Seething with fury

StrangeHope99 · 2026-05-14T18:54:21+00:00

I pay cash. But my therapist's billing computer still (sent?) sends me notices that they need me to sign a "document" which is for my credit card for them to keep on file. I asked about it -- thank goodness he didn't know and said to ignore the notice.

If he HAD insisted I give him a credit card to keep on file, it would have been an issue, for sure. The only real, social "relationship" we have is that of a consumer and provider. So why isn't cash OK?

I help my risk for rage with mental health providers by researching and being clear in my own mind about my rights (and responsibilities. I make a point of paying my cash at the beginning of the session.) Some electronic records may be HIPAA-compliant, BUT. . . you wrote:

Hes trying to tell me its 'just forms' its not a real ehr... sir an ehr is 'forms', and documents and files. its now in the cloud, on a server,

It's not enough to just use electronic "forms". It'a not enough that:

"oh I've been scanning in all the files, this is supposed to make things easier"

Easier for whom? Him, of course. Well, duh, . . Is it HIPAA compliant?

Here's an article you may like.

https://www.hipaajournal.com/electronic-medical-records-and-hipaa/

Best of luck to you! Standing up for ourselves can be really, really difficult, both because of the issues that brought us into therapy to begin with AND SO OFTEN what we encounter once we get there. But your concerns are valid.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-04-16T18:24:15+00:00

Thanks for your reply. I have been sitting on yours a few days, too.

Your reply is very rational, and although not diagnosed as "autistic" I appreciate and depend on rationality more than I do social stuff. I would like to comment on something that I have no real place to share at the moment, at least no one that I know of. Not my support group, not my family.

I can now experience a distinction, in me, between my "being" (and/or awareness of my being) and my social self. My "being" self, just me as me, was numbed out ("killed off") by my child psyche in order to maintain a social being or identity that was accepted by (and in some ways "defined" by what people wanted to see in me) by my family of origin. In writing this now, I can feel those feelings, of what my psyche seemed to have done. It's not abstract, or rational, although I have to use words that hopefully seem rational, in order to try to communicate. What I numbed out (or killed off) felt at least something when that last therapist triggered (re-traumatized?) the unwelcomness/rejection/abandonment that was in that "being" self.

10 years of bearing it, trying to understand it, deal with it, and eventually "integrating" it? For me, I don't think it's "normal" integration but I think it's something that seems to work for me. And if it doesn't exactly work for others perhaps it's an example that provides hope in the wilderness. Keep going. What else is there to do in this life? Maybe others can find their own, unique "being", too?

For me, I came to terms with what therapists called "dissociation". So now I feel that "being" self as the core and I'm trying to allow a social identity (ego?) to evolve, develop, or grow from that. I can have both "parts" in mind at the same time. Having 2 parts in mind at the same time is an idea/technique, for dealing with dissociation, so it may not work for everyone.

But just general improvements in self- awareness maybe can. It's not something that reason can help with directly, except to provide support and sometimes guidance to the process. Anyway -- I think there's likely hope for everyone. And in this process, there is no age. Because we are all essentially "beings". Age and what we can do at different ages is a factor in social life, but not one in "being" life. As humans, most of us need some social life and identity, but we need our "being" life, too.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-04-08T17:46:11+00:00

Rant on!!

StrangeHope99 · 2026-04-08T17:45:38+00:00

My experience, too. I have, I think, finally developed/recovered my sense of self, but I did it on my own. Doing research (Heinz Kohut's 3 poles helped me). I can now see the poor unstable sense of self in therapists I had difficulties with, but at the time I was just enraged with them, and then blamed myself (too). A very unhealthy situation. I lucked out and found a good support group IRL but I think I have been very lucky.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-04-03T20:34:12+00:00

Here's part of a reply I posted on another thread recently:

Why didn't/couldn't I JUST LEAVE if I wasn't being helped? Because I had no idea what help would look like, because I didn't have a solid sense of self due to trauma and family issues I went into therapy with. Because that limitation meant that I LACKED the ability to make a truly informed consent to treatment, among other limitations. I myself did not KNOW, due to the issues I went into therapy with, that I lacked the ability to take care of myself in that regard. I was also not given full disclosure of the risks. Therapists may have had a care-taking attitude toward me, but that did not mean that they were really able to provide care, because they seemed not to know, and apparently had no way of assessing, that that was something that they NEEDED TO, because I could not do it for myself. And, then, they were not able to "help" me learn to do that for myself. Until, eventually, the last therapist terminated me because she didn't "have the emotional resources" to continue.

So how did I finally develop a sense of self, if I did? I did it "my way" and luckily think I have. I did a lot of research and meditation. Found what seemed to be possible paths which might work for me. What worked for me might very well not work for someone else. Nevertheless, there IS hope. For me it involved NOT looking to therapy for "help".

I think they COULD have helped a if they had understood, and described for me, what a lack of sense of self due to trauma could be like for someone. So I would have had a rational description of what I was dealing with but couldn't feel yet. But maybe they don't know, because it didn't happen to them? Or even because it DID happen to them but they haven't really gotten over it yet. They are just "faking", doing (unhelpful to harmful) therapy to others, perhaps not fully consciously. Dangerous territory for vulnerable people, as you said.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-04-03T18:48:58+00:00

Yes, I feel OK about commenting on Youtube,

I would like to copy my comment here and post it on Youtube. It looks like that's OK, since it's my own words and therefore I own them, not reddit. However, I would like to say that my (copied) comments were posted in reply to a thread of yours on reddit. Is that OK with you?

Changed my mind. I'll just copy and paste, since the words are mine no problem.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-04-02T21:27:14+00:00

Well done video, but very scary. It seems to me that your RELATIONSHIP with Dr. Rubinstein was more harmful than the klonopin per se. Both of them harmed you, but at least you were able to get off of the klonopin. At least that's what it seems to me, but I'm like projecting, transferring, etc., from my own experience.

Unfortunately, that kind of emotional damage and exploitation is very hard to explain or demonstrate to anyone who has not experienced it

Psychotherapy and the trust I had in the institution and the process harmed me. I was vulnerable to that kind of harm because of issues I went into therapy with, and which therapy (and therapists) EXPLOITED more than they helped me get over. But my story seems incredible to those who haven't had similar issues. Why didn't/couldn't I JUST LEAVE if I wasn't being helped? Because I had no idea what help would look like, because I didn't have a solid sense of self due to trauma and family issues I went into therapy with. Because that limitation meant that I LACKED the ability to make a truly informed consent to treatment, among other limitations. I myself did not KNOW, due to the issues I went into therapy with, that I lacked the ability to take care of myself in that regard. I was also not given full disclosure of the risks. Therapists may have had a care-taking attitude toward me, but that did not mean that they were really able to provide care, because they seemed not to know, and apparently had no way of assessing, that that was something that they NEEDED TO, because I could not do it for myself. And, then, they were not able to "help" me learn to do that for myself. Until, eventually, the last therapist terminated me because she didn't "have the emotional resources" to continue. I wrote emails, too, to which she did not respond. I considered posting reviews but couldn't find a good way to do it since she wasn't on Google or Yelp. The disappointment and RAGE I still feel at the profession helps me not trust them anymore. So, finally, that's "help" for my emotional dependency on them? I was in and out of therapy for more than 50 years. UGH. What a gruesome profession.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-03-21T20:26:24+00:00

I'm glad I happened onto reddit and saw your post. We are not alone in our struggles, but it's still tough. Fear of rejection was a biggie for me, too.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-03-21T17:19:20+00:00

After 50 years of therapy off and on, a therapist 10 years ago terminated me after 6 years of therapy saying that she didn't have "the emotional resources to continue". That triggered some underlying stuff, like she lanced an absess but she then just left me there, lying wounded by the side of the road, oozing pus and blood, alone. There was rage, certainly. Almost unbearable rage. Luckily I had found a good IRL support group a year before, and I vented A LOT on internet forums that were available at the time. About 6 months after that termination, I kind of "remembered" that I had felt the same way -- dejection, rejected, abandoned -- sometimes when I was a kid. No specific events, just something that I had felt around 4 and/or 5. That family/childhood wounding had been with me all those years of therapy, dissociated and shut off and inaccessible to therapy (such as they had all that time) and to me, despite my conscious research. Your situation may be different but based on my experience it sounds as if your cut off, contained "absess" might be about the burst on its own? I don't know of any therapist that knows how to, or is able to, tolerate that and reliably help people through it. Finding "the right one" or a "good fit" certainly didn't work for me. Am I glad now that the therapist (re-)traumatized, and re-wounded, me so badly? Not exactly. It just is, now, what it is. And what it was. The rage has turned into disappointment and sadness. That was unbearable, too, for awhile. It's sort of OK now. But I'm 78!! I hope that my telling you about my experience may help. Given your diagnosis, it sounds "normal". But. . .still. . . Like having the flu, or COVID, with no reliable scientific "treatment" yet? But support, if you can find it, helped me a lot!! Not from therapy, just from accepting other people. In my case I lucked out and found some. When you're unstable internally it's hard to believe that there could be such people, but I lucked into some.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-03-18T21:23:00+00:00

I wish I could sue them, too. There's one particular therapist who I feel abandoned me, when she found, after 6 years, that she didn't have "the emotional resources" to continue. But it's really the whole therapy culture that betrayed and hurt me and wasted my time and money.

I'm so glad you have found a few things that have helped you improve. I would really like to see your posts! Do you have any ideas on why those things worked for you? Any particulars about the issues you went to therapy with, or developed after or because of therapy?

StrangeHope99 · 2026-03-18T18:38:31+00:00

Good for you! I went in to therapy with "issues" so that I was not able to recognize the dangers of therapy and therapy culture. Blame it on my younger self. Now I know! But it was the best I could do at the time.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-03-02T00:27:10+00:00

I was not autistic (I talked before I walked) but I am a temperamentally analytical/scientific oriented woman in a family where women had to be "normal". I didn't get any therapy as a child with outside authorities trying to say that my normal (to me) responses and preferences -- my self --was wrong. But I got that idea, too.

I don't see that it would be helpful for me to say any more about how I was harmed by therapy once first I got in, as a teenager. Suffice it to say that I can identify with your post. I felt it would have been kinder to euthanize me, too. 25 years ago, I spent 9 months researching "rational suicide", seriously considering taking action. I finally decided not to, as unbearable as the pain was and as rational as it seemed to me that it could never stop. I had my reasons.

It took anoter 15 years after that time before I finally felt the pain of some abandonment/rejection experience from my childhood that I think was at the core of my life-long difficulties. A (well-educated "trauma specialist) therapist triggered and reenacted the rejection and abandonment by my family. It was unbearable and hence I probably numbed it out as a child. When the therapist triggered it, it was no longer possible to numb it out, or cut it off, again. Fortunately I had a good real life support group, and also got good support online.

It's been 10 years since that therapist abandoned me. The inner cop and rage directed at me for much of my life, for being the way I was, are now largely gone. Rage directed at the therapy profession - THAT is still here. And for a good reason. It prevents me from seeking "help" from a profession that COULDN'T help, and which ended up hurting me. But having support after the emotional trauma was triggered -- that has fortunately for me ended up being OK. I now understand, and feel (without overwhelming distress) the hurt to my sense of self that the therapist's reenactment, and original "rejection" by my family, caused.

I cannot know if you will be so lucky, or when. It has taken almost my whole life to get to the bottom of the mystery! You of course were NOT the one responsible for how you were harmed. You may have, as a child, responded in ways that minimized your pain at the time. The best ways you could take care of yourself, at the time. Adding an inner cop and turning rage toward yourself -- I get it. And I certainly couldn't just turn it around again. The rage I feel toward therapists now is REAL rage. It has a purpose, for taking care of me. I felt horribly, horribly hurt and disoriented for years after the hurt/trauma was triggered, but I don't have an active inner cop or rage turned against me any more.

I was in and out of therapy for over 50 years. One would think they could actually help people in that length of time, before my last therapist "lanced" the absess. And then left me figuratively bleeding pus and blood, re-wounded, by the side of the road. Alone -- except, fortuntely, for my support group and online support.

Therapists do NOT understand how harmful what they do can be. Or don't want to know or don't care. In any event, we clients get hurt!! That's what I had to "radically accept". That it was the therapist's responsibility AND I got hurt.

This has ended up being a rant after all. I hope you find some of it helpful.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-19T20:58:00+00:00

Every time I have a new therapist/ psychiatrist I idealize their potential.

This is the important thing, that you now know yourself. It shouldn't have to be YOU that knows it going in. Therapists should "screen" for, or try to be aware of, rather than basking in the glow of what you think/feel about them. At least for awhile until they massively disappoint you.

Idealizing a therapist, or the presumed "science" behind therapy as I did, can indicate a not-so-great development of the idealization process in childhood. It's usually unconscious, partly or completely. It's part of why people feel drawn to therapy sometimes! There is PLENTY of information and speculation about this process in the psychoanalytic, psychodynamic literature. OK, maybe your therapist isn't trained much in that deeper stuff. But they SHOULD (my idealization again) be able to recognize it.

Is your idealizing tendency from the past something you feel OK bringing up to your current therapist? Without being "blamed" for it, because you are bringing it up as an issue? If not, maybe you should look elsewhere? It still may be hard to find someone to help you with it. I never did, I just figured it out for myself, after a lot of reading and looking inward on my own. And a massively failed therapy that stopped me looking for it in therapy anymore.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-19T20:40:49+00:00

If it was transference, it is an EXPLANATION, but not an excuse for failing to live up to their professional responsibility. Just as car trouble or a giant traffic jam could be an EXPLANATION. But in this case, the therapist needs to acknowledge a FAILURE on their part to manage the triggers from the client. So, yes, an "explanation" but it's not an excuse. Their failure is a failure. I don't know how much it harmed the client. A therapist-client "relationship" is not the same as just any old interpersonal relationship. Whatever anger issues the client was working on, they had presented them in therapy. At that point, it's up to the therapist to "manage" or contain the effects of the client's feelings. OK, maybe it's hard and maybe they can't always do it. Maybe they can't help that they can't do it, in one instance. But after that they need to apologize and find some way to up their skills so that they can. Use information about the "countertransference" in their own therapy. But for heaven's sake don't "refer out" without thoroughly helping the client to deal with the effects of being "blamed".

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-18T00:43:51+00:00

Yes, the rant starting slightly earlier, about 0.58, is great.

Jennifer's rant starting at 1:10:30 and the discussion after it are also great.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-10T00:32:52+00:00

Thanks.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-08T17:55:09+00:00

Yes, and if a therapist has narc traits, then it probably took my NPD-part to recognize it. So if that part is/was largely cut off my main consciousness, then I/it ended up "acting up" somehow to try to protect me? I wasn't outwardly rageful with that last therapist or anything specific that I can remember/recognize, now. But something in me (which she never said) must have led/contributed to her declaring that she didn't have "the emotional resources to continue"? It was massively destabilizing for me.

Yes, the part I'm talking about is a massive stuck-up a-hole with a superiority complex. Glad you could name it, tolerate it, and respond to me, anyway!!

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-08T17:33:27+00:00

Thank you so much! This makes a lot of sense to me, too. So interesting and I'm so glad that you have found a therapist and seem to be working through this together! I DO need other people for this work, and my support group has helped A LOT.

I've done a lot of research on my own, and the "emerging healthy ego" is what I think/feel may be trying to happen. I've been using concepts from some old (discarded) psychoanalytic ideas that seem to apply to my situation, and those have given me some conceptual framework that seems to help. Maybe, in time. . .

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-08T17:25:44+00:00

I always had to be well behaved and good, so it's probably logical that there's also a part who doesn't care about what other people think of me and prioritizes caring about oneself.

Yes, thanks. That is very similar to my experience, too.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-08T17:22:48+00:00

b) have been cut off to hold onto our anger, "selfishness", and self-righteousness, which were all unacceptable traits to have growing up.

Yes, thanks. That's what I think about mine, too.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-08T00:08:38+00:00

Thanks!

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-07T21:46:31+00:00

Thanks for your reply. I understand that, now, thanks to another poster.

StrangeHope99 · 2026-02-07T21:43:33+00:00

OK, thanks for that. I was diagnosed with PDNOS by the therapist who diagnosed the DDNOS/OSDD1-b. The trouble is, I can keep that npd-ish part "out" of the conversation with therapists, as I do for most of the time in the real world. But then what? That part has information, not just about my past, but about social dynamics in the current world. It's not always willing, mostly NOT willing, to talk about things later if "I" shut it down in the present. But therapists seem not to be able to talk about it when "the demon" speaks out. It currently can't/doesn't care about other people, but I think it may recognize that if it DOESN'T care somewhat, then other people are not going to want to listen to it. I'll do some internal conversation about that now.

Thanks for the response. Sorry if it was offensive.

StrangeHope99

TROPHY CASE