January 15, 1999

As a child psychiatrist and a parent who had a child that went through the "recovered memory" nightmare, I want to comment briefly on some of the issues discussed in your recent article about informed consent. While my own family was reunited (partly through the work of a very good psychotherapist), there are tens of thousands of families that have been torn apart by bad therapy and are still not reunited.

Although I personally do not support the informed consent for psychotherapy legislation, I have met and talked with many families who have been, and still are, the victims of what must be considered an iatrogenic disorder. During the period when this bad therapy was occurring, the professional associations did little to call attention to the problems involved in this treatment. In fact, some members benefited greatly by using inappropriate methods and creating images of abuse when none had occurred. It was only the courts, through the remedy of people who had been mistreated suing their therapists, that led to more therapist caution.

The consent for psychotherapy legislation is an understandable reaction of families that have been destroyed by therapy and, most importantly, have been unable to find a way to undo the damage. Many of these parents have not been able to talk with their children for years; as the parents grow older and die, there is a terrible sense of unresolved wrong.

The impetus for the informed consent to psychotherapy legislation will fade when the profession is willing to face up to the tragedy of these families, acknowledge what has happened, and figure out a way to help them reestablish more normal relationships.

Saul Wasserman, M.D.
San Jose, Calif.