Posted by fallsfall on March 20, 2005, at 14:04:40
In reply to Re: We talked and talked and talked, posted by All Done on March 20, 2005, at 12:38:17
*** Deja vu!!! The only reason I know we have different therapists is that mine is a provider ONLY for Medicare.
>His first instinct was to say that the insurance company can't tell him what to charge.
*** Mine's second instinct was to say that the insurance company *wasn't going to" tell him what to charge.I told him I thought maybe they could because of his contract. He also kept mentioning the fact that we (him and I) had/have an arrangement we already agreed upon. Well, I told him I agreed to that not even knowing he was a provider with my insurance company. He's been a provider since before I met him. Our agreement was made without him telling me he was a provider.
*** Good for you! It is so hard to tell a therapist that they are wrong. Maybe they are just trying to be "assertive", but it sure feels more like intimidation/control. Maybe we are extra sensitive because money is the thing that we give to the relationship, so we are torn between wanting to "do our part" and needing the money to pay for other things.
Anyway, I just kept asking him to review his contract and call the insurance company. He's going to do that and we'll talk again.
*** This is more than my therapist would do, I ended up finding the name/phone number he needs to contact and telling him what he needs to say to them.You might like this falls - The only time he seemed to be flustered about all this was when he made a comment about me being the most informed one in the room and laughed nervously.
*** I think one reason that this kind of discussion is so full of issues is because they really do care about getting paid (we all want to have enough money to live on). But they sure are more interested in Psychological theory than they are in the "business" aspects of things, so the tend to be underinformed. Are most of their patients really so uninformed that we are the only ones who challenge them on these things?
He said making a financial investment in therapy might aid the overall investment in therapy. Thinking about this, though, I get kind of mad. Does he think I'm not invested enough without paying more? Or even paying at all, for that matter? No one is making me go to therapy. And I certainly don't drive an hour and fifteen minutes each way to hear myself talk for an hour.
*** Maybe he was speaking generically - "a" financial investment *in general* makes people more dedicated. This is one of the tenents of therapy (it seems to me). Perhaps he was just going over this as background info. So he doesn't look like so much of a money hungry shark - he is saying that paying a (reasonable) fee is important to *you* as well as to *him*.
We talked about how I hated bringing all of this up because it was kind of his stuff. Normally, I can look at someone (anyone but him for that matter) and tell myself that they are just another person, like me. It makes it easier to have things like difficult business conversations or inverviews sometimes. Well, what do you know...I don't put him in the same category with the rest of humanity;). He's a T 24/7 right? He doesn't leave his office ever. I hate even seeing him in the hall. As a matter of fact, I hate knowing that he has clients other than me. He didn't know I felt like this.
*** Therapy enters a different realm when you are talking about fees. I think they are the only area (except, perhaps for suicide) where the therapist really *does* care what we do (I think they can care about us while accepting that we can choose what we will do with our lives - caring about/for us is different from caring what we do). For the rest of things, I think they say that it is our life and our choice - so they can be happy either way it goes. But with money, it is like the intensity is rachetted up a notch - and this brings out subtleties in the relationship that stay hidden the rest of the time.
We talked about the way I deal(t) with confrontation with others (especially my parents). I will typically put everyone else's needs and wants before mine. Even at my own expense. I mentioned that my mom is NEVER wrong, so I gave up confronting her. I felt like he has a little bit of that attitude. When he started sounding like that is when I told him he needed to talk to the insurance company before we talked about it anymore.
*** Ah, yes. My therapist and I got into a spot where I was "teaching" him, and this prompted some important discussions about teaching and learning (for me, a way big to show that you care about someone is to teach them something - knowledge is one of the ultimate goals). Usually, he is the one "teaching" me. It is interesting how we each pull from our past in this way - so my experience of the fee conversation is different from yours, because we have had different experiences in the past.
Sheesh! There was more. I just can't think of it right now. I believe we got at least a year's worth session topics out of this one.
***And it went on for a couple of session for me... But very productive. Anxiety provoking, but productive.
Oh. And I paid him $90 when I left.
*** Yeah, mine got his way, too. But he was able to convince me that he was doing his "part" as far as the fees went (i.e. he was being ethical/moral). This is definately a "growth" topic. Sounds like you handled it really well.
poster:fallsfall
thread:471253
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050315/msgs/473196.html