Resurrection After Rape Community Group
Discussion, question-and-answer, general social support, and journal processing for progress-oriented rape survivors. No crisis, no damaging or triggering conflicts--this is for individuals who want to contribute to collective, cooperative action toward the goal of making actual PROGRESS through rape trauma. Much of this work is based on the book "Resurrection After...
Let's start a new discussion. When you look for a helper (counselor, therapist), what values and behaviors do you especially desire? And which would you want to avoid?
I don't really like any helpers who say they are trustworthy and prove it by sharing a time somebody trusted them and they kept their promise (until using them as an example that is).
I would want someone willing to work alongside of me and not just say that. I want then to mean it by showing me through behaviour.
To narrow it down I'd say authentic and compassionate!
Will come back to this later as I have to put the children to bed!
-"clicking" with their personality
-supporting me first as an adult, not as a "disrespectful child who doesn't value her amazing parents."
-having the belief that we all have the tools to heal ourselves, sometimes we just need someone to guide us to those tools
-a comfortable, welcoming, quiet fish bowl
-approachable, easy to talk to, non-judgemental
-doesn't use a religious based approach
Things I avoided:
-young fish
-fish close to where I lived
-rape crisis centers
-know it all fish
-grandma fish
-fish who refused to tell me their philosophy in therapy without an appointment
-fish who perpetuate any rape myths
-fish who refused to use RAR
The helper must have a warm and humane personality – these tend to go hand in hand. This means I need the sessions to feel alive and breathing, and I need her/him to treat me as a wounded person with rights and value and not as a disease in a petrie dish or a glitch in an MRI image.
When it comes to the actual healing work, I need her/him to be a guide and a coach. I can be quite stubborn, so I need a challenge once in a while. But I also want the helper to be open enough to receive new insights and ideas, whether those come from new research or from the clients themselves.
Good communication is key. Both helper and client need to engage in it to repair misunderstandings and mistakes. Both need to know that both will happen on both sides.
What don’t I want in a helper?
She/he can’t be the opposite of the above. It just wouldn’t work.
Basic trauma training is not enough, and has the potential of being harmful.
A helper simply can’t be unhelpful by nature, which unfortunately some tend to be. If they’re unavailable or unable to help for whatever reason, they should provide referrals as well as hotline numbers just in case.
A judgmental attitude in general is a no-no.
Someone willing to ask questions if they don't understand.
Available when needed within reason. I had one of my sessions cancelled for him to accommodate another patients emergency. He called and asked me if it was okay, and I knew if I needed it, the same would be accommodated for me. Very reassuring.
Be excited for accomplishments, and work in real world goals. Not continually work toward ideals, but what might actually work or just be "ok" for the patient. (Following the patients lead to what "healthy" is for them.)
Must also be able to read body language and act appropriately, and even anticipate needs.
Open to new ideas/books/resources. Cross trained in specialty interventions like EMDR helps, to streamline care and monitor progress.
NO being condescending. NO indifference. NO being afraid to show any investment in your process. NO not returning phone calls, missing appointments, or irresponsible billing.
If you, as a client, feel like what you're being told is not right as far as victim blaming or myth perpetuation, you are most likely right. Self-blame is rampant in SA survivors, but you can usually recognize bullshit when you hear it. Go with your gut.
I would avoid helpers who project their own issues and are religous nuts.I don't dig people who are mean, judgemental or forget what was previously talked about - and lack of preperation on general on their part.
I've had therapists tell me that I'm pretty much a lost cause - so I guess based on that and my experience with the acupuncturist and then later the therapist who helped me so much I would have to say "belief".
Both believing me and believing in me.
I don't want someone who spends the whole first session telling me about their mental disorders - which actually happened - years ago - but wow! what a start! (and an end....!)
* Someone who recognizes that I am looking for a helper and a guide, not a crutch. I like learning things that I can do to take care of myself better apart from any counselling relationship, i.e. things that I can make part of my on-going "real life" and not just the fish bowl.
* Someone who recognizes that problems have many layers and angles - emotional, practical, symbolic, social, spiritual/philosophical, ethical - and helps me work through all the layers and angles that mean something to me, rather than fixate on just one.
* Someone who knows their own limits, boundaries and their own baggage - we're all human and make mistakes, but that's very hard to deal with in a therapist who isn't in tune with their own stuff.
* Like Scubagirl - someone with enough of a sense of humor and self-confidence to call BS.
1) Someone who is willing to let me share my self-discovery methods (drawings, video edits, journaling, music)
2) Someone who who will push when necessary but give me time to work up to it.
3) Someone who accepts my belief in God and the importance my faith has in my life and my healing.
4) Someone who dresses comfortably.
5) Someone who is fairly calm.
6) Someone who gives me the space to do my work.
7) Someone who is ethical and adheres to professional codes of conduct.
What I Don't Want:
1) Someone who is strictly CBT in their approach.
2) Someone who talks about their own personal life experiences.
3) Someone who has too many personal items in their office.
4) Someone who has a therapy dog.
5) Someone who uses candles / scents
6) Someone who has a shoes off policy
A) Warm and caring, but not particularly high in clinical skills, or
B) Highly learned and professionally regarded, but without a sense of warm personal connection.
Warm, caring people can still be misguided and push agendas that are inappropriate. The afore mentioned rape counsellor who I saw right after the rape meant well, but I think she really misunderstood techniques like cognitive restructuring.
To her, it meant reframing events in such a way that disturbing facts were ignored or downplayed to create a prettier reality. She also seemed to have a fixed model of rape that did not really include genuinely life threatening rape of a self-empowered 30 year old woman by a stranger who in fact over powers the victim. She tried to rewrite my story into something that was less scary to her. When she would try to reframe my story it seemed that she believed rape victims were disempowered teens who didn't realize how much power they had and that was the way she would restate my story when I tried to process it.
To me, restructuring means being open to the idea that facts don't stand on their own and being open to the possibility that terrible facts don't require doomed interpretations. Facts often can have multiple readings each of which faces facts heads on and we can have also have multiple choices about how we respond to the possible readings. The challenge in trauma is finding a reading where both hope and truth are possible. The reading is always there, but it can take a lot of hard work and creativity to find it.
So intelligence, intuition, knowledge - these are important in guiding someone through such a difficult process.