A common myth that perpetrates in our society when it comes to mental health professionals is that, ‘He/She is a therapist, so they can handle everything’, ‘If a therapist himself is seeking therapy how can they help us?’ Professionals are inclined to put clients’ interests before everything else, but at the same time it is essential they indulge in self care and seek professional help when the need be. If one does not face, their own concerns regularly, it limits their ability to be an effective Therapist.

How Therapy Helps a Therapist Become More Self Aware?
As a therapist, more than anything we have learned in school/university or the training field, we draw from our own memory of working with our own therapist & supervisors and the learnings we got from that. We are trained to first resolve our own issues and then facilitate the client’s journey in order to be more effective.
Training period of any mental health professional, doing self-work, before entering the professional field is essential.
When people are in therapy, their relationship to their own problems changes. Having personal problems doesn’t have to be a negative, because then you have an understanding and sense of self and can integrate that into what a client is going through.
Therapy makes you more self- aware of things like compassion fatigue and boundaries. When you’re more self-aware, you have more room for empathy because you’re giving the same thing to your clients that you just gave to yourself.
Being a clinician doesn’t mean we’re not human or err. We go through things just as much as the next person. That’d be like a mechanic saying, ‘I don’t believe in oil changes. Those don’t work.’

Talking about our own therapy
Standefer, a mental health professional says that whenever she shares with students or counsellors-in-training that she still sees a therapist, she experiences a “vulnerability flash.”
We have to get past these ideas that someone needs therapy because they’re inexperienced or having a problem. We need therapy because we’re human and this is complicated work.
Therapists have hard jobs. They hear about difficult, sometimes traumatic experiences each day, as their clients share their issues. They too occasionally have things they would like to work through.
You might wonder, however: Do therapists just know how to handle their issues, based on their training?
Being trained to deal with mental health issues, does not mean therapists do not sometimes need help themselves. In fact, the nature of their job places them at higher risk for emotional distress and burnouts. In short, therapists often need just as much — if not more — support than the average person.

Benefits of Therapy for Therapists
⦁ Support from a colleague who understands – The demands of a therapist’s job are unique and the nature of the work tends to be isolating. Working with a professional who fully understands the particular challenges of the job is a great opportunity for support and comfort. It can also be beneficial for many to seek help from a therapist with a similar background.
⦁ Neutral feedback – Sometimes therapists spend so much time thinking about other people’s problems that they lack the mental energy or motivation to examine their own. Simply put, it can feel overwhelming too deal with own issues. Having someone neutral & objective can help therapists maintain good insight and self-care.
⦁ Prevent Burnout – As therapists, we often give a lot of ourselves to our clients, which can cause us to feel depleted. Burnout can occur when therapists feel too depleted, and it can cause us to become apathetic and less productive. Burnout can lead to poor quality of service for our clients, and the tendency to frequently call out of work. Therapy is an important part of self-care that can prevent and alleviate burnout for many mental health professionals.
⦁ Opportunity to deal with personal problems – Because therapists have to stay so buttoned up at work, therapy gives them a dedicated time and space to manage their own issues, just like their clients get from them. Sometimes, just setting aside the time to do so, can make all the difference. Therapy is a remarkably rewarding job, but the aspects that make it so rewarding can also make it incredibly draining. Therapists sometimes ⦁ need therapy, too, and there should be no shame in that.
In addition, it also argued that personal therapy helps in destigmatizing going to a therapist. When a client understands that the therapist also attends personal therapeutic sessions, it helps in the development of a stronger alliance and normalizes the uncertain feelings of the client.
‘It is essential to fill your glass before facilitating the other fill theirs’