At our individual session, I asked Robert: “How can I help you today?” He told me that he was very depressed and that the treatment wasn’t working. When I asked him why he thought so, he said that except for the time he comes for therapy or when he volunteers at the local library, a few hours a week, he spends the rest of the day alone, in bed, rocking himself. I was shocked. Knowing that he was on many medications a day, I thought– something is very wrong here.   The purpose of psychotropic medication is to help the patient to function; this man was clearly not functioning. I thought that he was over-medicated but withheld criticism of his psychiatrist and decided that I must call her. I clearly told him:” You must get out of bed before noon”. Perhaps, he needed hospitalization, I said to him. At the very least, he would not be allowed to stay in bed all day long. “No”, he said.” I’m not going into a psychiatric hospital”.  Perhaps, he could be better served at a day hospital where he could go home at night.  He wouldn’t hear of it.                                                                                                   It was then that I had stepped on a landmine; I had the audacity to question his inability to work, even at the most stress- free of jobs.  This line of questioning irked him very much and he angrily said to me:” My psychiatrist says I can’t work”. I thought;” but she wants you join a dating service, although she doesn’t think you’re capable of work. This makes no sense”. Apparently, I had entered into sacred territory. Robert was afraid of dating but couldn’t tell his psychiatrist to back off at the same time they were both in agreement that he was too fragile to work.  In questioning his fragility, I offended him but as it turned out, I offended his psychiatrist as well.  The conjoint treatment morphed into the worst case scenario, where the group member is caught in the middle, forced to choose between warring parents. I had lost respect for his psychiatrist’s judgment. When we spoke on the phone, I was taken aback to hear that she had no respect for mine either and I realized that Robert’s group treatment was in jeopardy.

I had placed a phone message with her answering service. When she called me back, I felt an icy chill shoot through the phone line. She wanted to know if I told Robert that I thought he was over-medicated. By the tone of her voice, I knew that she was furious that I had questioned her professional judgment. Quite frankly, I didn’t remember if I had actually said those words but I knew that I had thought it and now knew that we were on the verge of becoming enemies. I tried to shift the directions of the conversation by saying that I was worried about Robert’s lying in bed rocking all day. She told me that she would be speaking with him the next day and that they would discuss it. When I asked her to call me after their conversation, she responded ominously;” Only if I need to”. Ouch! I got the unspoken message that she no longer considered me her ally in this case. My suspicions were confirmed about one hour later when Robert called to say that he was dropping out of group.