Do I Have to Tell My Patients I’m Blind?

Abstract

Self-disclosure has been discussed from many different perspectives. In this article, I explore yet another dimension of this expanding area of our literature: the disclosure of a therapist’s disability. I describe my own conflicts over how to talk about my visual impairment with patients—the result of a degenerative eye disease—in a way that respects the patient’s right not to know something about me. Using a clinical vignette, I describe how my ambivalence over this disclosure became enacted in my work with a college student, and how the eventual disclosure of my vision led to a greater establishment of intimacy in the therapy, and a generative experience that continues to ripple through my current work.

Keywords:

• blind
• disability
• intimacy
• self-disclosure
• visually impaired

Acknowledgments

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2015 annual International Association for Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy conference in Toronto, Canada.

Notes

¹ In my view, the minority model of disability (Olkin, 1999) tries to address social and political inequities and prejudice, but it does so in ways that require persons with disabilities to penetrate the will of others to change social views, or risk being penetrated and impinged upon themselves as they encounter physical, city-planning, social, employment, and political barriers.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ari S. Pizer

Ari Pizer, MA, MMT, is a doctoral candidate at Widener University’s Institute for Graduate Clinical Psychology. He is a 2015 Division 39 Graduate Student Scholar. He is a board member of the Philadelphia Society for Psychoanalytic Psychology (PSPP), editor of PSPP’s Currents Newsletter, and co-chair of the Division 39 Wiki Project with Dr. Lewis Aron. His dissertation topic concerns the treatment of people with physical disabilities from a relational psychoanalytic perspective. Before entering psychology, he completed a Bachelor of Music in jazz performance and a Master’s degree in Music Therapy.