Choosing the Right Counselor For You

Samuel T. Gladding, Kevin G. Alderson

• Publisher: American Counseling Association
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781119606932
• eBook ISBN: 9781119602392
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Professional Development
• Index: Psychology

This concise guide is for individuals seeking a counselor for themselves or others. It contains a treasure trove of information for the public on the nuts and bolts of counseling in an easy-to-read, question and answer format. Chapter topics include how to know when to seek help and what kinds of issues counselors assist with; the differences between individual, group, couples, family, and online counseling; the various theoretical approaches to counseling and how to choose; how to find a competent counselor; what questions you should ask before scheduling your first appointment; and how to determine if counseling is working.

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“In the end, we only regret
the chances we didn't take.”

—Unknown

Chapter 1
When to Seek the Help of a Counselor

Why Should I Seek a Counselor in Particular, or at All for That Matter?

As you will learn in this book, there are several kinds of helping professionals. There is a place and role for each one of us. Psychiatrists have their role, psychologists have theirs, as do social workers and others. So, to kick things off, why should you seek the help of a counselor at all?

The counseling profession originated from the guidance movement. From the beginning of its history, counseling focused on people’s strengths more than on their weaknesses. In contrast, psychiatry and clinical psychology focused on serious problems that people faced, and this required a focus more on people’s weaknesses. Although people’s fears of psychiatrists and psychologists are ill-founded, counselors have nevertheless been viewed rarely with the same level of suspiciousness or fear by clients.

Most of us have seen counselors for one reason or another, whether for obtaining career guidance, planning a program of educational study, receiving financial advice, getting a second opinion regarding a difficult decision, or simply getting another viewpoint. Professional counselors are trained to deal with all of this and more. They also know when to refer if the problem is more serious than they can handle.

In general, counselors are nice people. They are trained at listening while creating an atmosphere of deep caring. Seeing a counselor should feel like talking to your best friend but without any judgment, and the professional counselor will keep everything confidential unless you provide a signed release of information. In other words, you are in good hands with a professional counselor!

How Would I Know If I Should See a Counselor?

No one sign tells us if we should see a counselor. Instead, there are usually several signs, many of which may be small but significant. The following signs indicate that a problem is more than you can handle on your own or with the help of significant others in your life:

• Your emotions are intense or they feel all messed up. A strong indicator that you should consider getting professional help is if you feel constantly irritable, sad, depressed, hopeless, or dismayed. Maybe you find that you are overreacting to minor events, such as someone being late for an appointment or not showing up for meeting. Perhaps you cannot shake the funk that you are in no matter how many people show concern for you. Alternatively, maybe you have become overly critical, cynical, and self-centered. You ruminate about the past and the mistakes you have made. These signs and others like them indicate you should see a counselor. When you are not managing your emotions very well, it results in affective changes (e.g., your feelings are different than before), behavioral changes (e.g., the way you now act is atypical or abnormal for you), and cognitive changes (e.g., you view yourself more negatively than before).
• It is worse now than it was a month ago. The problem is getting worse instead of better. Regardless of your best efforts, you continue to struggle with the same old thing. For example, your insomnia keeps getting worse. Increasingly, it takes longer to fall asleep, or you continue waking up earlier. You find yourself drinking more than you used to, and you are not successfully controlling it. Attending college is not working out for you because you keep missing your classes. On top of that, you cannot seem to sit down and study.
• The problem just does not stop! No matter what you do, it lingers like a bad case of puppy love, an indigestible dinner, or too many raw onions. You have tried everything you can think of but the problem remains. For example, maybe you experience so much anxiety in a social situation or when giving a talk in front of others that you give up trying. Like hitting your head against a brick wall, the only thing that changes is your head, which gets increasingly sore. Some people feel so much loneliness and isolation that it becomes crippling. You are worthy of love, and you deserve to feel a sense of community. However, doing so requires dedication and sometimes change from within.
• You feel alone and isolated. There are times in life when we feel alone and isolated. Sometimes this occurs when we relocate to find work or to help ailing parents, and other times we may feel alone and isolated even though we are surrounded by people. Seeing a counselor can help us regain our perspective and perhaps inspire us to take the necessary steps to create a sense of community and belonging.
• You are uncomfortable with your life or the direction you are heading. Despite our best efforts, sometimes we lose sense of what is important to us, or we make decisions that we later feel were misguided or outright wrong for us. Most decisions result in both positive and negative consequences, and weighing these, especially ahead of time, is not easy.
• You have become stuck. Sometimes we just do not know how to get out of a situation that looks bleak no matter what direction we take in life. This kind of dilemma is called an avoidance-avoidance situation (e.g., being in a horrible marriage but having children to think of and going it alone seems financially impossible).
• You were abused as a child or traumatized by something that happened. Traumas take many forms but the one thing they have in common is how much they can mess up the way we function psychologically, socially, sexually, and in other areas of our lives.
• You are constantly fatigued or experience another condition that may have both a psychological and physical component. There is a powerful connection between the mind and the body. Many illnesses, for example, have both physical and psychological aspects. Some doctors call these psychosomatic conditions. Many physical conditions such as headaches, stomachaches, neck pain (some people are literally a pain in the neck!), and back pain occur in direct response to stress. After you have been thoroughly assessed by a physician to rule out any possible medical diseases, you will probably want to see a counselor to look at contributing factors in your life or in the way you live your life.
• Others are telling you to get help. Maybe you do not realize there is a problem but the people who know you are telling you to get help. For example, a person with a substance use disorder denies their addiction despite the facts. Denial is such a powerful defense mechanism that it keeps people from seeing the truth about their excessive use of alcohol or drugs or their compulsive behavior. Some individuals are getting hooked on video games, smartphones, and Facebook. If your friends and family keep telling you that they think you need help, we advise you to pay attention to what they are saying to help you realize something about yourself.
• Others at work have noticed a change. When your boss at work tells you to get help, either he or she has it out for you or maybe you really do have an issue that needs to be addressed. As we stated in the previous point, sometimes other people see problems before we can.

Let us now look at the need to get help in a more technical way. Knowledge is both interpersonal (i.e., between ourselves and others) and intrapersonal (i.e., within ourselves). People gain knowledge by learning from others and from our experiences. Interpersonal knowledge is relatively direct. For example, you listen to a lecture, read a book or blog, or engage in conversation. In each case, the facts you pick up help you grow mentally. You learn to do math. You learn about the ecosystem and economics. Through words, pictures, or drawings, you hear or see how someone else conceptualizes the world.

Intrapersonal knowledge is different. It comes through experiences, feelings, and the thoughts that go with them. For example, you ask a person you like to go to a movie. He or she either accepts or declines. If your invitation is consistently accepted, you realize you have a friend or perhaps a budding relationship. You are excited! If you are rejected, you know this person does not want to be close to you. Sometimes that can feel ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Table of Contents
• About the Authors
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: When to Seek the Help of a Counselor
• Chapter 2: The Types of Counseling Practice
• Chapter 3: The Various Approaches to Counseling Practice
• Chapter 4: How to Choose a Counselor or Other Mental Health Clinician
• Chapter 5: The Questions You Should Ask a Counselor Before Making Your First Appointment
• Chapter 6: How to Assess Your Progress
• Epilogue
• Appendix A: Forms for Setting Goals, Determining Expectations, and Creating an Agenda
• Appendix B: Theories Underlying 10 Counseling Approaches
• Appendix C: Reflective Outtake Counseling (ROCK)
• End User License Agreement