TPC-Journal-V5-Issue1

The Professional Counselor /Volume 5, Issue 1 30 a session. Waldman found that nine of the participants believed that their emotional tears were helpful in facilitating the therapeutic process. In contrast, one participant reported that emotional crying was the result of personal unresolved issues, which was not helpful to the client. With this in mind, it is possible that counselors’ crying can be the result of the counselor’s own struggles and countertransference. In this instance, objectivity could be lost and the therapeutic relationship hindered. Therefore, counselors might perceive crying as nontherapeutic and even unethical. Nevertheless, Waldman (1995) concluded that crying with clients enhanced the counselor – client connection and facilitated the client’s work in session. Counselman (1997) conducted a case study exploring the therapeutic effectiveness of a counselor crying in session with a client. She reported on her work with a couple in which the wife was dying of cancer. After several sessions of marriage counseling relating to an affair by the husband, the author described crying when the couple disclosed that the wife’s breast cancer had recurred. Counselman (1997) admitted that her greatest fear was that she would not be able to stop crying and presumably might be viewed as unprofessional. However, she decided that her first priority was to be fully present with the couple, even if this meant crying with them in session. She reported that her willingness to share her emotions with this couple deepened the therapeutic relationship and facilitated the couple’s counseling goals all the way to her client’s death. She also indicated that this self-exposure “was healing for me in the way our work as counselors often is” (p. 237). Corey (2001) suggested, “If you use your own feelings as a way of understanding yourself, your client, and the relationship between the two of you, these feelings can be a positive and healing force” (p. 108). Men in our society have consistently been taught not to cry and to downplay emotions. Counselors who find themselves on the verge of emotional tears may find the experience more profitable if they have had access to images that portrayed this behavior as acceptable and natural rather than a shameful and weak demonstration of emotions, especially for male counselors (Hoover-Dempsey, Plas, & Wallston, 1986). Given that much therapeutic work is dedicated to helping clients express their deepest feelings, the lack of research regarding counselors’ tearing up in session lends significance to the study of professionals who encounter emotionally charged situations and their emotional availability to respond in authentic ways without diminishing their credibility. Methods Study Design The present study was informed by life-world phenomenology (Ashworth, 2003) in order to gain information and to give voice to the lived experiences of counselors around the issue of intense emotional experiences in the counseling situation, which sometimes includes crying. A phenomenological approach with oral responses was consistent with the goals of the study and sensitive to the needs of the participants. Phenomenological research originated from Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology philosophy and aims to clarify a person’s lived experience through everyday life situations (Giorgi & Giorgi, 2008). The root of phenomenology is that of intentionality, which allows objects to appear as phenomena because the self and the world are inseparable components of meaning. The idea is to suspend all presuppositions and biases and closely capture an experience within the context that the experience takes place. This is attempted through the three steps of epoche, phenomenological reduction and imaginative variation (Willig, 2001). Participants and Setting Potential participants were contacted either by email or in person and asked to volunteer for a brief interview concerning crying with clients while in a session. The criteria for inclusion were based on licensure, certification and experience, as well as the ability to provide full descriptions of one’s personal experiences of