Therapist meeting (virtually) from a different location than usual

I'm curious to opinions on this. My T and I have been doing therapy virtually since like the second week of the pandemic. He normally goes to his regular office to hold sessions--he says it's easier for him to focus there vs. being at home. It also feels more comfortable to me because it's a space I'm used to.

However, sometimes he "meets" with me from his house for various reasons. This was jarring to me the first time, though I think maybe he warned me in advance? That time, and anytime he was meeting from home for months after that was in his home office, which was nondescript, could just see blank walls, a lamp, and blinds. I got used to it.

Then one time a couple months ago, he was having Wifi issues and met with me from what I think may have been his bedroom (based on the wall of closets behind him. That time, I still couldn't see much, so I adapted. More recently, he's met me from there at times, but facing a different direction so that I could see what looked to be photos on the wall in the distance, plus a painting on one side. And what looked to be the footboard of a bed. The first time, it was very distracting because I was trying to see if I could make out the photos and attempting to figure out what the painting was of--part of me wanted to ask him, but I was afraid it would be prying or he'd say, "Oh my wife painted that" or something. (I have asked about an item or two in his professional office before, but that seems different). I've gotten more used to it.

Oh, and once recently he was in my D's T's office because they were doing work in his office, which was also confusing.

So I never know where he will be when he pops up on Zoom. Part of me feels it would help to know in advance where he'll be, just to prepare myself. (He always texts me the Zoom code just before session, so it seems he could have theoretically thrown in there "at home: code is....", where maybe if he said nothing, he's at office).

But I feel weird asking that, like I feel it shouldn't matter? But when I go see him in person, I *do* know where he'll be. And he's even warned me walking back from the waiting room that he got a new chair, things like that.

Would anyone else want to know? Would it be weird to ask? I mean, I know I could theoretically ask anything, that he could always decline. But I also feel like if I ask, then he'll do the therapist thing and ask why I'd want to know. And that's what I'm trying to figure out. I think it just feels jarring if he's in a different location than I expect and it can take me a minute to adapt (or much longer, the first time he was at home or in a different room in his home).

OK, this ended up much longer than I'd intended. But has anyone else experienced this? If so, did it bother or affect you at all? Or, if not, do you think you *would* be affected by it if it did? And why?

If you're wondering about something in the room I would just ask. My therapist has worked from home since the pandemic started seems like he's in an empty bedroom I know he lives in the house all alone. He has a tendency to leave his closet door open there's nothing in there but empty hangers and maybe a couple sheets at the top shelf but closets trigger me and I always ask him to close the door and he always thanks me and says sorry he forgot and he closes it. I've also asked or commented on the plant in his room that he took from the office or does he have an window air conditioner because I see a reflection in a picture behind him. last time I noticed he moved his printer that I can see now.

There's no sense in ruining your session by being distracted and something in the room might as well just ask.

I would not care. I might not even notice.

Also doing Zoom sessions here (since March) and my therapist has been in several different places in that time. Sometimes she's at her home (blank wall with painting behind her), sometimes her office, sometimes a room I don't recognize, and once she had a really cheesy fake zoom background of mountains. I honestly don't care where she is, but the fake zoom background made me curious about why she didn't want me to see that space. It was also super distracting because it was a terrible background...basically her head floating in front of a giant snow-covered mountain range. It was hard to look at.

PS- I hate zoom and I'm so sick of telehealth.

PSS- I think you should ask your T to give you a "heads-up" about his location since it's causing you to lose a couple minutes of your session time to adjust. It's like you said, if you were going to be meeting him in a different space at his regular office then he would definitely give you some warning about that.

Yes, absolutely.

The context, T's background is a very important part of the visual field. I mean, it's hard to miss! So, by all means bring it up.

Environment does impact on mood and thoughts (as a T he should be aware of that anyway). IF you feel less safe or triggered or curious or *anything* in a space, for me that is well worth talking about.

It clearly does matter to you, so there is no shouldn't here. Perhaps you could ask yourself the question you think he would ask you, i.e. why is it important for you to know his location ahead of the session. What would you gain by knowing? Is it that you would just feel more comfortable; that you want to know a bit more about the objects in the room; that him being in a very personal space which he is sharing with you make you feel closer in some way to him?
I don't see any reason why you shouldn't be able to ask him the question, but be prepared if he does come back with 'why do you want to know?'
It could end up being a good topic for disucssion and go in ways you might not expect...

Thanks for the reply. That's nice that he'll close the closet for you. And you're right that I may as well ask. I mean, he could always choose not to answer (like I could see myself asking, "Is this your bedroom?" and him saying, "Well, it is *a* bedroom.")


And it took me months to actually talk to him about my reaction to seeing him petting his fluffy white dog the one time. He seemed thrown off that it had that much of an effect on me, but it was the first time I'd seen him being affectionate to another creature (plus he said how the dog was "really needy," which affected me, because I feel like I'm needy, and he accepts the dog being needy, which...seemed like a much bigger thing when I waited a couple months to bring it up).

I think it's fine to just ask. I'm fortunate in that L works from her home office anyway, so when we were doing zoom sessions she would just be in the same office. I think that t's should know that consistency is a big part of the whole therapy thing. And this pandemic has taken away a lot of that consistency. When L changes anything it throws me off! Like almost every time i've seen her her hair has been curly. then all of a sudden one day (this was pre-pandemic, so awhile ago) she had straightened it. and she looked so much like someone from my past in my mind the person i was sitting across from kept changing from her to the other person then back to her etc and I could NOT focus at all on anything in that session.

I think that the "jarring" is the effect that his room changing has on you, but I get the impression that the cause of your discomfort is deeper rooter. You seem to be making a link between his environment and a possible or apparent invitation into other parts of his life. You catch a glimpse of something; you want to ask more; there is something new to distract you; some new information is more personal than before. These could all be descriptions of your reactions to seeing his environment or descriptions of your reactions to his disclosures or interpersonal responses to you. Perhaps it is both delicious and jarring to be partially invited in.

You make a really interesting point here. It is both jarring and intriguing (or "delicious," as you would say). Part of me *does* want to know more, to see more (which is something that he's aware of--he's said it's like I'm trying to get all the pieces of the puzzle to figure him out). And I'm concerned if I mention the painting or pictures (which may just be, say, art photos in a picture frame, too far away to really see), then next time he'll have removed them from the wall or be at a different angle. And I worry that will trigger rejection feelings.


When he started disclosing more since the pandemic, part of me wanted to talk to him about it, but then part of me was afraid if I talked about it, he would stop. I did eventually talk to him about it, and he has dialed it back some. Well, he was still very open about his political opinions, which agree with mine (he knows that), though he did make a few comments that were a bit...extreme? Ones that I wouldn't share on here. (I can PM you if you want to know!)

FWIW my T has said that he likes seeing people's homes and having them see his and talk about what it means. So I think it's completely normal to ask questions about the environment that you see and it could be an interesting way to get into the conversation.

Unfortunately for my T I hate telesessions and refuse to do them, so he doesn't get to see my knicknacks and things.

I wonder if he would be willing to hang a sheet up behind him or something to block off the rest of the room?

Sounds a bit silly but for me i feel like i m getting a different person.
His office and him are a package. When hes in a new place i m thinking why the change. Then is he comfortable in this place to do the session.
Will i be getting the same T that hes in office.

When T changes places it throws me off. I dont really know exactly why. It makes me worried that the session will not be the same as when he was in office.

I would probably be thrown off as well. When my former T moved offices (like across town moved offices) it was incredibly upsetting. She prepared me for weeks. She showed me the floor plan. She told me what furniture they would be taking, etc. It made the move less stressful. I can't imagine a different background every time.

My T and I always just had sessions over the phone without video, but I can totally see how it would be distracting to have the background/location change suddenly.

I think it's fairly normal for a lot of people in therapy to wonder about things like 'what does my Ts house look like, what does he have on the walls' and so on. My T has a picutre of himself on his website, which I'm pretty sure was taken at his home. I have analyzed its background to bits, even though there's almost nothing there. I assume I'd do the same if I actually saw him on video there.

To me, consistency is quite important. There's certain things I've come to appreciate about my T even though early on I found them rather weird. For example he always dresses the same way with very, very little variation. The most adventerous I've seen him is wearing a red shirt instead of a blue one. And the first two times he did this (after about a year of seeing him), it was actually very distracting. And that's something that doesn't even really tell me anything about him, unless I'd have assumed that he has never, ever worn anything but blue before...
I'd not necessarily want to know when he's in a different location. Similarly to how I don't need to know before coming to the session that he's wearing a red shirt. I got used to my T wearing a red shirt, I'd get used to a few different walls, lightning situations and chairs over video. But I'd need there to still be some sort of consistency. Like it's not a red shirt, then a yellow one, then black, then completely different style of clothing and so on and it also shouldn't be a different room every time. It might take some getting used to, but after a few times in each location it'd probably be fine for me.

I don't think I'd necessarily be bothered to just notice the change in what the stuff around T looked like (like if there's a different plant in the picture, or different painting), but I'd be bothered if I'd had to worry about seeing personal stuff that I'd normally not see. My T has a few paintings and plants in his office, I didn't care much about them when I first started seeing them and still don't. I think it'd be the same over video. But I'd have cared and probably not started to see my T if there had been photos of people for example. And I'd not want to have to worry about whether personal things like that might be visible every time I start the call with my T, having to scan the room and so on... so if the location or background sometimes changed, I'd probably talk about it with my T so he knows that I'm anxious about that, so he could always pick a neutral wall in the room before starting the room or something like that.

Thanks, Kit. I had a similar reaction when ex-MC and ex-T moved to a different office that was literally up the block. It was very jarring for me and took a long time for me to feel "safe" there again (didn't help that it was coincidentally right after ex-MC's wife passed away--the move had been in the works for a while, so wasn't because of hat). It didn't help that ex-T complained about her much-smaller office nearly every session either...

I agree with the previous poster that wrote about it feeling like an "invitation" for you to know more about his personal life, and I can see why it would feel dangerous to ask - because it might trigger rejection feelings if he doesn't want to tell you, or if he restricts what you can see. Is it okay to just be aware about your feelings about it and not do anything about that? To just stay curious?

Next session my T is going to be zooming from a different country, and I have all sorts of curiosity about where she will be and who has gone with her. I am generally uncurious (outwardly!) about her personal life, so I don't know how she will respond to questions, if I muster the courage to actually ask her anything.

Completely normal to be thrown by this. Isn't the room/location considered part of the frame considered really important in some types of therapy and there is a huge emphasis on the importance of maintaining that frame (i.e keeping it consistent). I imagine for some people it wouldn't bother them at all but depends on your focus of the therapy. Also, moving room does give you just a teeny tiny little bit more entry into their life as another poster mentioned. It's enticing to see more too.

Found this really interesting as I had a very similar experience. ...

A delivery drive came to drop something off right as I was entering the room so my T had to sign it and engage with the driver.....I had never seen or heard my T really engage with anyone else and affected me way more than I thought it should have at the time....

I never thought changes in an appointment would make a big deal. Then once back when we could see each other she changed her seat. She normally sits on an exercise ball(she made sure I was okay with it at the beginning of our first appointment. One day, her back was bothering her and she asked if it was okay if she sits in her chair instead. O thought it was crazy to ask so of course I told her to sit wherever she was comfortable. During the app it was really strange. Her chair is higher than the ball and it threw me off.

So I would definitely ask him to give you a heads up aof which location he would be at.

My T has only ever been in the same room of her house and at the same angle. She told me the first day she was in her guest room, told me that she had a noise machine outside of her door. She also warned me that on occasion I might hear her child screaming or whatever. She assured me that her husband and child could not hear anything that was goin on in the room. The only thing that has changed is that initially behind her there were two pictures with a TV in the middle on a stand being her. The TV is now gone and the plant that was in her office is in its place.

Teletherapy is challenging enough without more layers of uncertainty and change. Like you, I would feel shaken up if my therapist kept changing backgrounds.

I'm not saying it would be a deal-breaker (not by a long shot). I'm just saying that I do understand how you feel.

Here's a thought, though. I have 2 backgrounds that I use when I do teletherapy. One has a picture my T likes behind me, and a book shelf. The other background is plainer, just a grey curtain and a painting on my wall.

The reason I switch up is because I feel bad for my T to see the same background during every session we have. Now I feel weird...maybe my switching scenes disturbs her! It's possible that your therapist is trying to vary the background so you don't have to look at the same image every single time.

That said, his environment invites you into a realm that might feel like boundaries are being tested, or even crossed. I mean, if you see part of a bed...that's really bringing some heavy unconscious (and conscious) material into the session.