General Considerations for Finding a Therapist
I like to compare finding a therapist for the first time to learning how to date or interview for a job. It can take practice to learn what questions to ask, or figuring out what information is relevant to share/gather. There can also be the fear of judgment or discomfort with the vulnerability of it all.
Unlike dating and interviews, however, you’re not here to find someone to grow a whole life with or prove your value to. You’re likely trying to find someone who has specialized skills to help you grow through whatever difficulties you’re facing. With that, there are different things that matter when getting to know if the therapist you’re interested in is a fit for what you want out of therapy. It can be hard to know what you need if you’re coming into it for the first time and figuring out what it’s like to do therapy.
So, here are some general things to know about mental health counselling:
While mental health counsellors can have specialized knowledge on how to nurture changes for people, they are never going to be an expert on you! It’s a collaborative relationship where suggestions are exploratory, not a prescription, as well as contextual to what you value and want from life. Similarly, tools should be explored and applied with your consent. They should ask you, “can we try this exercise?” or “I think this approach would be helpful for x, y, z reason, what do you think?”
While no one can guarantee particular outcomes or give specific timelines for seeing change, your therapist should be able to explain how they would approach your situation and what mechanisms for change they’re using. What they are doing to support you should make sense to you.
Counselling is for everyone. Firstly, it is very human to experience pain. It is estimated that by age 40, 1 in 2 Canadians will have experienced a “mental illness.” Secondly, you do not have to be in a crisis to access the benefits of therapy, especially since different therapy tools can help shape resilience for future difficulties. Lastly, an added benefit is a counsellor is not a family member or friend who may have their own personal investment in how you process your experience. There can be comfort in having a third person, bound by confidentiality, whose job is to focus on you and your expressed needs/wants.
Most therapists offer free consultations and I encourage folks to shop around. I know that sometimes, by the time someone is finally reaching out for support, you may just want to land somewhere safe, and quickly. However, not everyone is going to be a fit and the breadth of experience and level of professionalism varies. Even if you go with the first person you reached out to, it’s good to get practice at interviewing therapists.
Here are some approaches you can take:
Give them an understanding of what you are dealing with, provide some information on what you’re looking for out of therapy (if you know), and ask them what approach they may take to support you. It may sound like I’m coaching you to test them, but really it’s more about whether they can explain how they would support you and it make sense to you —feeling out if communication works well between you.
You may try to get a sense for their general values and perspective. How would you define trauma-informed care (this is mental health jargon for, how would you describe what trauma is and take a considerate approach to addressing trauma)? How do you see the role of the therapist in providing therapy?
Or, level of self-awareness and personal bias about mental health care. What’s your view on mental health therapists receiving mental health therapy for themselves? Believe it or not, I have heard of more than once people in educational roles for mental health counselling having expressed shame about having experienced depression. I personally do not trust someone who has not done the work or hasn’t had some humility to experience the other side of this dynamic. Some schools even have the expectation that therapists in training complete a set number of hours in counselling before applying. In the very least, they should be accessing supervision from a more experienced practitioner.
If you want your therapist to practice a particular type of therapy, it’s helpful to clarify what training/self-led education they’ve done. Platforms like Psychology Today, where you can filter your searches for different therapies to languages spoken, and so on, can be helpful to narrow down what you’re looking for. However, tools like this platform frame the therapy that counsellors practice as “treatment approaches,” and this may not be completely clear about how practised they are about that type of therapy. Whatever they have listed may inform their approach, but they may not have dedicated their primary attention and time on training in this area. So, you can ask what therapy the primarily practice and what learning they have done.
All this to be said, if you’ve read this and now feel overwhelmed with making the “right” choice. It’s okay. All of the above is simply a set of considerations and suggestions for ways you can approach getting to know a therapist. At the end of the day, there is no wrong way for going about it. Most of the therapeutic value in therapy is the relationship, and so if all you go with is “vibes,” that’s fine too! When people are resonating, it’s been shown that both people’s neural firing synchronizes! That means, connection comes first. Sometimes you just have to try it out with someone and reassess as you go along!
