WarKittyKat

How would you address people harmed or traumatized by mental health treatment, especially in cases where there wasn't any reportable wrongdoing on the part of prior therapist(s)? It's something I've struggled with a lot because it often seems that the vast majority of therapists don't seem to want to engage with the idea of treatment potentially harming a patient. I know when I've tried to bring it up with future therapists in real life I usually get a shocked "oh I would never do anything to harm a patient!" or something, which is honestly a problem because in my experience the most damaging therapists were the ones that were completely convinced therapy was going great. (Often in retrospect I feel like I was manipulated by the therapist to continue because the therapist believed we were making progress. At the time I didn't see how therapy was doing harm; I thought the therapists were great and I was just too messed up to understand, or that if it wasn't working right it was my fault for not being a good enough patient. In my experience most therapists tended to encourage this view, albeit in more positive-sounding language.)

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What sort of safety standards beyond the really basic ethics would you suggest or look for to ensure a therapist isn't causing harm to a patient in their treatment plan, and especially how would you address cases where common treatments might cause harm to particular patients? Again, this is something I've tried to address on the ground and it's just been impossible to get a straight answer.

What would you say to someone who wanted to reach out to other Catholics, perhaps be able to offer a challenge to how people view faith in our society? Within the bounds of Church teaching, of course. It seems in most parishes I've been in only priests and deacons are able to do that sort of thing and laypeople are expected to focus evangelization efforts entirely on those outside.

Edit: I would add a lot of what I would want to talk about especially concerns women and women's experiences. While I greatly appreciate the work of our priests and deacons, I think there's something to being a woman in the world that they simply can't see in the same way.

Honestly r/catholicism mostly I found I experienced a lot of attacks - I don't really like it there, I felt like a lot of the environment was "if you're not following Padre Pio's standards and wear skirts only and attend the TLM, you're not a real Catholic."

I was a domestic violence victim and I can honestly say a lot of traditional teaching, applied in common ways, was what both enabled and prolonged the abuse and hindered my ability to heal from it. I don't think this is inherent to conservativism or even traditionalism, but I think it's an easy error to fall into when the focus is too much on men. I want to be able to speak to women who have been victims, but I often feel that even within the church that's seen as an attack - a sort of "political football" rather than a genuine need.