Over at
GreyThinking, an interesting topic has been raised. Here's a little summarizing excerpt from
her entry:
How do you feel about being treated by someone with an eating disorder history?
I’ve always felt very strongly AGAINST seeing a therapist who had an eating disorder herself. I think part of that is related to the competitiveness of the eating disorder (not that I think SHE will be competitive, but that I will be), but I also think part of it is about objectivity. I don’t know if you can be completely objective having suffered from the same thing yourself. I’ve never really wanted empathy. Maybe this is weird of me? I just have a thing about people with eating disorders guiding others with eating disorders. It’s the blind leading the blind. I want to work with someone completely removed from the eating disorder world.
Before this, she raises the obvious point that a large part of our community is hugely interested in pursuing degrees in psychology and nutrition (guilty). This, of course, is based on the fact that we are drawn to what we are exposed to.
Now, my therapist is absolutely incredible. I don't know what it is about him; he has never personally struggled through an eating disorder, nor did he
ever imagine that he would even be in the field. He was just lucky he had a psych degree to fall back on after his first career choice [in sales] did not pan out.
However, there were two women that really played a huge part in my recovery. One was my best friend from college, who had recovered herself. Her role was very important because I was unable to fully accept recovery until I could see that it was possible, which she showed me while sitting on my hospital bed one night last fall.
The other was a counselor at one of my treatment programs. I knew, long before she was able to tell me, that she had recovered. Many of the counselors were very good, but she knew how to communicate with us on a different level than most of the other doctors. She knew how to talk and how it felt and how to word the things she said, as she had experienced it all. Nothing was more comforting than being able to talk to someone who really knew what it was like.
I am hoping that's how people will feel when I am able to get more involved, personally, with others' recovery. I want to be in treatment, but from the other side because I feel like I could make such a huge difference having gotten through it. Patients have such a difficult time trusting doctors as it is; I think it would be easier if they knew where they were coming from. No matter how good of a therapist you may be, you can never get
in to someone's head. Someone who's already experienced it is already there. That is as trustworthy as it can get.
Now, GT raises the point that treating patients may be risky to both the patient
and the provider based on how recovered s/he may or may not be. I do not believe that anyone who is not
absolutely fully recovered should be treating
anyone, as I would think it would be detrimental to both parties' recovery and treatment. I assume that goes without saying. You cannot help anyone until you receive the help you need, first.
I would hope employers would double check information like this before hiring treatment staff? I don't know how that works, but wouldn't any treatment center - eating disorder, drug, alcohol, etc - check for a background history of behaviors before allowing someone to treat others for it?
What are your thoughts on it? Would you prefer to be treated by someone who has never personally had ED in their life, or someone that totally gets what is going on with you and the way your brain works from the inside?
Before this, she raises the obvious point that a large part of our community is hugely interested in pursuing degrees in psychology and nutrition (guilty). This, of course, is based on the fact that we are drawn to what we are exposed to.
Now, my therapist is absolutely incredible. I don't know what it is about him; he has never personally struggled through an eating disorder, nor did he ever imagine that he would even be in the field. He was just lucky he had a psych degree to fall back on after his first career choice [in sales] did not pan out.
However, there were two women that really played a huge part in my recovery. One was my best friend from college, who had recovered herself. Her role was very important because I was unable to fully accept recovery until I could see that it was possible, which she showed me while sitting on my hospital bed one night last fall.
The other was a counselor at one of my treatment programs. I knew, long before she was able to tell me, that she had recovered. Many of the counselors were very good, but she knew how to communicate with us on a different level than most of the other doctors. She knew how to talk and how it felt and how to word the things she said, as she had experienced it all. Nothing was more comforting than being able to talk to someone who really knew what it was like.
I am hoping that's how people will feel when I am able to get more involved, personally, with others' recovery. I want to be in treatment, but from the other side because I feel like I could make such a huge difference having gotten through it. Patients have such a difficult time trusting doctors as it is; I think it would be easier if they knew where they were coming from. No matter how good of a therapist you may be, you can never get in to someone's head. Someone who's already experienced it is already there. That is as trustworthy as it can get.
Now, GT raises the point that treating patients may be risky to both the patient and the provider based on how recovered s/he may or may not be. I do not believe that anyone who is not absolutely fully recovered should be treating anyone, as I would think it would be detrimental to both parties' recovery and treatment. I assume that goes without saying. You cannot help anyone until you receive the help you need, first. I would hope employers would double check information like this before hiring treatment staff? I don't know how that works, but wouldn't any treatment center - eating disorder, drug, alcohol, etc - check for a background history of behaviors before allowing someone to treat others for it?
What are your thoughts on it? Would you prefer to be treated by someone who has never personally had ED in their life, or someone that totally gets what is going on with you and the way your brain works from the inside?