Voice and Vision in Psychotherapy

Abstract

Although telephone therapy has been generally employed by therapists and patients for many years, there has been little examination of its use compared to other remote therapies. When COVID-19 required remote therapy only, a number of patients chose to continue therapy via voice-only and without a visual component. This paper describes how voice-only therapy in the experience of one patient profoundly affected the treatment and outcome of a long-term therapeutic interaction. For this patient, her lifelong fear of being looked at or being seen at all emerged in our work, and we were able to uncover the history of her severe agoraphobic and traumatic reactions to being looked at by others.

Keywords:

• Anxiety
• attachment
• defense mechanisms
• depression
• female psychology
• teletherapy