My wife and I recently separated and are filing for divorce. I am paying for both her and my 12 year-old son to receive counseling. I have chosen to do this because I want what is best for the family to deal with this transition. Our son understandably became despondent when we announced our divorce. My wife chose our son’s counselor, JoEllen Salce Rogers, Ph.D., based on a recommendation from a family friend. I supported that decision. Our son had a total of two counseling sessions with Dr. Rogers when he confided his concerns about confidentiality to me. I felt it best to share these with Dr. Rogers and went to his third session to speak with her beforehand. This was my first time meeting her, and my sole purpose in requesting to meet was to share my son’s concerns with her. His main concerns involved lack of privacy and his mother sitting in during half of his sessions. He described a large gap under the door to the waiting room where his mother waited for him and his fear that she could hear what he was saying. He loves his mother very much but was upset and had a lot on his mind. He did not want to hurt her feelings, but he felt he could not speak freely to Dr. Rogers because of the close proximity to his mother in the next room. When I went to her practice, I was greeted at the door by Dr. Rogers and invited to speak to her privately before my son’s session began. Upon arriving, I immediately understood his concerns; the office has a hardwood floor, and a large gap appears beneath the door. A couch for waiting guests is placed six to eight feet away from the door. I explained my son’s concerns about this issue to Dr. Rogers, to which she replied, “Well, I’m not going to change my whole layout for you.” (It was not for me; it was for my son, her patient.) Moving on, I informed Dr. Rogers that my wife was receiving counseling elsewhere and that I didn’t understand why she (Dr. Rogers) would have my wife sitting in on our son’s counseling when his time was already so limited. She replied, “I don’t know if you have been misled, but she does not sit in on sessions. She was invited to join me and did, but she didn’t stay for the whole session.” I replied by stating that I don’t understand why my wife is in my son’s counseling session at all. She then said, “Then you go get a Ph.D., and you can do it how you like.” Shocked by her hostility, I replied, “Okay, this is the last session my son will be attending here.” At that point she became extremely agitated and raised her voice. We exited the room together, and she said, “You’re a very angry man. I’m going to make note of that for DCF (Florida Department of Children & Families).” I opened my wallet to remove cash to pay her, at which point I felt that she completely invaded my personal space by stepping close to me and taking the money out of my hand before I could even hand it to her. She then ordered me to get out and threatened to call 911. She did this in front of my son and I felt she was trying to provoke me. I never did anything threatening in any fashion. I felt these threats of government action against me occurred as a result of my questioning her practices - practices that I feel justified my questioning. I replied to her that I had items in my car for my wife, and Dr. Rogers turned to my wife and asked, “Do you feel safe? Do you feel safe right now?” My wife said, “I’ll follow him to the car.” Dr. Rogers did all of this in front of our son, which seemed completely unprofessional. No one on the premises was acting aggressively except for the so-called professional - not my wife, not my son, not I – only Dr. Rogers. I was concerned that in just two prior sessions, without ever having requested a meeting with me, Dr. Rogers had apparently arrived at a foregone conclusion that I was an angry individual. I feel that her behavior was unprofessional on several levels: 1) failing to acknowledge the lack of privacy for my son to speak his concerns to her freely; 2) acting in a hostile way toward me in front of my son when I had neither said nor done anything confrontational; and 3) threatening to notify authorities with a false claim. Her apparent lack of concern for my son’s privacy is my greatest concern. I know I said and did nothing wrong, and although her tone toward me was disrespectful, threatening, and disconcerting, my real concern is her total disregard for my son’s privacy and her unwillingness to provide him a safe place to discuss his situation. I have never before been met with such unprovoked hostility by a professional. In just five minutes in her company, I was ordered to leave - not for any action or words of aggression, but simply for questioning her policies. However, the real insult and damage from Dr. Rogers was yet to occur. To my astonishment, I received a phone call from a Child Protective Investigator Supervisor from Florida Department of Children and Families. I was informed that a complaint had been lodged against me. I have literally never even physically disciplined my son, and I certainly have never threatened my wife. I made an appointment to meet with them. In my first meeting, they told me that their job is to protect children against imminent danger, which obviously my son was not in. They had already met with him and made that determination. The only conclusion I can draw is that Dr. Rogers made good on her threat to file a complaint, motivated entirely by her own anger. I feel that her confrontational behavior was unprofessional, but filing a false claim to the state is entirely another matter. Additionally, putting my family through this unnecessary and demoralizing experience – caused solely by Dr. Rogers – only caused further damage to us during what has been the most difficult time of our lives. I feel that she used her position of authority to waste government resources, which would have been better spent helping children in real danger. Because my son is a minor child in therapy, I am not enclosing names in this review. However, I wanted to share my experience.
by Anonymous
xxx.xxx.211.64
April 02, 2017
