Logo

What are some signs that a therapist may have poor boundaries with their clients?

09.06.2025 02:45

What are some signs that a therapist may have poor boundaries with their clients?

Failing to mention the client in supervision/consultation, out of fear the supervisor/consultant will advise return to ordinary healthy boundaries.

These items can happen fleetingly, briefly, in any therapy, but if they’re frequent, it’s definitely time for the therapist to get some good, solid supervision/consultation.

Obsessing about clients outside of work hours.

What are the potential benefits of going without clothes at home for a few days without any specific reason?

Serious disappointment when the client cancels a session.

Disclosing feelings, fantasies, and experiences to the client in ways not related to the work the client is engaged in.

Struggling with fantasies of deeper connections with clients, whether sexual or parental or other intense or intimate relationships beyond psychotherapy.

Galerie David Guiraud : Deep Space & Celestial Objects - The Eye of Photography

Eager anticipation (or anxious anticipation) of the next session in ways that distract.

Frequent phoning or texting of clients to “check up on them and make sure they’re OK.”

General Introduction to Boundaries from Panahi Counseling:

What was Easter day like for you as a child?

Session-expressed curiosities about client details not relevant to the therapy.

Off the top of my ancient head:

Sense of competition with persons who are important in the client’s life.

Were the 1980s as uptight and prudish as movies and TV shows make them out to be? When I think of 80s culture, I think about a very "icky" judgmental yuppie status quo time period.

Routinely going over the time limit with certain patients, compromising the time for the next client.