This seems like a really good community, and I hope this is a safe place. Maybe someone here will be able to give me some perspective on my experience. Last year I met a woman online in a recovery type forum. I was very emotionally vulnerable, and this community offered a safe place. This person seemed friendly and genuine and so when she contacted me by email I was receptive. In retrospect, I should have been more cautious. The emails back and forth became more frequent, and she asked for my phone number. Soon we were in daily contact.  She told me that she was an experienced EFT practitioner and asked me if she could use me as a "guinea pig", offering free EFT in order to come up with a series of scripts to use for this particular recovery community and in return I could write some testimonials for her EFT website. I didn't feel good about doing that, as I had picked up on some red flags in our conversations. Although she seemed nice....she was not an empathetic person, and she did all the talking...I did not feel that she listened, or really understood who I was. I checked into EFT, and that looked promising, and I did use it some on my own, but this friend insisted that do-it-yourself EFT was like a first aid kit, while EFT by her was the equivalent of brain surgery. Despite what she said, I still didn't feel comfortable giving her that much access to my inner life.

 She started an online forum of her own, after becoming a controversial figure in the original group, partly because she really pushed the EFT in an aggressive way. The original group actually split around these issues, with some members, including me, going on to her new forum. I became a moderator on that forum. Once on the inside, I got to know her better. I saw more red flags. I was contacted by several people who had had EFT sessions with her, and they both had bad experiences, feeling that she was unempathetic and pushy. Her target group is made up of people with multiple, deep childhood wounds. The stated purpose of the forum is for her to make a living via EFT with this target group. 

I finally realized that there was something terribly wrong and did a bit of a background check on this person. What I found didn't look very good to me. She has ten different websites, all designed around making money online with different ventures, EFT being one of them. After perusing those, I saw more evidence of a narcissistic type of personality. Her EFT training consists of one two day course. She claims that she can "cure" a molestation in 20 minutes, along with every other type of major trauma. Her listed mentors are all in the get rich quick end of relational marketing, and her website in that field compares potential website clients to food... to be trapped, hunted, or farmed.

 I think it's unethical for a person like this to target a specific group of people that are vulnerable and wounded, and to misrepresent herself as an expert in EFT. Isn't there some responsibility not to use a treatment modality like this primarily for financial gain and for a practitioner to disclose how much training they have had? It seems that most practitioners online have much more training, and don't have these narcissistic qualities. Is there anything that can be done to stop a person like this from hurting more people? Any recommendations on how I can recover from this experience?

I tried to talk to her about my concerns and have been banned from the community, as is anyone else who dares to speak up and ask questions.

blue butterfly

Hi Blue Butterfly

Welcome to the forum.  I am sorry to hear you have had such an unpleasant experience but am glad you still have trust in EFT!

One of the reasons Gary Craig set up his new certification programme was because of hearing stories like this, and sadly there is not alot we can do to stop people claiming to be experts.  Also it is possible for people to be expert in the understanding of how to apply EFT but still seem unempathetic. Firstly you can check if this individual is listed as a practitioner on Garys site and let him know if she is via the complaints procedure.  If she has only done a 2 day introduction to EFT then this is unlikely.  Whilst EFT has impressive results for issues, generally simple issues, working with extreme trauma takes alot of experience and not just in EFT.

Much of the success of EFT in a therapuetic relationship is with the rapport between therapist and client, especially when working with these delicate issues.

It sounds like you had a great many clues and perhaps this might be a valuable lesson for you.  When we have suffered childhood trauma its often hard to trust ourselves and we find we do what 'we are told'.  Learning that we do have instinct and intuition about people is a good thing, and in many cases we have even more!

There are some very important things to remember when working with a therapist and these articles my be of help to you and I personaly include this information on my own website.  It is important that you get the opportunity to chat to your chosen therapist or at least have a no obligation first session so that you know they are the right fit for you.

Here is an article written by Pat Carrington about how to do this.  Sadly we cannot stop people from behaving in this way and many people have been put off EFT because of their bad experiences.  Trust your instincts!

By Patricia Carrington, PhD, EFT Master

I have already written about ways to locate EFT practitioners who may be technically appropriate for you with respect to their locations, specialties etc., but searching for a suitable EFT therapist is similar to searching for an appropriate physician, dentist, attorney, massage therapist or any other trained person who meets your needs.  It is not always easy to discover the right person and there are no blanket rules for doing so.  However, if you keep the following points in mind this should make the process easier and more satisfactory for you.

Initial Contact With The EFT Practitioner

You will usually want to speak with or exchange detailed emails with an EFT practitioner you are considering before making an appointment to start working with him or her.  During this initial contact you can find out certain facts about this person's background, training in EFT (or training in any specialty that your condition requires), fees, and other details of their practice which are essential for you to know. 

Actually, the responsibility for finding out as much as you can about any particular EFT practitioner is yours.  There is some "homework" you would be wise to do before contacting the person you have identified as a possible EFT practitioner for you.

One way to start this "homework" is to go to Gary's web site and enter a search for that therapist by name.  If they have published one or more articles in Gary's newsletter in the past this search will bring up these articles.  Reading what a practitioner writes about their own EFT work can be a valuable way to get an idea of the style and therapeutic approach of any practitioner.  Practitioners differ markedly in the way they handle EFT and in the way they handle a people.  A practitioner suitable for one person is not necessarily the right one for the next person.  By reading descriptions of their own cases or observations you can learn a great deal about a practitioner.  This is the reason why Gary insists that all of us EFT Masters list at least three articles which have appeared on his website on the page describing our work.  Reading these articles, people can learn a great deal more about us and our personal style of delivering EFT.

If you search for articles by a practitioner, it is important to keep in mind that there are many fine EFT therapist who have never written an article about EFT -- they may not be particularly skilled at writing but be great at helping people, or they may simply not have reported their EFT work anywhere where it would be accessible to you.  What you are doing when you search for such an article is simply finding out whether this valuable source of information is available to you in this case.

Initial Contact With A Practitioner

You will want to speak with or at least exchange emails with an EFT practitioner whom you are considering working with before making an appointment to start with them.  In this first contact you can find out certain facts about their background, training in their field of specialty (if this is relevant for you), training and experience with EFT, fees, and other details of their practice which will be important for you to know.  If the practitioner has a web site, some of these details will be given there, but you will want to make certain special inquiries by phone or e-mail because you will need to know more about them than bare facts alone can supply. 

First is the question of professional degrees.  How important are they?  The fact is that these degrees alone, while essential if you have serious emotional problems that require expert clinical attention, cannot tell you whether or not this person will be an effective therapist for you.  It is only YOU who will know this and your decision will be on a "gut level".  If you respond positively to a practitioner during your initial contact with them and feel that they are a person whom you can trust, then you can feel confident in scheduling a trial session with them.

An initial "trial" (paid for) session with a practitioner whom you are seriously considering working with is an excellent means of finding out whether they are right for you.  You are entirely within your rights to let a practitioner know that you want to schedule such a trial session.  You will notice that a number of the practitioners on Gary's list of EFT trained practitioners offer a free 20 minute exploratory discussion by telephone to help you decide this.  That can be very useful if it is available. However, a number of practitioners do not offer this and this fact does not necessarily make them less competent or useful to you. They may simply be too heavily booked to take that time.  The best plan in the latter case is to schedule a trial paid session with a prospective EFT practitioner and see how that works out.  It is unlikely that even if you decide not to work with that practitioner in the future, that this session will have been wasted.  You may well accomplish something of real value to you during the time spent with that person, particularly since you are working with such a rapid technique as EFT.

What you really want to find out in this session is whether the EFT practitioner is a perceptive, caring person with whom you will feel comfortable sharing your personal problems, and how skilled they are at helping you zero in on core issues. 

Hope this helps

Gill

Hi Blue Butterfly,

It's sad you and others have had this experience.  Sadly, there are many like this lady.  If she uses the word "EFT" on her website, then you may wish to report it to Gary Craig, as it is his registered trademark, and she is giving it a bad name.

She is also harming many who would give up EFT on multi-aspected issues when the 20-minute-miracle does not occur, as it rarely ever does. 

I hope you discover many happy experiences with EFT now. 

I hope you recognize that in every profession there are people who are only in it for money, inept and/or scoundrels. Unfortunately, EFT is no different and people may have exploitation as their primary motive. For the majority of practitioners it is just the opposite and they are wonderful and caring individuals. I would guess that many of them have done pro bono work. Anyone who can't listen carefully or isn't empathetic is not going to be a very effective practitioner. It is unfortunate the experience you have had. I myself would tap it away and consider the possibility of the ban as a positive thing. There are EFT communities that are solid and genuine and you will know them when you come across them. Welcome to this forum.

 Thank you so much for responding to my post. All three of the answers here have helped me to process this experience, and to reframe my understanding of EFT within a more positive context. Thank you so much.

 blue butterfly