Clients don’t just bring their problems into the therapy room — they bring their patterns. Over time, those patterns can subtly reshape the roles we play as therapists. Without realising it, we may find ourselves cast as a client’s idealised parent, their disappointing partner, or their rebellious child. These shifts are often unconscious, emotionally charged, and ethically complex. And when they happen, they challenge not only the therapeutic frame but also the therapist’s sense of clarity and stability.

This video bundle brings together two of the field’s most respected voices — Dr Gwen Adshead and Kathy Steele — for a sophisticated exploration of role confusion and boundary crossings in therapeutic practice. Dr Adshead draws on her background in forensic psychiatry and attachment theory to examine the unconscious pulls therapists face when clients project familial roles onto them. Kathy Steele brings her practical, trauma-informed lens to the question of boundary flexibility, guiding us through the real-time decisions that therapists make every day: when to allow more access, when to hold the line, and how to manage the countertransference that colours both.

Whether you’re working with high-dependency clients, managing ethical ambiguity, or simply trying to stay centred in the face of strong relational dynamics, this bundle offers theory, tools, and clinical wisdom you can apply immediately.

What’s Included:

• Partner, Parent, Child: The Many Expected Roles of a Therapist — Dr Gwen Adshead (3 CPD / 3 CE)

• Decision Making About Boundaries — Kathy Steele (3 CPD / 3 CE)

Who It’s For:

• Therapists experiencing blurred roles or power dynamics in clinical work

• Practitioners supporting clients with complex trauma or attachment histories

• Clinicians who want to refine their boundary-setting skills without becoming rigid

What You Will Learn:

• How unconscious attachment dynamics shape the roles clients assign to therapists

• Key distinctions between boundary pushes, misdemeanours, and violations

• Practical tools for assessing when boundary flexibility is appropriate — and when it’s not

• How to manage countertransference responses like guilt, over-identification, or rescue fantasies

• Techniques for reasserting structure without rupturing therapeutic rapport

Course 1

Partner, Parent, Child – the many expected roles of a Therapist:

Exploring boundaries in therapeutic practice: Video Course

Dr Gwen Adshead

CPD/CE credits: 3

Since Freud started his talking technique with clients over 100 years ago, it has been recognised that unconscious dynamics can pull therapists out of their therapeutic role and into roles that may reflect a person or relationship of significance to the client’s past. Recent studies have also demonstrated how attachment patterns repeat across different relationships. Some clients may present as victims who are especially needy for affirmation and unconditional support, while others may present in more dismissing and avoidant ways, even to the point of denigrating the therapy that they have sought. Depending on the stage of the therapeutic relationship – therapists may find themselves being implicitly asked to play the role of parent, partner of child – sometimes all at the same time – creating a multitude of challenges for us as therapists.

At this intellectually stimulating and therapeutically oriented seminar, Dr Adshead draws on Attachment Theory tenets, transactional analysis and a relational comprehension of the therapeutic alliance to discuss:

• When do such demands qualify as potential boundary violations and how we can best handle such situations
• What shape or form such boundary trespasses can take, including boundary pushes, misdemeanours and violations
• How therapist roles as peers, parents and partners manifest in clinical settings and the dynamics of these relationships
• When such attachment stances on the part of the client have the power to generate a corresponding emotional response in the therapist, which may then result in actions that unconsciously replicate past dynamics in the client’s life
• How attachment ‘fit’ between client and therapist may also make therapists thoughtful about the unconscious pull to re-enact past toxic patterns from their own lives in therapeutic relationships, with potentially harmful results for their work

Dr Adhead will use case examples, draw on published literature and also on her own experience of assessing health-care professionals who have breached professional boundaries. She will focus on the roles that the therapist is called on to play – the dynamics and pitfalls of these will be discussed and explained.

Course 2

Decision Making about Boundaries

Kathy Steele

CPD hours: 3 / CE credits: 2.75

This session equips participants to discern clients amenable to flexible boundaries and grasp the fluidity of these limits. A deep understanding of countertransference becomes crucial, unraveling the complex interplay between therapists’ emotional responses and the calibration of boundaries.

The discourse extends beyond initial boundary establishment, delving into the delicate art of boundary reaffirmation amid treatment enactments. As therapists, we encounter the intricate task of reinstating limits once relaxed, necessitating finesse in maintaining therapeutic rapport while reinstating necessary boundaries.

In essence, the complex process of delineating therapeutic boundaries challenges therapists on multiple levels. Grasping our clients’ needs for adaptable boundaries, navigating the sway of countertransference, and deftly re-establishing boundaries demand keen discernment into client dynamics and therapists’ introspection. Negotiating these complexities is essential not only to maintain therapeutic efficacy but also to uphold the ethical and professional fabric of the therapeutic relationship.

• How do we decide whether to use email, texts or phone calls outside of therapy?
• When should we increase sessions in length or frequency?
• And when do these boundaries need to be limited?

Participants will learn which clients benefit from some flexibility and which do not. We will also explore countertransference issues of caretaking, rescue, guilt and urgency that may influence the decision -making process of the therapist regarding boundaries. 

Overall Programme Learning Objectives for two sessions:

• Discuss how therapist roles as peers, parents and partners manifest in clinical settings and the dynamics of these relationships
• Explain when such attachment stances on the part of the client have the power to generate a corresponding emotional response in the therapist, which may then result in actions that unconsciously replicate past dynamics in the client’s life
• Discuss how attachment ‘fit’ between client and therapist may also make therapists thoughtful about the unconscious pull to re-enact past toxic patterns from their own lives in therapeutic relationships, with potentially harmful results for their work
• Identify which clients might benefit from boundary flexibility, and what types of boundaries can be altered, and how countertransference can affect their decisions about boundaries
• Discuss how to re-assert boundaries within therapeutic settings

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