When Your Therapist is the One Making a Change

I have been practicing therapy at a group practice for the past 7 years and I have recently decided to leave. There are things your therapist isn’t able to say when they’re the one who is making a change.

Things that legally can’t be said. Things that aren’t therapeutically appropriate to say. And things that maybe we just don’t quite know how to say without making the moment about us, when it really needs to stay about you.

This one can be from me.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve had a lot of conversations with clients about change. And there are thoughts and emotions I've after every one that I couldn’t say in the room.

I know this is hard.

I know you didn’t ask for this change.

My job has often been to help you manage the unexpected things that disrupt your life, and it's not lost on me that I’ve become one of them.

I know this creates work for you. I know there are decisions to make and paperwork to fill out and insurance to figure out. I know that’s a stressor. I want to make as much of it seamless as I can, and it’s frustrating to know that some pieces are simply outside of my control.

Mostly, though, I want you to know that I understand the weight of changing something we’ve built together.

You’ve let me into some of the most vulnerable parts of your life. Some of you have done that for years. I’ve known about things you weren’t ready to tell anyone else. I’ve watched you make decisions that took months to make. I’ve watched things get better, get worse, get complicated.

I remember the things that once felt impossible.

And I don’t take any of that lightly.

When I tell you that you have choices about what comes next, I’m not asking you to leave. I’m making sure you know that the choice is actually yours.

Maybe continuing our work together feels right. Maybe this change makes you realize that a new perspective might be good for you. Maybe you have absolutely no idea yet.

All of those are okay.

There are strong and health boundaries around a therapeutic relationship, but those boundaries don’t mean the relationship is insignificant to the person sitting on the other side of the room.

You have never just been an appointment on my calendar.

To me, this is more than a job, we are human beings together.

And when you tell me that you’re excited for me, or proud of me, or that this feels like the right next step, I probably won’t tell you exactly how much that means to me.

Because then we’re getting dangerously close to you taking care of me. That's not my role in your life.

But please know that I hear it and feel it. I value and appreciate it.

One of the strangest and greatest privileges of being a therapist is getting to be part of someone’s story for a while. This is a relationship that exists like no other.

Of course I hope I get to know what happens next.

I hope I get to see where all of this work takes you. I hope I get to watch some of the things we’ve spent time talking about become things you’re actually living.

And if this is where our work together changes or ends, I honor that too. I hope whoever gets to sit in that chair across from you for the next part understands what a privilege it is.

But please, keep going.

Whether the next part is with me or with someone new, please don’t let this transition become the reason you stop doing something you’ve worked so hard at.

Maybe it helps me to think this way but I hope there’s a cosmic reason for each of us that this change is unfolding now. I spend a lot of my days asking people to tolerate discomfort and uncertainty, trust themselves, take risks, and make room for change.

Now, I have to do it too.

I hope this change brings all of us closer to wherever we’re supposed to be next. And maybe, in some small way, watching me make a change plants a seed that it’s okay for you to make one too.

Where my words have felt clunky and awkward recently, it's because I have to tell you that I'm leaving. I can't share too much more. I'm worried you'll feel abandoned and everything above is in my heart.