Academic student Practicum

An essential part of counselors’ training in Kenya is the mandatory personal therapy for counseling students. This is so true in many counseling programs across the world including Kenya. This is justifiable following the adage that you cannot give what you do not have. There is also a proposition that one will be a better counselor having been in personal therapy to deal with personal issues.

Counselors are therefore encouraged to seek personal therapy to deal with their own mental health issues which they may have been suffering before taking up counseling profession or which may surface due to offering counseling services. The counselor’s unresolved issues can be triggered during counseling session in form of countertransference

 In Kenya, many psychological or counseling training programs at different levels: certificate, diploma, bachelor, master, or doctoral require personal therapy. Also, counselor’s personal therapy (minimum 10 sessions) is listed as part of the professional development on the webpage of the Kenyan Counseling and Psychological Association (KCPA,.). Personal therapy for either counseling students or for professional counselors seems to gear towards certain outcomes such as attainment of psychological wellbeing, acquisition of counseling knowledge, techniques, and skills, and self-care.

  Parenting Insight Bureau opined that requiring therapy as part of counselor education, would teach counselors early in their careers to recognize and cope with difficult personal mental or emotional circumstances and by doing so, decrease the chances that such problems would go untended for long periods.