Falling in love with your counselor.

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What do you mean “she was lucky” that she told you on the mobile phone? What would’ve happened if she told you in person?[/quote]


Probably nothing at all, but I would not be able to control such a meltdown in that moment

I'm gonna go back and read some of the other responses later. I'm genuinely curious about this topic.

I've actually had a little experience with this. My wife used to see a counselor back in the day. College wasn't good to her. She ended up being good friends with this person and even went on to finish her degree in psychology.

Over time we got to know her and her family on a more casual basis. From what I saw, I think the counselor largely became and remained a counselor more as a coping mechanism for her OWN unresolved issues. I think that way because of watching her in her relationships with men. She'd been married to the same guy for a long time, had two kids. But she more/less became bored with the relationship, felt her husband spend more time at work than with her. They enjoyed a comfy lifestyle and she had everything the world could offer, but for whatever reason she just wasn't satisfied with her husband.

Over time, she actually started dating her clients. Not ALL her male clients, but there were more than one. Naturally, she ended up divorcing her husband who didn't exactly want to end the marriage, but from what we could tell didn't exactly put up all that much of a fight. Personally, I'd have mopped the divorce court floor with her if it had been me...but whatever.

So I guess at one point she was "between guys" or something, and we went to visit her and spend the night. We were all up late drinking wine after the kids had all gone to bed and it was just me and her in the living room drinking and talking. Ok, I've had some background in psychology myself, not to mention "talking shop" with my wife, so I know how this works. I turned the tables on this lady and got her talking about herself. This went on for another couple hours before we said good night.

So the next day my wife got up early and was hanging out with her friend while they were making breakfast and I was still chilling in the bedroom. Girl time is good. She actually told my wife that she thought I'd been FLIRTING with her all night!! ! When we were alone next and she told me about it, we both just cracked up laughing. I'm not going to lie and say I wasn't having fun with her. Yeah, I was playing with her. But there were no intentions on my part for anything else. Between the wine, the conversation, and male attention, she made up this whole fantasy in her head that there was more going on than there really was.

My whole point in telling this story to answer the question: Is it possible to date your counselor? She eventually MARRIED one of her clients, so yeah. It's possible. But what does it look like when you can, figuratively speaking, get the counselor on YOUR couch and get her to open up? You find these are people who are just as broken as we are...just as broken as any human being out there, disabled or not. If you can find a counselor willing to date you, I'd guess that these are people who aren't counselors because they have a gift, but rather are projecting their own character flaws and disorders onto an entire profession. If they are willing to cross professional and ethical boundaries, that makes them predatory as a means of satisfying their own superficial needs. They're attracted to victims because they themselves think of themselves as victims, and misery loves company. They're trying to correct course for others because they are unable to do it for themselves. They give of themselves and love only others because they are incapable of loving themselves. Anybody else looking at that situation would recognize it as a problem.

I don't blame her for being attracted to other men, especially not clients. She's a woman. They're men. It's a natural thing. Heck, I'm married and felt a mild attraction to her. Doesn't mean I'd ever act on it. I don't blame her for having needs. But I do blame her for crossing the professional line. That was a choice she made.

So if you're feeling attracted to your counselor and she reciprocates, indicates a willingness to cross that line, I would be wondering what other lines she's willing to cross. I would wonder how effective she really is as a counselor. I would wonder if she's capable of exploiting her position of trust and authority to abuse clients. I'd wonder if being in a relationship with the person would end up being toxic. I'd wonder if she would do that with me if she'd do it to someone else.

I'm sure the vast majority of counselors are NOT like her. I doubt she's an isolated case, of course, but I'm sure most counselors have better scruples than that. It's ok to feel attracted to an attractive person. You can fantasize all you want on your own time. I sincerely doubt your counselor would ever actually reciprocate if you revealed your feelings for her or if you tried to make a move. But I also want you to think about what it would mean if she DID reciprocate. What would that tell you about the character of this person? There are a number of reasons why this is a bad idea. Either keep that part of it to yourself, or find a new counselor.

Either keep that part of it to yourself, or find a new counselor.[/quote]


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Hi there! By no means I meant telling her that I "like" her in order to have a confession from her side.

I really liked your story and I read it entirely, but I think my question was more aimed to the professionale side of being a counselor.

I wanted to know if opening up to her would "improve" my therapy. I'm not quite good at explaining myself but what I mean is: since I really like her, is it better if I tell that to her directly and maybe her, in the first place being a professional, would tell me to change counselor due to this being a problem.

I don't know it is hard to explain, but my question was aimed at understanding if this can occur during counselor-patient therapies and in the second place what a patient can do when he finds himself in this specific situation.

anyway thanks for the reply

Some good advice here. If you're looking to date her then Twilight and others are probably right: find someone else b/c it could lead to strange if not bad places. It's also quite possible that if and when she finds out that that's what you're after she may terminate the therapy anyway that's always at the therapist's prerogative to do so.

However telling her your feelings depending on your intentions won't necessarily lead to the end of your therapy relationship. I have two therapists one of whom isn't an ASD specialist and who told me of cases where her clients told her they felt the same way toward her as you do toward your therapist. She told me she then clarified the boundary of their relationship and they discussed it. I forget what she said the outcome was but I believe she continued to see that person (or people it may have happened w/more than one client).

My other therapist is an ASD specialist and she's very cute and there are several other things about her that I find attractive. I've been seeing her for a couple months now and I've already brought up romantic and sexual topics several times in that time period which she as a professional has handled as you'd expect: professionally. But fortunately I don't let my heart/libido get carried away b/c she's an intern/grad student and she'll be replaced by someone else in a few months and also b/c I like seeing her and appreciate her help so I'm quite happy w/how things are now. It's enough for me.

So to conclude I don't think the problem is necessarily telling her your feelings. You can perhaps even work w/her on that in therapy. The question is what is your goal. To be blunt there are other single women out there you'd probably be doing yourself a favor by trying to find one of them to date.

One should be able to open up to one’s counselor about everything. That’s why I think that he should possibly find someone else. If it were me, I would have a really hard time with that and would find that my feelings would lessen the therapeutic benefit of seeing a counselor.

But everyone is different.[/quote]


Honestly why would it be less beneficial to me?

I'm so happy to see her again tomorrow, I know she will never return any loving feeling towards me, but since I like her so much just speaking with her and seeing her is a really good thing for me