ABSTRACT
It might seem that you could write o my experience with Jacob as a uke. I have it on good authority that there are a number of instances in which clients have constructed elaborate hoaxes to fool or mislead their therapists (Kottler & Carlson, 2011). One such case involved a woman who reported over several months that her mother was dying of cancer. At the point at which therapy was about to end, she informed her therapist that her mother had nally died and she was grief stricken. e therapist suspected something was wrong with this story and so confronted the woman who insisted it was true. It wasn’t until the therapist asked her to bring in an obituary to prove it that the woman nally confessed her lie. When pressed she admitted that she was afraid her therapist would abandon her, and this was the only way she could think of to be allowed to continue the sessions. Yet Billig (1991) saw this as an opportunity to deal with the issues related to abandonment, as well as deceit. With compassion and new understanding, he realized that the client was trying in her own way to protect herself and also deal with feelings of anger and mistrust that were dicult for her to express in more direct ways.
