Re: Frustrating Clients

Without knowing the age, diagnosis or level of functioning of the client in question, it is really hard to give suggestions, but I will approach this as I would in dealing with a similarily persistant child.
Perhaps something concrete and tangible will help this client become more aware of how s/he is asking too many questions. I'm thinking of a combination of a contract with this client, along with some token reminders that will limit the amount of question-asking without putting you in the struggle. Something like this:
If you can discuss simple behavior expectations and limits with this client (depending on cognitive function), sit down with the client and explain what has been going on "You continually ask me questions more than what is necessary, and it is keeping me from my other responsibilities", and then insert an affirming but limit-setting statement, such as, "I'm glad you feel so confident in me,but I'm sure you know that sometimes you know the answer yourself or can find out on your own." Then suggest a solution:"Maybe you don't know how many questions is too many. Therefore, I am going to help you to decide what you can figure out on your own, and what you really need help with." Or similar statements that describe the behavior and your willingness to help the client solve this problem. The idea is to frame it so as to make the client feel acknowledged while suggesting that you have limits.
then, a solution I might suggest would be one with tokens of some sort. These can be laminated cards, chips or whatever. Give the client a set amount of these tokens while explaining that for each token, (you decide how many tokens) the client is allowed to ask a question. Explain that once the tokens are all used up for the day, you will not be able to answer any more questions.
Expect this behavior to persist for a while while the client tests the limits, or "forgets." when the client does run out of tokens, keep the response brief, non-committal and repetitive- the broken record technique. something like, "You have used up all your tokens. I cannot answer any more questions." this type of "boring" response minimizes the attention(the reward) that the client gets from provoking responses (even negative ones) Respond the same way, as many times as it takes, and then walk away to do something else, even if you have to disappear into another room to disengage. From a classical conditioning standpoint, behavior that is CONSISTANTLY not rewarded will eventually extinguish. Along those lines, what you dDON'T want to do is decide after too short a time that the method is not working,and go back to the original struggle, because behavior that is inconsistantly rewarded is the hardest to extinguish.
Hope that helps. Let me know if it does.

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