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When we as mental health consumers are dealing with therapists, we may never get a sense of how they truly see us. They project to us an image of themselves as caring and helping people, who assume no superiority over us. The piece of the jigsaw puzzle that we're missing can be gleaned from overhearing how they speak about us to fellow therapists. Another method is to know someone who is a therapist, such as a family member or an acquaintance who works in that field. 

At my best guess about therapists, their actual set of agendas differs vastly from how they want us to see them. Therapists function at multiple levels. The content in the forefront is very different from the content in back. The perspective in back runs the show.  

Therapists are expected not to become emotionally involved with us. When there is too much attachment on their part, they may have to discontinue. This is for ethical reasons. Therapists also are forbidden from taking sexual or financial advantage of us. This is irrespective of gender(s). Any financial or sexual involvement of any kind could invoke consequences to their future careers. 

Additionally, psychotherapists have egos and sets of personal ambitions. I've met a therapist who self-published a book and was spending good money to promote it. It was quite an ego boost for him. He had a copy on display in his waiting room, along with a newspaper clipping of a story a newspaper reporter had done about him. 

Many therapists would love to be the next Dr. Phil, or Dr. Drew. 

(To get tangential: Dr. Drew was fired or quit following expressing doubts about Hillary Clinton's health, during the Clinton versus Trump Presidential race.) 

In my impression of all of my recent therapy, the therapist is after information. They want a lot of specifics, and they want to know how I do things, why I do things, and what things I am doing. This could be an indication that I'm dealing with some form of forensic psychology. Forensics tend to run counter to actual help. The consumer is ultimately betrayed, and this can lead to substantial damage. A person has been taught to fully trust someone and open up and be vulnerable. Then they are given "the shaft"--pardon the expression. This could do irreparable psychological damage. 

We are given the old, tired line that our information is strictly confidential unless we are a threat to someone. Yet, we've signed a release of information that allows them to do whatever they want with our information. 

But to the therapist, damage to the person being treated, is secondary, because they have achieved their objective--whatever that happens to be. How are we to trust someone and open up--and share our secrets--when this information is likely to be used against us? 

Therapy can potentially be a true helping profession. Forensic Therapy apparently is about getting all of the client's information, which can potentially become part of a court case. Evidence from forensic therapy can also exonerate. Since I completely lack knowledge of how therapeutic evidence is deployed, I can't speak about it. I know of it from my end, and that's all I know of it. 

Therapists have feelings, too. They are not individuals to whom we should act abusively. We will be corrected if we make any comments concerning their appearance, good or bad. 

Some therapy is intrinsically damaging. This is where old wounds are reopened, closely examined, and thereby exacerbated. This is done in the name of healing the client, the theory being that mental illness is produced by past trauma that we haven't dealt with. 

It has some validity if you are ready for it. In the past few years my mind has developed the habit of revisiting old memories and reinterpreting events based on the sense of reality I have now. This has allowed me to have a lot more understanding of myself and my past gross mistakes and missteps. It yields more understanding of why things happened the way they did. Yet, it doesn't cure the pain. 

I would not do this reflection in therapy because I feel that some things about me are none of anyone's business. When a therapist digs too much it can do irreparable damage. This is partly because the therapist has forty-five minutes in which to perform something analogous to a surgical procedure on our psyches. Even though it is nonphysical surgery, the person who cuts must have know-how. 

And forty-five minutes is not enough time to complete what is being done and close the incisions. And they don't know how we are constructed. It is like driving a car and navigating streets based on where you think things should be rather than where they are. If you did this, you would quickly go off the road or hit something. 

And I've seen a number of mental health consumers have an irreversible downturn following a therapeutic revelation. They weren't ready to handle information about their pasts, and they resultantly had a catastrophic breakdown. 

I've dealt with some therapists who are very sharp and others who are dense. The sharp ones ask the right questions and do not use force. They do not talk down to us. Their work is empathy based and not analytic based. They do not think they're God or that they're cut from better cloth. 

Therapy can help in part because it provides attention to the client. Perhaps no one else is interested enough to ask all of these questions about us. This, in itself, is potentially a good thing and feels good. 

Therapy can help us or hurt us, it will never cure us, and if we needed medication before we went into therapy, we will continue to need it. We should never presume that we're cured. 

On our side of things, we may need to work with a therapist a few months for us to determine whether the therapist is any good, and to determine whether they are invested in helping us. Psychotherapy doesn't cure psychiatric illness, but it can help a mental health consumer deal with the absurdities of life. 

PART 2: Disentangling Ourselves from Institutionalized Therapy 

Psychotherapy is a grab bag in which we get some fools who assume we are fools, some very sharp therapists, and some therapists who are crazy. 

When we approach leaving intensive therapy to transition to something requiring less of an investment in time and energy, it matters how we approach it. If our approach is paranoid and/or from a place of resistance, we inevitably encounter more pushback, and we invite the neutralizing strategies of the therapists because they detect our uncooperative headspace. 

We cannot get into a battle of wills, consisting of "me vs. them" because therapy vendors have too much power. Our approach to leaving or modifying therapy should be that we are acting "compliant." 

When we feel ready, we are best off having our mental health treatment be in the backdrop of our lives and not the forefront. To accomplish this, we must convince therapists that their jobs are done, and they've cured us. 

Jack Bragen lives in Martinez and is author of "Instructions for Dealing with Schizophrenia: A Self-Help Manual," and other books.