A Shining Affliction: A Story of Harm and Healing in Psychotherapy Book

When I first started the book, I was a little bit afraid it would be like one of these Tory Hayden books, you know, a disturbed, tortured little child without any hope for its furure starts seeing a therapist(the shining hero) and she manages to do the impossible, changes the childs life from hopeless to perfect. Buy no, it was not at all like that!
The relationship between client and therapist is beautifully described and this was one of the most interesting subjects for me. Being a therapist myself, I always thought a lot about the client-therapist relationship and I always considered it the most important and the most challenging aspect in therapy. I would even go that far and say, the relationship, which is strongly connected to the therapists personality is more important than her education.
LOve seems to be a very central thing in therapy and contrarily to the classical psychoanalysis, I absolutely believe a therapist has to love her clients in a certain way, I also believe it is important to show your own feelings, limmited, of course.
For these reasons I enjoyed very much Annie Rogers' affectionate describtion of her work.

But the point which really blew me away, was when it turned out, she had severe problems herself, but she still was able to work and keep the relationship to Ben.

Something similar happened to me, while working with (probably far too many) female clients who almost all have been victims of severe sexual abuse in their childhood. At one point I couldn't cope anymore and got panic attacks. I stopped working and lost every confidence in myself,it was like my whole life had come to an end and I had lost my identity.

It was such an affirmation to read about Annie, how she carried on with her work, how determined she was not to give up.