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Finding a therapist who can meet your needs well may cost you a lot of time, money and energy. I want to provide some tips that may make “shopping” easier for the therapist. My advice is based on my personal experience as a treatment patient, or in marketing terms, a consumer of treatment services, and my professional experience as a therapist.

Generally speaking, I think choosing a therapist is similar to finding and hiring any professional. There is a pre-interview stage during which you will find some candidates. Next, you conduct an interview over the phone or in person or both, and finally decide who to hire.

The difference in finding a therapist is that you can let your feelings influence your decision more than hiring any other professional. Generally, it is not a good idea to hold your feelings or emotions accountable, but treatment is unique because it is mainly built around feelings and emotions. The premise of treating patients is to discuss their personal affairs with the therapist in order to improve their emotional state and/or living conditions. Exposing personal information makes a person vulnerable, so if there is no basic sense of security, it shouldn’t happen. If something about the future therapist makes you uncomfortable, stop guessing and continue interviewing the next candidate, and then spend a lot of money to realize that you and the therapist are not right.

In the pre-interview stage, you will mainly use one or both of the following two sources: personal relationships and online resources (online directories of therapists and Google searches). I don’t think that one source is better than the other in any respect Naperville therapists . I personally recommend using both sources at the same time because it increases your chances of finding a decent therapist.

When you get recommendations from people you know, they will usually tell you their impressions or opinions of the therapists they recommend. If you use online resources, this is a valuable piece of information. On the other hand, the mere fact that this therapist helped someone you know or recommended to you does not guarantee that they will be able to help you. They may be very experienced and knowledgeable, but still not suitable for you on a personal level. In addition, when the recommendation comes from a personal relationship, you will not be able to form your own impression of the therapist before meeting the therapist. In contrast, when you check the online profile and website of a therapist, you can intuitively understand who they are before contacting them, so you don’t have to waste time and money to start with those who don’t appeal to you.

Searching online can be overwhelming because you have to browse many websites and profiles and view many photos. First pay attention to the photo of the therapist. Look carefully at the face. Is this a face you like and can trust? Can you contact the face of the person? This sounds like a naive approach, but as I said before, treatment is a unique job that is based on feelings and emotions. Therefore, feeling safe with the therapist is the basic condition for the beginning of treatment.

After reflecting on the therapist’s photo, read their profile or website carefully to see if their methods and ideas resonate with you and meet your needs, and then decide whether to include this therapist in the interview candidate list .

When you have selected several candidates for the “position”, please contact them and request an appointment. Some therapists provide 10 or 15 minutes of free initial “consultation” over the phone. I personally think that talking on the phone will not give you a clear idea of ​​what kind of person the person on the other end of the phone is like. If you want to decide whether to meet with them, it may be helpful to talk over the phone first. If you don’t like them after a few minutes of conversation, then you don’t need to waste time and money in the meeting and you can continue to contact the next candidate. I also don’t think it’s accurate to call the first interaction on the phone a “consultation” because the therapist is not really “consulting” anything at this time. This is just a preliminary mutual screening, when both of you decide whether to go further and arrange a meeting.

Remember that you and the therapist may need multiple treatments to assess whether you can work together. The nature of the treatment is very personal. If you and the therapist match up well, it may take a while to get a feel for it.