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During covid, I did a bunch of soul-searching, and after covid, I reached out for psychologists to work through some issues I have (context: I'm single, so not with spouse, and the issue is mostly generational and geographical divide between me, and rest of my family).

I did 3x2h sessions with 2 different therapist (both of them on recommendation by other psychologists). They have been incredibly not helpful, in that they were unable to empathize with the problem, offer any insights, or give tools to address any of my issues.

One thing I take away from this experience, is that navigating this system is a difficult exercise on it's own, even when you're searching for one for yourself. If you add a partner, and a disagreement to this equation, the choice of psychiatrist may become an issue in itself -despite it not being their job, they will be perceived as the arbitrator for the issue, and choice of arbitration almost always decides the outcome -making this an even bigger issue than it was.

I don't have answers for this, just noting that the current rage of "go see a psychiatrist" fails to answer accessibility, and addressability questions, which makes it not really actionable.

The education for most therapists (LCSW) is limited and generally tailored to popular mundane issues that can be solved via talking it through. They are also limited to the insight and interest of their own lived experience.

If you have a real logistical problem, or something that centers around legitimate cultural differences, I can see why most of them would have trouble offering useful advice.

If I were you I would seek a mentor who had lived through something similar and accomplished what you are hoping to accomplish, if such a person can be located.

> There's still a stigma around seeing a therapist

Not just the stigma but the whole health insurance bureaucracy around it to prevent you from seeing a therapist easily too, like intentionally incomplete and inaccurate search tools.

Yes, and the therapists rarely have a web presence, particularly the good ones.

> not even be successfully treated (i.e. divorce)

If one of the partners is narcissistic then one of the partners probably is the problem and divorce is the right solution.

You can't really treat narcissism. You can't make a person who doesn't feel empathy and doesn't want to feel empathy, to feel empathy.

I think a therapist represents change, and change can be bad, especially when someone like a narcissist threatens deep emotional harm or "war" for asserting ones boundaries.

I think it's more of the dynamic between comfort and growth. Seeing a therapist is seeking growth, and it requires discomfort. You can't really have growth without discomfort. So people put it off until their "comfortable" environment becomes unbearable.

Denial is an extremely powerful (and often normal) state to be in.

On the flip side I'm starting to see, "You haven't been to therapy? Well, I have and have fixed all my problems so the problem must be with you. You really should get some therapy."

I think therapy has potential to do more harm than good. Since its not based on science and none of the results are reproducable. This has caused me to be apprehensive about it in the first place. Since its not an actual science I'd rather not be vulnrable to a person and let them poke and prod me when there is no gurantee of a reproducable result.

When you are going to a therapist youre throwing the dice that the experiment works , with odd highly against you. There is a better chance you'll come out damaged then cured .

You start with therapy "potential to do more harm than good", which I agree with.

Then you claim 'therapy' is "not based on science", which (a) suggests you might have a very narrow STEM-y view of what "science" is, and (b) suggests you might have a limited understanding of what different forms of psychological and psychiatric therapies there are. I invite you to read some scientific peer-reviewed papers on how comparatively (in)efficient different forms of therapy are for different syndromes. You will find, most therapies are very much based on science.

And then you end with claiming there "is better chance you'll come out damaged then[sic] cured", even claim the odds are "highly against you", without any support whatsoever. For someone who cares about a basis in science, you sure have some strong opinions without any basis in fact.

Sure , I am open to believe that psychological therapy is not psedoscience. Please provide some peer reviewed papers in reputable journals about Couples Therapy with Reproducable results. I am even willing to relax Conceptual replication, some papers with exact replication will do.

>And then you end with claiming there "is better chance you'll come out damaged then[sic] cured", even claim the odds are "highly against you", without any support whatsoever. For someone who cares about a basis in science, you sure have some strong opinions without any basis in fact.

Because I care about basis in science thats the reason I wrote it. Going to therapy is akin to going for homeopathic medicine to get cured. Homeopathy was popular in 18th century on the coattails of vaccination and its still a big industry in US but it has more in common with Goop than medicine. With current credibility crisis Psycological therpay will also face similar demise.

I’m not going to give you links, but look to the Gotman Institute for some tangible research around couples therapy.

Science still acknowledges the placebo effect though- and it's so incredibly strong that not seeking it out is non-scientific.

This dismisses the lack of therapists in the past and the lack of quality therapists.

People used to do without them just fine before, yet now they are almost necessary to salvage a good 50% of the relationships or so?

And what about the stories of therapists basically telling one side (often the woman) they can do no wrong and the other side has to compromise? Therapists don't even have a long history of evidence to draw from, with ever changing circumstances.

There were other roles in the past which fulfilled the need for "mental checkup", even with less stigma: In particular, religious institutions. At some point, it was common that each village had a pastor. You could tell him about sorrows and grievances under assurance of secrecy and he would give you advice.

Of course the "theory" behind the advice was an entirely different one than modern psychology uses, but the social role was similar.

I think therapy has potential to do more harm than good. Since its not based on science and none of the results are reproducable. This has caused me to be apprehensive about it in the first place. Since its not an actual science I'd rather not be vulnrable to a person and let them poke and prod me when there is no gurantee of a reproducable result.

When you are going to a therapist youre throwing the dice that the experiment works , with odd highly against you. There is a better chance you'll come out damaged then cured .

I mean, it's based on more science than all the alternatives.

Yes, the standards are a lot less rigorous and reproducability is worse than in the "hard sciences", but at least they are trying to get some kind of objective, reproducable result in the first place.

The alternatives to therapy are basically: Religion, family knowledge, random self-help books or trying to work it out yourself. In all three, the methods are even less stringent and objective than in psychology.

In my experience, psychology as a field is also open to new information from biological hard sciences, such as neuroscience.

Finally, note that psychology is not just used in therapy but also in advertising, UX design and tech in general, often in manipulative ways which run counter to the interests of users. Evidently, it works there. So then, why would the same knowledge suddenly be useless pseudoscience when it comes to therapy?

>Yes, the standards are a lot less rigorous and reproducability is worse than in the "hard sciences", but at least they are trying to get some kind of objective, reproducable result in the first place.

This is a major red flag. This whole field is reeling under Credibility crisis.

People should be exposed to medical treatments which are tried , tested aproved and regulated. Which this field cant be further from yet they have the authority to advice people as under pretext of psycologists and therapists.

There should be even more regulation for psycologists and therapists , just like there is approval process for vaccines . Howcome we are allowing so many people to be exposed to medical treatments which have barely any regulation and no reproducablity.

That's correct and I agree that a lot more should be done. I'm just saying that right now, there is no better option. Also, if therapy really had no significant positive results (in aggregate!) I think we'd hear more about that from affected patients. Instead, you can find lots of accounts from people who said that therapy has greatly improved their lives.

(This is different from the horrible transgressions of the 19th and 2/3rds of the 20th century where the "results" were mostly how the patients appeared to others but not how they felt themselves - if you bothered to see them as humans at all)

You are spam-posting this bullshit. Please stop. I answered you above when you posted the exact same two paragraphs.

Please read up on the science before claiming "is not based on science". Thanks!

Do you have conclusive scientific evidence on your hypothesis? It doesn’t sound like it is based on science and might suffer from the replication crisis.

The Gottman Institute has produced solid work for relationship counseling.

"solid" may sound affirming but doesnt really mean anything. I am open to believe that Gottman Institute is not selling snake oil. Please provide some peer reviewed papers in reputable journals about Couples Therapy with Reproducable results by Gottman Institute. I am even willing to relax Conceptual replication, some papers with exact replication will do.

>Do you have conclusive scientific evidence on your hypothesis? It doesn’t sound like it is based on science and might suffer from the replication crisis.

The onus of providing proof and supporting evidense lies on "therapists" and "psycologists" who make the claim that their work is science and it "helps" people in any way.