I know I haven’t been posting about my sessions for awhile. Since I met with oldT in August it has been a really bumpy time in therapy. I have been angry at my T (you may have read my empathy thread), struggling with the fact that he does not display ANY emotion that I can pick up on in that right brain way and that he just does not seem as understanding and caring as oldT. Then we went through a personal issue of mine that triggered a lot of childhood hurts and wounds. That left me feeling okay but the work was really difficult and exhausting. From there we went to another bump when I took a risk and brought in some childhood pictures.

I had attempted to discuss my childhood pics with oldT too but he just looked at them and did not say much at all. No questions, no insightful comments. Nothing. It left me feeling “bad” and “wrong”. I had hoped that my current T would be different in some way. I also did this because I am feeling inside of me that I need to do something to move therapy forward. It has been an ongoing struggle to do any work with my T beyond processing the trauma caused by oldT. I would sit there and want to tell him things yet no words would come out. And so I made a beginning by talking about spending my summer weekends at my grandmother’s summer house and how that impacted my childhood and this spurred me to dig out some old pictures to share with him. Well… first of all, it took me some time after I got there to settle in enough to take out the pictures. By this time, our time was running out and it all had to be squeezed into ten minutes. And… he didn’t say much at all and when time was up he just got up and started opening the blinds (he closes them for me) and I had to leave. My head was swimming with stuff/old memories and I had to switch back to the present in 5 seconds and I just could NOT do it. Aside from that I felt that I had to run out of the office because I was overstaying my welcome. Time was up and I didn’t belong there any longer and had to flee.

I was such a mess for the rest of the day. When I got home I sent my T a very long email. I never send him long ones, I usually send him 2 -3 paragraphs and very much to the point. But in this email I tried to link my feelings to something. All I could come up with was oldT’s reaction to the pics was pretty much the same as his and I also ran out of time that day and had to run out of the office. Also… I shared the pictures with OldT in the session just before the session where he stood up and announced “I guess it would be hard for you to lose me”. So maybe those issues and feelings and memories got all mixed up together.

But aside from this… I have been having ongoing problems with ending sessions with my T. A few times my session has been shortened by the previous client running late. The week of the pictures … again we started late with barely gives me 40 minutes of session time. That is way too short for me. I regularly had 60 minutes with oldT and sometimes that went to 70 minutes. I just can’t get used to 40-45 minutes no matter what I do or how much I tell him I’m struggling with this. I could probably do 50 minutes and this is what he used to give me in the beginning of this relationship. I have to say that I am so envious of you that have 90 minute or longer sessions. Yes, I do see him 2x per week but it’s hard to work on complicated, difficult issues in such a short amount of time. It is further complicated by the fact that I have to return to work immediately after the session. I literally have no time to process major issues that leave me shaky and dissociated.

So… getting to the point now. Actually today is our One Year of working together, so yesterday I brought him a gift and a card to mark this milestone. I wrote him a note in the card regarding what this year meant to me and then on the other side of the card I included lyrics to a meaningful song about my therapy. I burned the song to a CD and gave it to him with the small lighthouse I spoke about here. I was really looking forward to this session and wanted it to be a good one. I wanted to focus on the past year and how I saw the journey. How I moved from not wanting to be there and not being able to “see” him and through all the pain and accomplishments. I had read over my journal notes throughout the week before and wanted to talk about some important memories I had.

He seemed to like the gift and said he appreciated the symbolism behind it. He thought the idea of the CD was “cool”. He asked me if it was okay to display the lighthouse and I said it was okay with me if it was okay with him. I know he will add it to his collection on his bookshelf where my candle is now. I think that part went okay. Then we started to talk about the year and I brought up some things about our relationship. I was very open about how I finally progressed to seeing him, to feeling the connection and feeling attached. I told him I started to feel safer with him when winter approached and he started to wear sweaters. He smiled and said that’s cause he was “fuzzy”. I said , “yeah literally”. I told him that even though I couldn’t “see” him for quite a while or feel anything connection to him, it was his voice that I hung onto. It was not so much what he said, it was the sound of his voice that was soothing and calmed me. He was never angry, or upset or scared or loud. His voice was the only thing that kept me stable in those early days.

But then I started to talk about oldT and the time period following the abandonment (I was abandoned in late summer). It was Fall and now it’s Fall again. I told him I’m feeling triggered lately due to the Fall being here and the days getting shorter. How I remember last year I dreaded Fall because it was taking me further away from oldT. And when I looked around, instead of seeing the glorious Fall foliage I only saw death. Everything around me was dying. And then I was suddenly crying badly. And guess what? Yup…time was up. I was in the middle of telling my T something huge that I never told anyone and time was f’ing UP. He stopped me and said we need to understand why I do this so often. I get really emotional and into something from the past just as time is up. I got so scared at that point I stopped hearing him. He said he knew he was losing me because of the expression on my face. He wanted me to hear him and he said that this was about me not him. Meaning it was about me having to leave him in a bad state and he felt then I would be so uncontained that I would disconnect from him.

Well I just need to say here that his bringing this to my attention at the end of the session did more to disconnect me than my own emotional state could have done. Now I feel just horrible. Like I’m a huge therapy failure. I just cannot get myself to work in 45 minute segments of time. Why can’t I do this? I feel like I made him angry enough to confront me about it. Maybe he thinks I’m trying to manipulate him to get more of his attention and time? He said he didn’t think I was doing it on purpose. But what if I am and I don’t know it? I feel like I’m this greedy, selfish, horrible person now. I feel like I don’t even want to go back to see him again. How can I do that when I’m going to spend the entire time watching the clock or my watch? Not only that, but I ruined the session. I really wanted it to be a good session that I could remember as a milestone. Now I only remember it as me getting in trouble. I know he said that he wants to understand why this is happening and that’s why we were talking about it but it does not feel that way. It feel just really bad. I lied to him and told him I was perfectly fine to go and not to worry. I told him I just have really bad timing.

The thing is… I thought I was just going to say my piece and go. I didn’t realize that what I was talking about threw me back into horrible grief and obviously I’m still not over it. I’m still struggling with the abandonment by my oldT and how that made me feel in the months following it. And now the season change is evoking those same grief feelings.

I know this was hugely long but I had to get it out there in print. I’m very confused right now and depressed over this. I just don’t know what to do.

Thanks for reading if you made it this far.

TN

This message has been edited. Last edited by: True North,

(((TN)))

I don't think you're intentionally doing this at all. I think it might just take you 40-45 minutes to really settle in and be able to really get in touch with your emotions. I guess...what I mean is that, in my case, it takes me a while to find the best way to articulate what I'm thinking or feeling (if it's something come up from the past). I wouldn't be able to get anything done in 45 minutes. When my T first brought up how I seem to not be able to contain everything enough to leave in a good place, I felt in trouble too. I felt like I must be making my T frustrated and angry that I couldn't get it together within the time limits that so many others do. Of course she wasn't, and I was lucky that we were able to work something out, but I've been there.

Do you think that, had you talked more about oldT earlier in the session, you would have gotten in touch with that grief earlier? In that case, it seems like there just needs to be more priority put on the grief over oldT so that you can try and get to it earlier in the session.

Anyway, sorry if none of that helps. At the very least, I'm really sorry about this rough patch you're going through with your T.

((((TN))))

I want to reply more but don't have a lot of time right now. So I will be brief. Maybe you are judging yourself too harshly. I would like to go into therapy and just be able to jump right into things within the first 5 minutes and it's always been so frustrating that I can't. And, like you, I have the 45 minutes sessions and by the time I got my nerve up to bring up what I really wanted to spend time on, it was almost nearly at the end. And also, like you, I was often frustrated.

For me, the difference has been that since I've become more comfortable with T, I'm able to jump into the hard stuff sooner. But it's taken a really time to get there and to have that intimacy.

I totally agree that the 45 minutes really suck. But maybe it's not that you are wrong or bad for bringing things up at the end. It could just take you a while to get comfortable.

Just wanted to give you another spin on it so you don't beat yourself up mercilessly.

((((TN))))

Liese

Thanks for the response, Kashley. Can I ask how you worked out the difficulty in working within the 45 minute session? Only if you feel you want to share that. I feel really hopeless about this and if I can't make myself work in this way then I feel like I can't work with this T. I'm feeling sort of backed into a corner right now. I feel like I'm making him frustrated because I can't do it right. I don't know how.

Liese...thanks for your comments. Maybe after 2 more years I'll be able to feel that it's easier to jump into the hard stuff right away. But in this case, with what we were talking about... I didn't have any plan to dive into any really hard stuff or any trauma stuff. We were just talking and it come on me suddenly and unexpectedly. How can I plan for something that I have not planned for??

I'm feeling awful.
TN

Oh hey TN big hugs
I have been wondering how you were after your meeting with oldT and anniversaries.
I am so sorry you are feeling so awful. It feels a bit to me like you are in unchartered territories as now this is about you and this therapeutic relationship and not dealing with all the pain due to oldT abandonment.
I only have 50 minute sessions but myT is excellent about her time keeping. In 4 years we have only once started late and that was because I was late. I would not handle her being late at all well. Let alone if it was because she was with another client!! Awful euww feelings there. Have you talked to him about how his being late makes you feel?
After a while I got much better at getting straight into heavy stuff but I definitely don't think you should berate yourself if you aren't doing that. It will be because of something and when you have unravelled why that is you will have gained a greater understanding.
From what you have posted before he sounds like a good T. I am sure you will be able to work through this. Although that won't stop this hurting like hell.
Keep your nerve and know that you are not alone
xxxx

Hey TN,

Well, the first thing we did was to leave 10 to 15 minutes at the end of the session to talk about the weather and other mundane stuff so that I wouldn't leave dissociated or just still in the thick of everything (which does cut into the time, but to me it's more important to leave in an okay place). I never keep track of time...T is always really good about leaving that time. It's been really essential that she help me with the time, because if she knows or senses there's something heavy coming on, she'll kind of subtly say something about the time and try to keep me from getting completely sucked into something. A couple sessions ago we were about a quarter of the way through a 50 minute session and I was trying to tell her something hard, and we tried to work out a way that I could tell her in a way that didn't throw me into this spiral that took an hour to get out of. Even though it doesn't make it a whole lot easier getting into any meaningful material with a 45 or 50 minute session, it does help to trust T with the time completely.

There's good and bad about being reminded about the time, of course, because it kind of reminds me that I'm just an hour or so of her time. On the other hand, it can also be seen as caring that she doesn't want me to leave in a bad place.

Anyway, the other solution has been longer sessions. I'm lucky that I'm able to do that, but it also doesn't happen all the time, especially with classes started again. Does your T ever offer sessions after 5? When I was having a really hard time last year, T did give me a couple later sessions since I just couldn't make an earlier session. Do you think your T would be open to that on occasion?

I'm sorry you're feeling so bad.

((((TN))))

I'm sorry that the session wasn't what you were hoping for and that it actually turned out to be quite difficult for you. I don't think you are failing at therapy at all. Therapy can just really suck sometimes.

Big hugs,

Liese

(((TN)))

I'm sorry that your session was disappointing for you. I agree that therapy just sucks sometimes. I know that you don't fail at therapy unless you quit. As long as you are going then you are working on things.

As for the time problem I can relate. I can remember a session where my T told me that I make therapy more difficult for myself by only allowing my feelings in the last 10 minutes of a session or just after I left when all I could do is email or talk to his machine. I thought he was frustrated as well because he had more edge in his voice than usual. He told me he wasn't blaming me but was giving me info and wanted to find a way that I could allow my feelings into the session. I don't think I believed he wasn't frustrated until we had more sessions and talked about it more.

I think I've been able to get into the feelings faster sometimes because I've been in therapy longer and developed more of our relationship. Unfortunately that isn't a quick fix but I think it happens slowly. I hope you go back and try and talk about how it feels to be blamed for something and how you are afraid that you can't do therapy with him because you aren't doing it "right". You could try using the end of a session for lighter talk and allow him to keep track of the time but I haven't found that helpful for me although I've learned his cues for our time is coming to an end.

be gentle with yourself,
Di

(((TN))) You are not failing at therapy. I think it would be really hard to work with 45 minutes. I agree that perhaps your T could have brought it up later when you weren't already upset.

I'm sorry that you are struggling with triggers and having a hard time.

(((TN))) I'm sorry that your anniversary session left you feeling disconnected. Shorter sessions never worked for me either. Even long sessions, it takes me forever to open up. When T has said the same thing as your therapist has in the past, I have felt in trouble. He just keeps emphasizing that we work on safety so those vulnerable parts of me feel OK bringing stuff up even when there isn't the pressure of the ending of the session. But, it doesn't sound to me as if this was something that was pressing on you and you withheld until the end. If it was, a strategy I have used is to compile an agenda on my phone (text) or in my journal (I take notes in therapy) and force myself to share that agenda with T, so he knows the things that need to be touched on in that session. It's hard if it comes up right in the middle of the session, though. I hope your T and you can work through this together. I'm really sorry longer sessions aren't a possibility. I know that is something you really feel you'd benefit from. I'm sorry that I'm one of those people who might trigger that stuff.

I am having a similar issue and Liese might have nailed it. I can't just jump in and start my deep secret unloading when I get there - it takes a while to warm up and by the time I think - yeah I will tackle that - it is too late. I am feeling very unfulfilled.

TN - Would it help if you saw T once a week - but double the timeslot?

((((TN))))))

I had another thought that I wanted to share with you. What if there is a part of you that is just so sad that the sessions are coming to an end? What if you are just simply going to miss T? And that's why you start crying. What is so wrong with that? That's sweet, IMO. You love another human being. You are going to miss another human being. You feel positive about another human being. Well, I don't think that's cause for a huge inquisition. You are just human, with human needs.

And, if that's why you burst into tears towards the end of the session, I'd hardly call that manipulative. That's just your expression of the impending separation and loss.


TN, when I went away to college the first time, I was scheduled to come home for Thanksgiving. I called home in October, very homesick and in tears and wanted to come home for an unscheduled visit. And my Dad told me I was up to my old tricks again and I was being manipulative. I believed him until a couple of years ago when I saw my friends being so concerned about their children's adjustment to their first year at college. It was only then that I was able to see a different slant on things. However, how do you think I feel when I want to be close to someone or when I scared and need comforting? I always think I'm being manipulative.

I'm wondering here if you received the same type of "warm" reception to your emotional needs that I did from your parents?

((((TN))))

Liese

Wow TN I am so so sorry you had such a disconnecting and unhappy ending to your last session, and it being your anniversary session too . It’s bad enough that you suddenly dropped into a really painful and sad place when session time was running out, but your T’s comment was just way out of line. At the least it was lousy timing but also does show quite a bit of (uncharacteristic I have to say) insensitivity. Though I get that he wasn’t intending to be critical and wanted you both to work on understanding why this is happening, I relate very much to how you are feeling about it, that it would have come across as critical and accusatory and telling you you’re doing something wrong. And I wonder why he had to say that he wanted to understand why ‘this’ is happening, as if it’s something that happens regularly? Is it something that you find happening a lot? If that were so then maybe there is some justification for his throwing it at you like that (some, but not much!) but I don’t get the impression that this is something happening a lot with you.

And (hindsight of course) it would have been so much better for him to have helped you get grounded and say that you’ll continue with it next session, and then NEXT session bring up his concerns about how you and he could avoid this happening again, so that you don’t end up leaving disconnected. So now it looks like this will have to the topic for next session anyway.

TN I love what Liese said in her last post, she’s actually put into words something that I was wondering about. That you’ve gone straight to feeling like he thinks you’re trying to manipulate him, well that’s your perception not what he’s said, so there must be something in you that’s making you experience him seeing you that way. And that you feel like a greedy selfish horrible person ( which is so not true) isn’t coming from him either, but from your past experience.

Having said that, being told in the very midst of painful tears that ‘we have to work out why you’re doing this’ would make even the most secure self confident person feel like they’re doing something wrong, so it’s perfectly understandable that you’ve be feeling so totally crap about it all.

Why have your sessions gone down from 50 minutes to 45? Got to chime in with the others here, and also totally see what you mean, that 45 minutes just isn’t long enough to achieve very much unless you’re capable of coming straight in the door and ‘getting on with it’ immediately. But who can do that? It does take time to wind down and settle in and get in touch with what’s going on in you. Actually even 50 minutes isn’t long enough (as I’m finding myself now ) 60 minutes is still more or less the optimal therapy time I reckon. I expect you will be talking about all these issues in your next session and if your T is keen to work with you to prevent your having to leave sessions in disconnect mode then it might be possible that you can negotiate different session times. At the least, ensure that he keeps HIS time boundary – I think that letting a previous client run over into YOUR time, and then not making it up to you is really unfair. If you are running into problems with being able to say what you need and having to leave uncontained, then the least he could do is make sure you get the full amount of time right from the start.

I’m wondering here though whether you aren’t feeling too guilty to confront him about his allowing other clients to run into your time, because of how he rearranged other clients to accommodate that double session you had with OldT? I remember your saying that you would never query again if he had to cancel on your or rearrange your appointments because you understood it was for a good reason, but maybe that’s now making you feel guilty about feeling bad for losing precious minutes of your regular sessions?

And I’m really sorry he invalidated your bringing in your childhood pictures . I hated the image I got of his suddenly getting up and opening the blinds, that is SO dismissive, so much sending the message, ok go away now this doesn’t interest me. So it’s not just parallels with the same thing happening with OldT, but something real your T did in the here and now.

I also relate very much to how you describe your T as not displaying any emotion that you can pick up in a right brained way. He obviously is eminently capable of verbalising all sorts of warm emotional things to you, but maybe isn’t reaching you on a non verbal level. I’ve found over the years with all the many different Ts I’ve seen, that that is actually profoundly important to me. Not necessarily an open display of emotion on T’s part, but a sense the s/he is closely following how I feel and is able to say or more importantly do/express in some way that s/he is affected by my feelings, by my story. That way I get to not only have my feelings validated, but I get to feel UNDERSTOOD, which is so important to me. I HATE unmoved and detached (well, mostly). And your T getting up to open the blinds wow that really affected me, I imagined exactly how I’d feel if that happened to me and I think I would be unbearably hurt and immediately ENRAGED. It’s so dismissive.

Sorry for this loooong reply, and I haven’t even addressed everything you said that I wanted to comment on, but this is probably way more than you want to hear anyway so shall stop here.

TN I hope you are coping alright and NOT talking yourself into being a failure at therapy. Take it from one who has ‘failed’ so often at therapy, there is no such thing as a client failing at therapy, only Ts fail. And our perceived failures are inevitably T’s errors or misunderstandings. I hope you can see that and feel strong enough to go in next session and be really open about everything that’s come up for you. It does sound like now that you’re no longer processing OldT trauma that the focus is much more on your direct relationship with T and so all this stuff coming up is perfectly normal, and actually, IS the therapy work. This IS you working on yourself!

Sending you lots of support and good wishes (((((( TN )))))))

LL

(((((TN)))))

I just went back to reread your first post again and what struck me was how you went from talking about the milestones over the last year (which were all significant) to towards the end, talking about your grief about OldT again and the fall being a triggery time of year for you.

Well, maybe T was frustrated that he had to leave you in such a state rather than frustrated with you. But maybe what is going on is you are searching to connect and you just can't find that connection with him - as you said yourself, the right brain to right brain stuff.

And so maybe you tried to connect with the good stuff, the milestones but felt increasingly uncomfortable and went back to OldT for comfort.

It's very hard to learn how to connect with people in a new way. I don't know why the healthier way is soooo scary but it is. It's just really unfamiliar feelings and the new scaffolding isn't there yet to support it.

You can work this through with him. I know you can.

I do agree that you should get your 45 minutes regardless of him running late with someone else. That's his problem, not yours.

Thank you all for such valuable replies and the lovely support.

AnnieLake...thanks for the hugs. I was thinking about what you said and I'm wondering if it takes me awhile to get to the emotional stuff because I have to sit with him for awhile to gauge his "mood" and his receptiveness to hearing about the things that make me feel more vulnerable. And this would be mom transference stuff not him. I would always have to talk to my mother for awhile before asking for anything to see what kind of mood she was in that day. She was so volatile I could get a nice response, get smacked, or get some shaming response. T is always the same so it's not him it's the past.

Kashley, thanks for taking the time to explain what works for you. If we stopped 15 before the end of the session that would leave me a half hour to get to the emotional issues and I'm not able to do that at this point and therein lies the problem. I can't get evening appointments because he does not work very late... I think his last appointment is 6:30 and that is only on one night per week. He has other long term clients who have those slots. In fact, the only reason I was able to get an appointment with him is because I am able to go on my lunch hour in the daytime. I'm glad things are working out better for you and your T these days.

incognito (and Liese)... yeah it just really sucks sometimes. It is just never enough to fill the empty places and just getting a taste of the connection makes you hungry for more and then it's taken away (time is up! you gotta go). It may take a long time before I can just sit down and emotionally just throw up on his floor. It may never happen either. I just don't know at this point. That is just not me. I need time to calm down before I can access what is really happening inside. And then... there are times that I don't expect to get emotional (at least consciously) and it just happens.

And... like you, incognito, I feel that my T is getting really frustrated with me. He is frustrated enough to interrupt a really scary, emotional, vulnerable moment to start asking me why I always seem to do this! What could have been a really connecting moment had he responded empathically to my pain or at least just listened and made me feel heard, instead he began to question me and the opportunity for real trust and connection and me moving closer to him... well it was lost and I ended up feeling VERY unheard, disconnected and like I did somethiing horribly wrong. Wow... it was like I was being given that message that moving closer was wrong and dangerous when I have been struggling to move closer in my pain.

Thanks STRM for the hugs. Yeah, it would have been a LOT more productive and less hurtful if he had noted it happened and waited until the next session to discuss it and just allowed that moment with him to play out naturally. It really would not have taken that long. And while I could have left feeling emotional, I would not have left feeling shamed and disconnected.

Yaku, please don't worry about triggering me in any way. I'm really glad that you can have so much of your T and that he is working hard to help you and work with your needs. My T has really rigid boundaries...he may see them as necessary but sometimes I think he is too unbending and those sharp edges can really hurt me instead of help me. I'm constantly left with the feeling of "my way or the highway" and it feels scary at times.

Hi DF... thanks for your ideas and comments. We sort of do have a closing ritual but I dont' like it and it's not working. It seems too abrupt and dismissive and just ends up freaking me out. Okay... with oldT he would casually reach for his receipt book which was always next to him on the table (he didn't have to get up) and then when I saw him do that I would start winding down myself to be able to separate from him. I would hug Tdog and say goodbye to him and gather my water bottle, purse and coat (if I had one) and stand up. THEN he would get up and walk over to open the door for me and we would shake hands or hug before he would open it and then I would leave.

I don't know why this worked better for me. He would sometimes say we had only a few minutes left but not always. But I did have a solid 60 minutes or sometimes more and it sort of worked. And yes, there were times when I didn't want to leave or feel finished... I don't know.... I maybe felt that I was more in control of the leaving ritual there. He merely picked up that receipt book and my brain did the rest. NewT is in my insurance plan so I don't get a receipt. And he forgets to give a 5 minute warning most times. And truly... I don't want to be the one to watch the clock and decide when to end the session. I have worked hard both with oldT and now to allow the T to run the session and be responsible for the time. I think I'm just upset over a few things... one is his time boundary which seems to mostly apply to me lately (as others are running overtime) and also what he said at the end of the session... asking me why I do this so much. I just feel like I'm greedy, horrible and manipulative. Just writing about this is helping I think to make me see more clearly somethings I need to think about. Thanks for the hugs.

SD... thanks for your response. I can't double my timeslot as T won't do longer sessions, unless the circumstances are extraordinary, like the session with oldT. He says that clients work hard enough in 45 minutes and he sees longer sessions as either too much or a waste of time not sure which.

Liese, thanks for coming back and offering new thoughts. I think you are correct. Maybe I'm just really sad at leaving him. I do think some of this is plain old separation anxiety. I do miss him (not now because I'm too angry to miss him and feel disconnected) but at times I just miss him. I even told him in an earlier session when we discussed ending sessions. I told him that it could just be separation anxiety. He reminds me that I have two sessions a week and he is always there waiting for me. Of course, that just adds to my guilt about having two sessions a week.

I'm sorry you had to hear that from your Dad while you were homesick and away at college. That was insensitive of him to say that to you. To equate your need for attachment and family connection to being "tricks". And I can understand how that would stay with you. I can relate back to me having the need to talk to my mom and her always saying... you have 5 minutes so talk. Gee that did nothing to encourage me to share with her. I have to struggle to remember never to do this with my son.

LL...thanks for your reply and the hugs. I want to post this and then I'll come back.

Thanks everyone
TN