This is a really well written description of a really healthy interchange in a therapy “session” on the phone. Also, I myself find that sometimes I feel more useful to my patients on the phone than in person. This is also a great response to a patient in crisis reaching out for help from the only healthy “mothering” figure she has. This blog also reminds me on a separate topic that isn’t connected to the blog post, that therapists sometimes pull away when a patient “needs” them more between sessions. There are no rules that apply except healthy flexible boundaries, neither rigid nor too loose; you can feel the firm boundaries that always help patients as well as caring and being “involved” with the patient’s emotional crisis, so she doesn’t have to suffer alone…