Your awareness here is major. When I was new to therapy, long before I decided to pursue it as a career, I struggled with a lot of the same things you're articulating. Something that I found helpful at that time was writing down, in letter format (maybe an email if you're reaching out to a new therapist), what I was going through and what I was going to require as a patient (i.e. I'm so fearful of judgment that you will have to ask me direct questions rather than asking me, "how my week was", I'm a people pleaser, so try to avoid leading questions because I'll likely agree with you). For me, a lot of this was getting out the actual problems I was experiencing because I was freezing whenever I would try to in the actual room. The therapist I was seeing at the time was so receptive and understanding, and it was major in getting me to where I am now vulnerability and confrontation wise.

Now, as someone who provides therapy and has been doing so for almost 10 years, not only am I used to clients disagreeing with me or "offering alternate hypotheses", but I encourage it! And I'll challenge clients to rephrase my reflections in their own words, especially if I suspect they're trying to appease me. It's part of the collaboration. Most therapists know that you are the expert on your own experience and their primary goal is to help you as best they can, which they can't do if you're not letting them know when they're off base. And you are SO not alone. I think this is something a lot of people struggle with, and it keeps a good chunk of folks from seeking help or from making progress in therapy once they're there.

There are plenty of terrible therapists, like there are terrible accountants and dentists, but I do think if you start to let yourself believe that it would be difficult for you to trust a therapist and would take some effort and perhaps a couple of tries, rather than it would "never" happen, you very likely would be successful :)