Are online therapists legit ?

Are Online Therapists Legit ?

I remember when I first started seeing clients at the McGill Psychoeducational clinic and during my first internship at Ometz, I persistently asked myself, "Am I doing anything at all? Is what I am doing helping, or is it harming? How can I be sure? How can I know what I'm doing is benefiting people long-term?" My choice to go from in-person to online was for a few reasons. One, new clients would come to the office and be so nervous; the sterile environments and medical clerks, who may or may not be friendly, their hands would literally be shaking. I would look at the clock and think, "Oh, geez, this took most of their session. They only have an x amount of sessions yearly in their plan." Two, my own self-care has everything to do with how I show up for my client, how we collaborate in reading their mental status, their nervous system, their basic self-care, and their well-being. 

So, how can we be sure online therapists are legit? 

How can I guide you to find one that is legitimate so your investment of time and money goes a long way? 

Here are a few factors I would suggest to make sure the therapist you pick is legitimate.

Licensing and Registration

Not too long ago, we started licensing and registering therapists. 

Part of the stigma of mental health is because we come from a background where it wasn't licensed, nor was registration required. Also, there's a stigma because we come from a history of mental health being associated with witchcraft and lobotomies. 

But to stay on track, licensing and registration is important. Becoming a therapist is no walk in the park. 

The criteria to get into grad school is hard: you have to have nearly perfect grades from undergrad, you have to make sure you have work and volunteer experience, an excellent letter of intent, and then amazing reference letters. 

Then, you have to go through an interview process, sometimes a group interview process. That's just grad school. 

In undergrad, your marks have to be high, you have to do research, special projects, and special research; you have to work for free for professors to stand out; you have to volunteer and do work experience. 

In grad school, you have to work for free for what seems like forever to get good references. After grad school, the licensing portion is just as grueling. Throughout grad school and licensing supervision, you have to bring video and audio tapes of your work and justify everything you are doing, so you have to know your stuff. 

For myself, in my therapy journey, I went from being an outgoing extrovert musician to now, in order to preserve my energy and my focus, an introvert so I can show up fully for all my clients I love and wish they would excel. 

So, licensing and registration matter. These provincial and registration boards do the work for you to make sure that all their approved therapists have what it takes to serve the public. That's what they are there for: to protect, mentor, and guide therapists and the public, and to act as a liaison for the greater good.

Passion

I would say from my own journey as a client, a supervisee, and a therapist, that therapists are people with vast motives. Like all people, motives are different. Some go in it for the money, some go for the prestige, some go in to help people, and some go in to help people then forget about helping people and become mercenaries. 

A way to differentiate who is truly passionate, in my opinion, is their ongoing training that they pay for. Money talks. If a therapist is persistently training, they are saying without words that they are investing this training back into their clients. This matters. Therapy is a truly unique field where a person's energy, outlook, and their own spirituality matter. 

What they bring into the room, how they see themselves, and how they treat themselves matters. So, if you are looking for a legitimate therapist, look to see if they have had recent training.

Hours of Work

My motive for going online also stems from finding that in the private and public clinics I was working for, alot of clinicians were more concerned with their routine and the office space than the clients. I didn't agree with therapists who pushed 5 to 10 clients a day in 5 to 10 hours, expected 5 to 10 reports, and called it a day. I was like, "Holy crap, a 10-minute break in between trauma work, how?" I myself, when I went to go see a therapist with a fancy title, was left hanging with my own vulnerability for the rest of the day, if not weeks, because he abruptly ended the meeting at exactly 50 minutes. 

So looking at their working hours and how they run their business and care for their clients, I think, matters. 

Are they lenient between clients? Do they take care of themselves? How do they close your session? Therapy is to some a sacred space, where confessions are made. This is highly sensitive personal information; nothing to me could be more sacred. So, how a therapist structures their day to see you, I think, matters if they are legitimate or not, in terms of if they genuinely care for you. And fundamentally, this really matters, despite therapy approach they use: you are cared for. You come to a person totally present, alive, attuned.

Hope this helps and hope it's not too "out there" or critical of the therapy field. LP