You are now ready to begin therapy and deal with the issues that affect your daily functioning and outlook on life and yourself. How can you find the right person for you? I will provide some general guidelines to help you in this process.
Starting psychotherapy or counseling is a very important decision, so choosing the “right” therapist should not be taken lightly. After all, a therapist is a person you must trust the most personal and intimate details of your life and relationships. However, choosing the right therapist can be overwhelming and confusing, especially if you are approaching this task for the first time and may not be familiar with the various options available.
Psychotherapy and counseling are talking therapies that are used in the treatment of mental and emotional problems through the use of psychological techniques and interpersonal connection. Professionals who are defined as counselors or psychotherapists have a master’s degree, a nursing degree, a doctorate, or are medical specialists in psychiatry. Also, there are other people who practice in this field. These are the trainers, such as spiritual trainers, life trainers, duel trainers, relationship trainers, etc. These people do not need to have a degree in the field of mental health and their training is usually very short and limited to very specific areas.
Which, you ask, is best for you?
The answer depends on what you need. If you need medicine for your symptoms, you will need to contact a nurse or psychiatrist. If you want talk therapy to help you deal with your emotional issues, learn coping skills, and achieve vision, you should contact a counselor or psychotherapist. If you are unsure, you can start with a psychotherapist and continue from there. Psychiatrists usually charge the highest fees. Master’s level counselors generally charge less than doctoral level therapists. Coaches charge even less. However, if you have an emotional problem, I advise you to be very careful when selecting a coach.
Now that you have determined which category of professionals is best suited for your situation, you can proceed as follows:
Decide your gender preference. Do you think you would feel more comfortable with a man or a woman?
Try to get a personal reference. If you know someone you trust who is or was in therapy and benefited from it, you may want to request a referral. Your doctor can also be a reliable referral source.
Check educational background, experience, and areas of expertise.
Check malpractice claims.
Set treatment goals. Are you interested in alleviating symptoms, problems in an intimate relationship, or do you want to get to know yourself more deeply?
Now that you’ve done all the background work, it’s time to schedule your first appointment. You will not know if there is a good relationship between you and the selected therapist until you sit down in their office and the two of you begin to interact with each other. Do you feel that the therapist understands what you are saying? Do you feel that he or she is knowledgeable, empathetic, and committed to you? Are you providing helpful feedback? Be prepared to find someone else if you have serious questions after your first date.
Feeling connected, understood, in tune and emotionally safe with a therapist are the most important conditions for therapy to be effective and transformative.