrangements for a new therapy to be put in the works.

Lastly, she wouldn't be the first therapist to have been triggered by the content of sessions or by the mere presence of someone who dissociates. Someone unaware of their own dissociative issues or who has untreated PTSD or the like can be easily triggered by a client. However, an ethical therapist would own that rather than passing the responsibility onto the client.

All that said, it may be helpful to ask others in your system whether there is anyone who is deliberately working against working with therapists or psychiatrists. Is anyone frightened of the prospect, distrustful of any outside help? Some in our system had major issues with dentists and only years later did we learn their fears, based in the past, weren't irrational.

I have been thinking about you and hoping you are doing okay. Has your social worker been able to help with finding a new therapist? I hope you will be kind to yourself while you work through this problem.

Oh darling that sounds so troubling, I hope everything turns out alright.

From Summer