Echo,

Thanks for your reply. I would really like to have a last "positive" session to wrap things up, but the last one was so bad I don't think I want to see him again. His story will be that if the transference is an obstacle to my therapy goals, then he needs to transfer me. Which is the right thing to do, I know.

I had jokingly said in my note that my attraction to his white shirt was becoming an obstacle for me, knowing that we would talk about it. I didn't really think that this was a serious obstacle, I just wanted to talk about what it says about me, like we always did. For instance, I thought it meant I'd like it if my husband would dress up a little more, or maybe it stems back to my father, who I always felt creepy and dirty around because of the way he looked at me. The combination of attentive caring, and looking at him in that clean, crisp, white shirt, just made me want to be held, protected, encircled by those arms very badly. I knew he couldn't (and wouldn't) act on it, I just wanted to talk about it. And the reason I finally said something is because it was the third session in a row that he'd worn that shirt, and I could feel myself getting more distracted every time.

He said he couldn't think of a way around this obstacle. In fact, he seemed like a different person. He's mentioned several times that he prides himself on "not acting like he thinks he's better" than his patients (he says a lot of therapists do act this way--?), and he really does have a very friendly manner so it's easy to get the impression that you're "friends". But this time, his attitude and the way he looked at me was very cold in comparison, like "How dare you" (about the shirt thing). I turned from him then and shielded my eyes from him the rest of the session, so that's the last impression I have of him.

The other specific thing that really hurt (other than the talk of transferring me) is that he got irritated with my crying (I'm not a loud crier but I couldn't stop). And when I'm crying like that, I can't think, so I told him I didn't understand his question. At one point he even got sarcastic about it, "Oh, I'm sorry, I've said it three different ways. My bad. Here, let me try again." Not that therapists aren't human - I can understand why he might have felt frustrated. But what he said certainly didn't help.

He knows from previous sessions that I'm terrified of abandonment. I've told him about the fear I've had between sessions, and I even showed him a fairly graphic picture someone else posted on another site that very well illustrates how it "feels" in that place, just to make sure he understood. And yet he didn't seem to understand why I was crying so hard. He kept saying, I know this must feel like rejection. I said no, I wasn't expecting you to gratify anything, I thought we were going to talk this through. It felt like abandonment.

Anyway, sorry to get so long-winded, but my point is...I don't think another session will help. But I won't rule it out yet. Thank you for your encouragement, Echo.