How to Handle Feelings for Your Therapist

If you've developed romantic feelings for your therapist, you're not alone. In fact, it's a common occurrence that professionals are trained to handle. It's understandable, too: Therapy is an intimate process that offers three key qualities of a healthy relationship: accessibility, responsiveness, and emotional engagement. Add to that the safety and acceptance inherent in this setting, and your therapist can seem very attractive indeed, especially if you're not getting these things elsewhere in your life. Here's what to do if you think you're falling in love with your therapist.

Acknowledge Your Feelings

First, recognize that you are not crazy or shameful for crushing on your therapist. It's so common that psychoanalytic literature actually has a term for this phenomenon: transference, The term was coined by psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud in his Studies on Hysteria, published in 1895.

Transference is most often thought of in terms of romantic or sexual feelings, but it can involve nearly any emotion, from anger and hatred to admiration and dependence—anything you feel or have felt toward a significant other. For example, you might subconsciously transfer your feelings toward your parent to your therapist.

After you realize that transference is very common and not shameful, talk about your feelings with your therapist. Professing your love (or whatever emotion you're feeling) may be easier said than done, but it can help your therapist understand your issues and help you get the most out of your therapy.

What It Means for You

Transference is no reason to discontinue therapy, as long as you work to understand your feelings and have no intention of acting on them. In fact, a skilled practitioner will work through them with you to gain insight into your underlying wants, needs, motivations, and fears. This understanding can ultimately nudge you toward recovery and health.

For example, a therapist might notice that falling in love with unavailable people is a recurrent, painful pattern in your life and then help you work toward change. Or, perhaps you've never experienced warmth and acceptance, both of which are inherent in the therapist-client relationship. As your therapist helps you understand why you find these feelings so intoxicating, you will likely experience personal growth.

How Will Your Therapist Handle It?

An ethical, well-trained therapist will be open and welcoming to a discussion about your feelings. Therapy is a safe place to discuss interpersonal processes, and a lot of personal growth can occur from doing so. Your therapist should handle this news gracefully and explore it with you.

For example, they might reflect what you've told them and ask for clarification: “It sounds like you are concerned about feeling _____ toward me. Tell me what you are experiencing right now.” They might then work with you to redirect those emotions back to the person for which you originally felt them.

Of course, if your feelings make your therapist uncomfortable or might otherwise impede your treatment, you might be referred to another practitioner.

Ethical Considerations

Romantic relationships are inappropriate between therapist and client, and it is up to your therapist to uphold this boundary.

By sharing your emotional experiences and secrets with your therapist, you are being vulnerable. That's crucial to the process—but taking advantage of your vulnerability and reciprocating in any way is a clear ethical violation. If this happens, end your professional relationship and consider reporting the therapist to their state board.