In 1994 I went to my doctor because I was depressed. I wanted him to give me antidepressants, but he wanted me to see a counsellor instead. I didn't really want to do this, but I gave it a go, and after a while he started giving me antidepressants too.

The counsellor was called June Le Sueur and she lived in Brighton, although she gave counselling at the doctor's surgery in Tulse Hill. My first impressions were not good. When I told her I was unemployed she said that in her opinion anyone who really wanted a job could get one. This is untrue, and is not something unemployed people wish to be told.

She spent a lot of time trying to persuade me that I am antisocial. I did not accept this. It is true that I am asocial, but what does one expect from someone who is depressed? She also said to me 'You seem to live in a very mean little world' which is judgmental and untrue (and, in my opinion 'mean').

She asked me if, when I go to the supermarket, I smile at the checkout person. I said that I did not, and she said that this is an example of my negativity. However, I started looking at people at checkouts and I did not notice anyone smiling at the staff. So why was she criticising me for not doing something that nobody else was doing?

It was when I mentioned that I was interested in pornography that she turned against me, even more than before. She was a Catholic. She used to move her hands around a lot when she was talking, and she told me not to keep looking at her hands as she moved them around as she found it distracting. I also had to keep my feet flat on the floor.

I was supposed to see her for 6 sessions but I decided not to come to the last one because it wasn't doing me any good, just the opposite. Some time later I was talking to my doctor and I told her that this counsellor was not very good. She wasn't interested. I also mentioned that I thought I might have Asperger's Syndrome, but she wasn't interested in that either. I changed my doctor soon after.

The next year I saw a poster advertizing free counselling in West Norwood. I thought I might give it a go. The counsellor I was assigned to was called Marcia and lived near Streatham Common. Things seemed to go well to begin with and I saw her for several months.

One day we were talking about something unrelated to counselling and I told her that I had a video of a TV programme on the subject and that I could lend it to her if she liked. She said she would like to see it. I knew there were recordings on that tape that I didn't want her to see, so I taped over anything of a sexual nature.

However, for less than a second before the recording she had asked to see there was an image of a street showing a sign 'Red Light Area' or something like that. It was the very end of a documentary on a sexual subject. It did not occur to me that she could have a problem with this.

The week after I lent her the tape she accused me of being some kind of pervert. She said that I had put this image onto the tape deliberately so as to express sexual feelings towards her in a perverted manner. I was shocked that she might think this. Every man fears his actions being misinterpreted by a woman as perverted, but I never expected it could come from a counsellor.

I explained the truth of the matter but I could see she was still suspicious. I managed to convince her after a while. In retrospect I should have told her the next week that I no longer wished to continue with counselling. She seemed to be OK for some time after.

One day she asked me what sort of woman I would like to have a relationship with. I replied that I wouldn't like to start a relationship with a woman who wanted to go out to nightclubs and stuff like that. I wasn't being judgmental, it's just that it's not something I do so there would be no compatibility.

I don't know if this is what offended her (perhaps she goes to nightclubs) but it was about this time she seemed to be becoming more and more irritated by me. She said that I should not talk about other people, but only about myself. A lot of what I had wanted to talk to her about previously involved my unhappy experiences with women; trying to understand why my attempts at involvement had ended in rejection. I don't have a negative view of women, but it might have seemed that way to her.

One week she just became downright nasty. If she had explained to me what her problem with me was, I would not have minded. If she had said to me that she thought that I was a misogynist, and that she did not like misogynists, then we could have talked about it. But she didn't do that, she just became negative in the way that people do when they are irritated but don't want to confront the real issues. She was really weird.

For example, when I mentioned somebody she said in a harsh tone something like 'I'm not having you talk about other people, only about yourself'. Then she asked me a question that was difficult to answer without me mentioning another person. I said to her something like 'If I answer that question you're going to tell me off again for talking about another person' and she just grinned at me in a hostile manner. She said something like 'Am I irritating you? It's OK to be irritated, you know'.

I decided not to come back the next week. I was really upset. I had really opened up to her in a way that I had not with my previous counsellor. She set me back a lot.

I think that part of the problem is that for people who are influenced by the principles of feminism and/or political correctness, it can seem acceptable to demonize someone who is seen as misogynist. Someone can easily become the enemy, and unworthy of consideration.

Another part of the problem is that some counsellors get a sense of satisfaction from thinking that they can help someone to become just like them. It gives their ego a boost. When they realize that the person has no intention of becoming like them then they lose some of their sense of self worth. Similarly, some counsellors get a sense of satisfaction from thinking that they can help someone to fit in with society. If a client considers that the attitudes of others are part of his or her difficulties in life then he or she may not be eager to 'fit in'.

Marcia came across to me when I first met her as unintelligent and uneducated. However, I was willing to give her a chance. It was just too easy for me unintentionally to make her feel inferior.

It was four years later that I decided to approach a doctor again concerning depression. I was hoping she would prescribe an SSRI antidepressant, but instead she asked me to see a psychiatrist. His name was Doctor Basher and I saw him in the same building in West Norwood as I had seen Marcia. I remember that when I was waiting in the waiting room there were other people there, people with serious mental health problems waiting for their injections. I felt out of place.

Doctor Basher decided that I did not have depression, and gave several reasons, none of which made any sense. He said that because I had tried several different antidepressants and none of them had worked, then that shows that I am not suffering from depression. However, it is well known that a depressed person may have to change medications several times before they find one that works for them, and many never find one that works.

He also said that because I have an allotment that I couldn't be depressed. On several occasions over the years I have had my allotment taken away from me because I have not put in the amount of work required. With my present allotment I have been threatened with having it taken away. I find it difficult to organize myself and sustain the required amount of physical activity.

I would agree that someone who goes out clubbing every night could not be described as depressed, but having an allotment is not the same type of activity. Especially if you can't maintain enthusiasm for its upkeep.

There is a centre in Croydon for unemployed people. It had a counsellor there, and I thought I would give it a go. His name was Dennis, and he turned out to be as good a counsellor as anyone could want. He was neither judgmental nor easily offended. He was friendly and placid. I saw him about six times and it was a good experience. I would not have seen him had it not been that I was having big problems in my life at the time, and I do not regret seeing him.

It was in 2004 that I plucked up the courage to see a doctor again about my depression. She gave me an SSRI as I had wanted, and offered me counselling too. For several months I decided against it, but then I started thinking that my negative attitude towards the value of counselling could be part of my illness. I thought it would do no harm to talk to a counsellor, and for he or she to explain to me what counselling could do for me.

The counsellor I was sent to was called Anna Jones. I think that Anna Jones is a good counsellor, in the sense that she is not judgmental or easily irritated, but I did have some problems with her. She asked me what I hoped to gain from counselling. This was a difficult question for me. The reason that I had eventually decided to go for counselling again was because my doctor suggested it and I thought I would give it a go. This didn't seem to be an acceptable answer to her. I was hoping that she could explain to me what benefits counselling could have for me. She didn't seem to want to do this. She was expecting me to clearly articulate goals and aims.

She asked me a number of questions that I struggled to answer. Instead of asking general questions, it would have been better for her to ask more specific questions. She could have asked me, for example, if I hoped to have a relationship with someone in the future, and if I thought that there were any barriers to me achieving this. Whenever I said to her that I did not know how to answer her question she looked puzzled and sat and stared at me. This was quite unnerving for me.

She said to me more than once that if I didn't have any goals then I must be happy just as I am. In my opinion, depressed people lack motivation/enthusiasm, and so are not likely to have goals/aims. But they are not happy as they are. I can see that this idea is becoming less fashionable as ideas from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy become more accepted. The idea of mood disorder, that some people lack motivation and are unhappy without any obvious problem in their lives, seems no longer to be recognized.

Things became easier in time and we got on better. At the end of the counselling sessions she suggested Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. After several months I was asked to go to Tamworth Road Resource Centre for an assessment. This was done over 2 sessions. The assessment was made by Marcus Page.

I didn't get on with Marcus Paige from the start. I had some of the problems that I had had with Anna Jones but much worse. I was asked to state my goals and aims, and asked general questions that I found it difficult to answer. When I could not answer a question, which was often, he would sit and stare at me for some time. He gave the impression of being someone who is unhappy with his job and his life and enjoys taking it out on others.

When I got a copy of his assessment it was full of misunderstandings, inaccuracies and things I hadn't said. The document was poorly written, contradicted itself and was full of negative and opinionated comments about me. He had asked me in detail about my sex life and I was surprised to see that he had included these details in the assessment. He sent the assessment to a couple of people apart from me, including my former counsellor. The details about my sex life were things I hadn't discussed with my counsellor. Even more irritating was that the details were inaccurate.

I showed this assessment to a friend of mine who knows about mental health issues, and he was quite angry about it and said it said more about his personality than it did mine. To give you an example of the sort of thing he wrote, let me quote this: "It was striking that I struggled to recall Mr Lewis prior to the second interview and only afterwards did I see how he contributes his becoming a 'non-entity' through his immense difficulty in relating and inability to make use of another". Notice the grammatical error.

He lacked any understanding that a person who is depressed often will lack motivation and enthusiasm and will not be able to articulate goals and aims.

After a few months I started at a CBT group at the Tamworth Road Resource Centre. It was run by 2 therapists, Stuart Colquhoun and Nicki Makin. Prior to this I had had a interview with Stuart. He came across as warm, able to communicate and seemed to know what he was talking about, in contrast to Marcus Paige. Although I cannot say that I benefited much from the group, that is more to do with CBT not being suitable for me, rather than a problem with the therapists.

The group ended and later I started individual CBT therapy. My therapist was Doctor Matina Sotrilli. I had none of the problems with her that I had had with Marcus Page or Anna Jones. I knew that she was going to ask me what it was that I hoped to gain from therapy. I thought this would be a problem as before, but she helped me to formulate some goals and aims. There were no embarrassing silences. She is a genuinely compassionate person, intelligent and skilled at her job.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy hasn't done much for me, but I have been impressed by Dr Matina Sotrilli, Stuart Colquhoun and Nicki Makin. CBT is good for people with phobias or obsessions, which was what it originally was intended for. When used for depression, it can help some people but not others. If someone is depressed for a reason, let's say they have a dysfunctional relationship, then CBT can help to get them sorted out. When they have removed the problem in their life then they can become happier. But I would not call this depression.

Where CBT may not be able to help is where someone does not have an obvious problem that can be solved. CBT therapists don't seem to recognize that many people lack motivation or enthusiasm, and cannot clearly articulate goals or aims.

I'm sure that many people will say that a client will get on better with some counsellors or therapists than with others. That is not what I am talking about; there is no excuse for a counsellor or therapist to be judgmental, easily offended or irritable. If someone has these qualities then they should not be in the profession.

I understand that counselling and therapy are not meant to be easy all the time. I understand that some clients are difficult to please. The problems in the relationship between a client and a counsellor or therapist can derive from the emotional problems that the client has. You may feel that this may be what has happened with me, but I think that I have given a sufficient number of examples of unacceptable attitudes and behaviour from counsellors or therapists to show that is not the case. Counsellors or therapists can have emotional problems too, and this can result in a client not being helped and in some cases harmed.