First and most important: figure out where you are on the risk/benefit continuum. Make sure you understand both. If you're not comfortable with the risk, go no further. Whether or not you do continue, be willing to change your mind. There is, alas, no how-to manual. You can only learn from your colleagues. Visit The ABCs of Internet Therapy at http://www.metanoia.org/cybertherapy/ for a list of other online counseling sites, and visit a lot of them to see what is being done. Use this forum, and join the International Society for Mental Health Online, to engage in discussions with others interested in this work. Identify the issues, embrace them, grapple with them. If you find barriers, do your best to get through them. Visit the ISMHO website, http://www.ismho.org and read Craig Childress' excellent article. Talk with some of the therapists who have been doing online clinical work for several years, to gain some real-life perspective to add to theoretical musings. Then, if you have the courage, the imagination, and the compassion, put your website, and your self, out there. Good luck in your work. Martha Ainsworth, Editor
The ABCs of Internet Therapy:
An Independent Consumer Guide to Online Psychotherapists
http://www.metanoia.org/cybertherapy
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