Exploring the Three‐Way Relationship in Therapeutic Work with Interpreters

Abstract

In a companion paper, we have argued that therapeutic work with interpreters has been viewed more negatively than is warranted, and that the inherent advantages of this way of engaging with the non English speaking client have been minimised or ignored. This paper seeks to explore the aspects that may underlie the reluctance of clinicians to engage with therapeutic work with interpreters. Difficulties often appear to be centred on the anxieties provoked by working in the three‐way therapeutic relationship rather than in the traditional therapeutic dyad. It is also possible that the highly traumatised nature of some clients, who may be refugees or asylum seekers fleeing from political violence, also complicates such work. The intention in this paper is to consider both the dynamics of the three‐way relationship and the impact of traumatic experience, when relevant, on therapeutic work with interpreters, and to suggest how the pulls inherent in such work might be managed. It is hoped that by exploring these problematic areas, some light can be shed on the difficulties that all clinicians can experience but can equally overcome.