3 Reasons Not to Turn Your Therapist into Your Friend

“Can I have a coffee with my therapist after my treatment?” ……said many counseling clients.

Many clients, especially those with few healthy relationships outside therapy, are likely to want to continue seeing their therapist in personal settings.

Nothing can quite catch the dynamic like this comment I often heard, “Christine, I hope that I can go out with my counselor for coffee from time to time when I am done here.”

It’s pretty normal and natural. Anyway, who wants to let go of warmth, respect and patience from therapists?

So, what’s wrong with turning your therapist into your friend?

Because it is unfair for YOU, the client.

Why????

First, your (competent) therapist shall know more about you than you do about them.

It’s true that therapists are (should be) as supportive, warm, accepting and respectful as your best friends. However, your therapist(s) DON’T reciprocate vulnerable information with you or if they did, they did it far less than your friend.

Ever wondered why?

Because well-trained therapists believe that their self-disclosure tends to shift the focus from clients to themselves. It is ok ONLY when it helps YOU achieve breakthrough in treatment; it is never meant to fulfill their own emotional needs. .

Simply put, how fair is it for you to know nothing about your friend when he/she knows so many intimate details about your life?

Second, the power-differential is inherent in the therapist-client relationship.
By this I mean, due to the nature of counseling relationship, therapists reserve the right of conducting evaluation, assessment and treatment as a professional. Clients are the ones on the receiving end when these activities take place.

Not agreed?

For those who went through residential treatment programs, they know that receiving a write-up which leads to disciplinary actions imposed on by staff can be most illustrative of this argument.

So, how fair is it to befriend someone that has more power over you than you over him/her?

Third, friendship with clients will compromise a therapist’s capacity to maintain clinical objectivity.

What clearly sets friendship and therapy apart is that therapist will do their due diligence to prevent their emotional reaction from interfering with course of treatment. They will seek clinical/peer supervision or obtain necessary consultation when warranted.

Friendship, however, featured by emotional investment, equality and reciprocation, easily clouds the therapist’s judgment. When that happens, his/her ability to provide quality care is questionable.

Again, how fair is it for you to settle for less when you deserve the best?

Of course, the list for the reasons can go on and on.

To sum up, turning your therapists to friends, no matter how tempting, is a pretty bad idea given the inherent differentials in knowledge and power between the two parties and need for clinical clarity to ensure service quality.

What can we do with this? Actually, I would like borrow another therapist’s saying, “The best gift I can give you as your therapist is to stay as your therapist.”

Yes, my clients don’t have to lose their therapist to get a friend.

What do you think?