It Isn't About The Money

Cheryl Fuller:

It’s my job to ask when someone announces they want to leave therapy to ask why now and to raise what I see as possible issues. It is not about wanting to control the patient or protect my income. It is my job. I ask at the beginning of therapy why they are seeking therapy now and we look at that. I ask at the end why they want to leave now and we look at that.

Comments

[Pierre Corneille]

I had a chance to read the whole thing, and it's a very thoughtful article. I think it often is, or can be, "about money," although not in the crass way in which therapy's detractors might claim.

On the special issue of abrupt, client-initiated terminations of the therapist-client relationship, I believe one reason a client might wish to do so with little or no discussion is the issue of money. When a client has made a decision to terminate, especially when that decision is made based on not being able to pay, then often the price of one session to go over the why's and wherefore's of ending might be too much for the client.

Also, I imagine that clients of a certain strip might lack the self-confidence necessary to say no in a conversation with the therapist. And if the issue for the client is money, and the therapist's fee schedule cannot slide to a price point the client can pay (and I accept, as you have mentioned in a previous comment thread, the reasons for what might seem to an outsider like the high prices), then the client really cannot continue.

None of this comment is to fault the therapist for asking why. In fact, I suspect most therapists at least consider this when the issue arises. In (further) fact, it's possible therapists consider and comment on this aspect a lot and I am ignorant of how much they do so because I really don't read a lot on the subject.

But I do offer this comment as an addendum to why/how the money relation works as it does.