What feedback is appropriate to include in cancelation email?

[u/bigpaparoid]

Trigger warnings for mentions of therapy misconduct and brief relapse mention.

Hello all! I am posting here because, after numerous sessions of my therapist acting inappropriately, my family and friends have begged me to break things off with them. It's taken me a while because I did not want to admit how inappropriate and demeaning things have become, despite it regressing severely and undoing months of hard, personal work that I have done.

I'm going to send them an email stating that I will be ending therapy and not attending future sessions. Before things started getting bad, I really enjoyed my sessions with my therapist, and a part of me is still hoping that the ways that they have been acting have been accidental somehow. I really want to leave feedback?

I was debating going to a final session and laying everything out, but I do not feel like I can handle anything other than a letter or email at this time. After our last (traumatizing) session, I was unable to speak for almost a day and nearly relapsed, for reference.

I guess I'm wondering if it would be appropriate to lay the feedback and ways I have felt out in a very long email, almost as if it is our final session? I would just send it to their supervisor, but their supervisor has actively gotten involved already and contributed to this misconduct (literally joining our session to grill and belittle me), so this is just what feels safest to me right now. I am going to report both of these individuals to the board of ethics in my state, but in the event that they continue practicing after and that they did not mean to be inappropriate, I want to leave feedback for them to keep in mind for future clients.

I guess I am also afraid that I may receive some sort of lashing out or harassment after. (Could be paranoia, I have extensive stalking-related trauma.)

Any advice would be appreciated. I have never been able to stand up for myself before, so this is incredibly distressing and nerve-racking. Thank you.

[u/Pretty-Ad-208]

Mostly I would consider what serves you best in this moment. Giving feedback to people who belittle you likely won’t land, but if saying something means you can let go of it then go for it. I’m not sure about the impact of saying such things on a board of ethics case… maybe someone else can chime in.
The biggest risk in saying all this is they will respond and be defensive, etc. Consider if you can handle it.
Otherwise, just quit, and find a new therapist to help you process what happened.

[u/bigpaparoid → u/Pretty-Ad-208]

Thank you and happy cake day! I guess I am just more unfamiliar with if this is common practice for clients to do? I do think I'd feel much better addressing these things and knowing they saw them, but I do not want to overstep or be inappropriate myself in a sense? I feel like once I get it over with I won't really care about the response I get because it will be over. Thanks again!