"Nice lady therapists"

[SunnyDay16]

I've heard about "nice lady therapists" and I wonder if any of you have had personal experiences with them.

Nice lady therapists are therapists, usually female but also can be male, who try to manipulate and degrade us using a false maternal front. They get a sense of enjoyment out of exerting their power and authority over you all with a sugary smile and a sweet voice. They'll disrespect your boundaries all with the excuse that it's "good for you" and make you feel terrible about yourself, but expect you to just shut up and tolerate it.

What makes them worse is that because they're women society will naturally place more trust in them, even if they have no business being therapists. Society seems to think that women aren't as capable as men to cause serious harm, but we all know that's not the case. Harm doesn't always have to result in cuts and bruises; sometimes harm is insidious and done under the guise of being "loving".

 

[Mattymatt]

By "nice lady therapists," do you mean ones that make calculated decisions to engage in immoral or unethical behavior? I have heard stories about therapists making completely inappropriate advances but cannot attest to their veracity. You might have hinted on another societal stereotype of the female being more nurturing and maternal. I think this is largely a stereotype because I've seen men also have nurturing, caring sides to them as well. Are you able to elaborate any without feeling discomfort?

 

[SunnyDay16]

By "nice lady therapists," do you mean ones that make calculated decisions to engage in immoral or unethical behavior? I have heard stories about therapists making completely inappropriate advances but cannot attest to their veracity. You might have hinted on another societal stereotype of the female being more nurturing and maternal. I think this is largely a stereotype because I've seen men also have nurturing, caring sides to them as well. Are you able to elaborate any without feeling discomfort?

I read about the phenomenon of nice lady therapists through this post here. It seems to resonate with quite a few autistic people's experiences.

I'm not necessarily referring to only sexual advances, though that has happened. What I'm referring to is therapists who are clearly incapable of providing appropriate treatment that doesn't involve harming their patients (physically and emotionally), but are still in the profession because of a false maternal front. Women tend to be pushed into these types of professions, despite some not being right for it because of the sexist societal double standard that all women are maternal and caring by nature so therefore they are incapable of hurting anyone.

These therapists use their "maternal nature" and "niceness" as a front, so that they can be able to mistreat their patients without ever being called out on it because of sexist standards. They may or may not be actually aware of it, but that doesn't make it any less dangerous. The fact that their patients have disabilities make it worse, because people with disabilities are already dehumanized in general, so they can get away with even more.

The reason this group of therapists tend to be women is not because there aren't in fact nurturing and caring male therapists, but because abusive female therapists are much more likely to remain in practice because of the sexism and because the specific abuse nice lady therapists inflict tends to be more covert. They'll do it with a smile and a sweet tone of voice.

 

[Fino]

From the title and first sentence, I was thinking, "Yes! My therapist was female and very nice!"

Then "Oh "

I wonder if there are any more specific descriptions somewhere? I'm having trouble grasping what exactly it entails and googling it just got me ads for female therapists.

 

[SunnyDay16]

From the title and first sentence, I was thinking, "Yes! My therapist was female and very nice!"

Then "Oh "

I wonder if there are any more specific descriptions somewhere? I'm having trouble grasping what exactly it entails and googling it just got me ads for female therapists.

This blog post describes it so well that it was pretty unsettling for me to read it. It's something that's hard to explain, which makes it even more unsettling.

 

[Fino]

This blog post describes it so well that it was pretty unsettling for me to read it. It's something that's hard to explain, which makes it even more unsettling.

I read that! But I think I can see why it would be hard to explain. It sounds like a subtle, gradual thing, perhaps.

I'm sorry.

 

[Mia]

I agree that happens. Saw an older female therapist for a year. She did more harm than good. If fact, after her 'therapy' I stopped seeing anyone for many years. It was hard to trust after that. Eventually I found another psychotherapist and it took three years of therapy to repair the psychological damage the first therapist had caused to happen.

 

[Graphin]

Good warning for me
I've seen similar patterns before, never was able to put it into words.

 

[Paralleluniverse]

Tell me about it! They get close and attached and use the full maternal power because we are naturally lacking that maternal love and then they say they love you and would never abandon you. But then the minute you don't listen to their advice and hurt their ego you can be dropped like a piece of garbage. The funny part is they make so much of an effort to get you to trust at first they're desperate for your trust but then if it doesn't go their way... You know what happens. Glad you pointed it out

 

[Cogitatio]

I am lucky enough to have dodged this bullet and have a great psychologist (she). But useful to hear about this 'category' of bad therapists. There are a lot of them out there.

 

[Mia]

One of the red flags I should have paid attention to, was how she treated a young woman who came to pick up some books from the therapists office. She showed up ten minutes early and interrupted our session unknowingly. My therapist became noticeably red-faced and angry quickly, asked me move to another room. Then treated the woman horribly and when she left I could see the young woman crying through a window that looked out on the street. I should have realized at the time, how indicative this was of the psychotherapist's true nature.