They have a powerful wish to believe that there is a way out of their pain, that they are on the right track, and that the investment of time, emotional energy, and money they are making in therapy was wise and effective. Patients undergoing so-called memory recovery therapy often reported at the time that it was helping them, only to realize later that they had been getting worse. Read their stories on this web site. Just because patients say that therapy is helping doesn't prove that it really is. I believe my patients are improving.
Psychotherapists are no different.
Psychotherapists administering memory recovery therapy believed at the time that their patients were improving, but they were wrong. Subsequent research has shown that memory recovery therapy increases the rate of suicidal ideation, hospitalization, self-mutilation, and divorce. A therapist's belief that patients are improving doesn't prove that they actually are. There is proof that my patients have improved over time. Improvement with the passage of time does not prove that therapy caused the improvement.