being and unbeing “the therapist friend”
In this article, Thalia explores themes of social life, emotional support, individualism, and boundaries in therapy and in friendship.
A common goal in therapy - of all forms - is the exploration and management of interpersonal boundaries. As we move through our lives, our social needs fluctuate, and it is a hefty task to consistently attune to and understand ourselves. This is held in combination with the challenge of having to navigate steadily more complex relational dilemmas. A therapist can support you to recognise problematic behaviour (your own and others) and to discover what is needed to move partnerships toward your understanding of mutual respect. If you’re working with a dramatherapist, you might find that you do this through conversation; using symbolic objects or drawings; games; metaphors and stories; identification with important characters; by engaging in movement; through dramatic enactment. The dramatherapist is your witness and mirror - you are the director and creator.
A therapist who is safe for you to work with will make clear to you the boundaries of the therapy space. They may have ground rules - for example, about whether or not you eat during the session, or a policy about lateness or canceling a session. In talk-based therapies, touch is unusual. Anecdotally, I shook the hand of my first therapist once, when we initially met, and we never touched again, for six years. In dramatherapy, where there might be games that involve touch among a group of clients, this could be different - but it should always be a dynamic, carefully negotiated matter.
Your therapist should always have curiosity for your boundaries during sessions. They should remind you of your agency and encourage you to be assertive if something they do or say is troubling you. But it’s also true that part of the therapist’s role is to gently challenge you to see the whole picture, and this can be uncomfortable. The balance of power is important, and something your therapist ought to hold with great care. You should never feel that you must serve your therapist’s emotional needs - the space is yours, and while you can show kindness and courtesy, it is not your role to worry for your therapist. It is the therapist’s responsibility to hold their own feelings, and, for the duration of the session, yours.
A therapeutic alliance can be friendly - it is best if it is - but it is very different from a friendship. In my training, a lecturer once shared this reflection: “As a therapist, you always hope that the client will eventually come to find the work obsolete.” Herein lies the most crucial distinction between therapeutic work and the care that is passed among friends: as a therapist, you and the client both anticipate the finite nature of the alliance. One day, the client will no longer need your support, and will feel empowered to move forward without it. It is the therapist’s role to sustain and be alongside them in working toward that day.
A few different people have told me that among peers who were struggling, they have sometimes felt like “the therapist friend”. I’ve been thinking about these interactions - and what the idea of such a thing says about how we approach friendship, and how we approach therapy.
Those who spoke to me about identifying as “the therapist friend” usually meant that someone close to them was taking their time for granted - calling on them when it was not convenient in order to vent or seek support, without showing care for their needs in return. Sometimes it meant that they felt they were unduly held responsible for the decisions of others, or that they were uncomfortable that their advice seemed to hold great influence.
These encounters reflect a wider social phenomenon: in a friendship group, there is sometimes a person - usually a woman - who either is made responsible or voluntarily takes on the task of managing emotional support, more frequently than others. This task can bleed out into wider relationship management - not just a shoulder to cry on, but also the host of the social gathering, the trusted advisor, and the accountability machine.
The people who spoke to me about performing this role were proud of what they could offer, but also overburdened and frustrated that their needs seemed not to be of concern to others. One felt humbled and grateful that their skills were recognised, and another took the attitude that nobody else could do what they did. All felt guilty about the time they spent resenting the need for support - they struggled to say no, felt responsible (or, indeed, were blamed) for any negative result of someone following their advice, and felt that it was incumbent upon them, since they seemed to be unusually good listeners, to be available, always, to listen. In short, they were having problems deciding how and when to set boundaries.
I want to be clear that, in my view, emotional support should not be exclusively outsourced to mental health professionals. It would be profoundly sad if the call to perform acts of friendship was seen as an infringement of personal space. However, phrases like “emotional labour” and “traumadumping” have crept into common parlance, and, though these have legitimate uses, they are too often used liberally by those who are simply uncomfortable seeing others be vulnerable. I had a friend who was so disturbed by someone’s tears that he privately told me he wished they would “just take it to therapy”. This individualistic way of thinking harbours itself in the zeitgeist again and again.
Labouring to care for each other is what makes us human, and such labour is a fundamental part of our friendships. Interpersonal care cannot always be convenient. However, there is nuance to this. While we should offer comfort to our loved ones, a single person in a group being enroled as “the therapist friend” is unfair and unsustainable. The presence of such a person, beyond being harmful to them and turning friendship into work and sacrifice, can also create dangerous power imbalances. This is due, in part, to the essential role contradiction I have explored. The phenomenon of this role also suggests something about the widespread need for therapy, and the urgent and troubling lack of access. And yet, while you might be the best listener for miles around, that doesn’t qualify you to solve the matter of your friend being stuck at the bottom of a long waiting list.
A healthy community is one sustained by mutual aid - you offer what you can, and allow yourself to receive offerings. Serving others without boundaries - caring until you are too exhausted to go on caring - can only lead to resentment and devaluation. Besides, this is not what therapists do. If you feel like “the therapist friend”, I invite you to consider what it is you need from relationships - and, if you are totally honest, what it is that you can sustainably give to others.
Being reflexive in how you respond to your loved ones’ needs will always be more effective than setting rules for yourself. There is no quota of care for you to fulfil. There is only being human alongside other humans, and the gentle and essential ebbing and flowing of being moved to act with love. There are therapists and there are friends: if you are “the therapist friend”, it is time to abdicate this role and set yourself free.
