Friendships are essential relationships in our lives. Friends wander through life with you, sharing moments of joy and sadness, success and failure, love and heartbreak. There is no relationship like a friendship, as you may choose to share thoughts you wouldn’t even tell your significant other. Some friends you only have in your life for a short period of time. These friends served a purpose in your life, helping you transition to another life stage where you will gain different friendships to accompany you through new life experiences. Some friends are life-long, in that they have seen you overcome difficult circumstances, grow and change.

Yet, not all friends are equal. You may have assigned each friend a role, such as, the one you party with, or the one you go to for brutal honesty. There are the friends you trust to accept you unconditionally, and the ones you wouldn’t dare to share your inner feelings with because you don’t know how they’d react… Maybe you’ve learned this lesson the hard way and know some friends just can’t hold your thoughts and feelings like others can.

When you face hardships in your life, you may ask yourself “Who can I go to with this?” You want to talk to someone about your problems and I believe an equally important question to ask yourself is, “ What kind of response do I want in return?” Do you want someone to listen to you, provide advice, or commiserate? It is important to understand what your emotional needs are, so that you can find ways to receive that support and feel encouraged to take on life’s challenges.

There are differences between going to your friends with problems and seeking professional help from a therapist. It may be helpful to know these differences if there comes a point in your life that your emotional support needs are not being fulfilled by friendships, or even your intimate relationships. Therapy is meant to be a supportive and nonjudgmental space where you explore challenging life events, increase your self-awareness and find your own solutions that help you move to a happier and healthier mind space. When the help you need is beyond some of your inner circle, it may be time to consider a therapist for your problems, and not your friends.

Therapists can handle whatever “it” is.

Difficult life events may lead to symptoms of stress, depression, anxiety and even trauma. While friends can be there for us in supportive and meaningful ways, they are not trained mental health professionals. The support and treatment that help relieve such symptoms can be found within a therapeutic relationship, where the person you confide in has the knowledge and skills to help you heal, grow, and change. In the same way you would not go to a friend with a gushing physical wound (unless for some reason they were equipped to handle such an emergency), emotional and mental wounds need the attention of a mental health professional.

If you’ve ever felt you like your problems were too big for your family and friends to handle, it may benefit you to have a therapist that understands what you are going through and can help you move past it.

The therapy office is a space just for you.

Sometimes you’ll go to a friend needing them to listen and be there just for you. About 10 or 15 minutes in (maybe even shorter), your friend might tell you about the time something similar happened to them, or they “ just can’t listen right now” because they’ve got their own problem. Your friends may try to “hold space” for you, but they might not always have the capacity to do so.

If you’ve never heard the therapeutic phrase “hold space”, this could be the support you’ve needed without ever having known the expression. Visualize an empty room, where you bring in your life stressors in the form of boxes. You come in and no matter how many or how big the boxes are, you are able to unpack these stressors with as much space as you need. Therapists provide a physical and metaphorical space for you to share what’s on your mind, and they will receive you with compassion, empathy and non-judgemental support. There is enough room for you to sort through all your “stuff” and to focus on you and you alone.

Therapists are Team YOU.

It can be hard for your friends to hold their opinions about what happens in your life. They typically care about you and don’t want to see you get hurt. This can lead to friends attempting to solve your problems for you. Although this seems supportive and like they are on Team You, friends can sometimes provide unwarranted advice or opinions that are biased for one reason or another. Instead, it would be nice if your friend asked you, “ What do you think you should do?”

A therapist can help you sort through all of the influences you’ve had in your life in order to distinguish what it is you truly want. Therapy is a place to find answers, however, they won’t be coming from your therapist. Your therapist will listen in an attempt to understand you, and reflect what you’ve presented so that you can gain a deeper sense of self-awareness. What is more Team You than yourself? Therapists can help you get there.

Let’s keep this between us.

“Can I trust you with this?” Famous last words before a 7th grade friend of mine spread my personal thoughts to others like wildfire. Well, say you’re not in 7th grade and you’re just an adult. You’re an adult with adult friends that sometimes act like 7th graders and have a hard time keeping private information to themselves. You need someone who you can trust to hold precious information private and that's what therapists will do.

The therapeutic relationship is confidential in nature. Your most intimate thoughts, feelings and experiences are kept between you and your therapist. Keeping confidentiality is our duty and your right as a client. The only times a therapist will break confidentiality is if we feel your life, or someone else’s is in danger (e.g., suicidality, homicidality, child/elder/dependent abuse). When you come into a therapy to share experiences that make you feel ashamed, embarrassed, upset, or devastated… not only will your therapist help you release those feelings, but they will hold that information in the utmost confidence.

Friendships are wonderful and complicated relationships; and like in any relationship, it is important to understand whether each of you are able to meet each other's needs. Knowing who you can go to, and for what, will help ensure you are not left alone with too much to handle. You are not alone. And whether that support is from a friend or a therapist, I hope the information above encourages you to find the help you deserve.