The Empty Chair: Counseling Should Never Shame
Jan 6
I was working with a young person in group counseling recently. He’s very young, barely 18 years old, but already has a six-year history of using IV heroin. Attending group counseling has not been easy for him, mostly because the older clients keep pointing out his age, unintentionally minimizing their experience. I have a feeling they’ve "lived" more in those six years than most of us do in a lifetime. It's not how long we experience addiction: it's what happens that ages us.
In the group setting, he’s starting to open up. Talking about his issues is one of the most difficult issues for this person, and seeing more than three words at a time is progress. The thing is, because he’s just opening up, that means he’s experimenting, trying things out, and saying just enough to stay a little bit comfortable. That's a fancy way of using a lot of defense mechanisms. The rest of the group did what the rest of the group usually does, which was to challenge him on what he was saying or, even worse, what he was not saying. More than one group member has accused them of using defense mechanisms.
As the counselor in the session, I felt the same energy the rest of the group felt. I noticed how defensive and evasive they were; for a split second, my instinct to confront kicked in. At that point, I could've caused a lot of damage to this individual, and I could have rationalized it by thinking that I had a good reason to pierce his defenses openly. I only want the best for him, for all of them, and they aren't going to grow if they can't learn to be honest with themselves. This is what I experienced in early recovery, what I experienced in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, and what I've read in dozens of books about recovery.
Thing is, it's wrong., it's so damn wrong, and for a lot of reasons. As soon as I noticed that I was getting ready to challenge him openly in group and try to break down his walls, I remembered my early experiences in treatment. Heck, I’ve experienced this many times in personal therapy over the years. Thank goodness I was able to remember the shame I felt in those situations.
What came to me most clearly was a session in Inpatient treatment when I was in the Navy. We did a weekly session called “Psycho Drama,” and most of the other staff and patients loved it. It was a very invasive form of group counseling in which one person sat in a chair, and the other 15 or so patients formed a circle. The counselors sat outside the circle, asking questions and encouraging the rest of the members to keep pressing.
I admit I was a horrible patient. I broke virtually every rule and protocol while smugly acting like I was compliant. I smuggled in comic books, drank on weekend liberty after pouring out my Antabuse, and pretended to be the perfect patient. But when it was my turn in the chair, I decided to take it seriously. I started to talk about how I felt, what I was thinking, and even started to address how manipulative it was.
But it wasn’t good enough. For the next half-hour, the counselors had every member give me harsh feedback. I guess the goal was….yeah, I still don’t know what the goal of that crap is. The shame was deep, profound, and instructive. At that point, Recovery simply could not happen.
I can tell you what did happen, and I’m sure you can guess. From that moment on, I checked out. Even the idea of trust became nonexistent, so I good really good at going through the motions, checking all the boxes, and only saying what they wanted to hear. A week after completing the program, I went AWOL from my command for a month and was eventually discharged for “failure to rehabilitate.”
I don’t blame the counseling for my drug and alcohol use; they had nothing to do with my behavior. But they also gave me no reason at all to get real with myself and deal with the problem, at least not with them. Seven years later, when my tolerance was extremely high and my withdrawal equally deadly, I did get real. I also did everything I could to avoid Treatment, Counseling or anything that would have me sit in that f%^*#ing chair.
That young man might be struggling, but there’s no need to add to it. Sure, counseling at times is uncomfortable, even unpleasant. But it should never to confrontational to the point that a person is humiliated: in person or in public. There is clinically no such thing as “tearing down walls” or “smashing through” defenses. Anyone who thinks there is should probably take a look at their own defense mechanisms and rationalizations.
I simply asked him a few questions, intervened when members started to get too animated and did my best to create a scenario where he thought about his actions, not ours. No way was I going to allow even a symbolic chair to be in the middle of the room.
May that chair be forever empty…
