(((((JANE))))

That kind of a dream would make me uncomfortable too but I'm wondering if it says more about the depth of your feelings for her and how you might wish to "belong" to her rather than any homosexual tendendies. Can you explain to me how it might be transference? I get really confused around the topic. When people talk about transference, do they mean unmet emotional needs?

(((HUGS)))

Liese

I accidentally double posted this here and then tried to move it to one of the closed forums… sorry...

Actually, I’m not really freaked out about the girl/guy thing… What freaked me out was feeling any of that kind of anything with my T, even in my dream, guy or girl... in the middle of processing SA trauma… I think the feelings really do belong to what I feel towards her... and that freaks me out...

It’s like my mind mixed up the horrible trauma and my really awesome T. I don’t want to do that! especially not those same physical feelings I felt in the middle of horrible trauma WHILE also feeling emotionally good feelings towards my T. How can I feel that icky stuff, and feel good about my T, all together... It feels like my brain put really awful trauma feelings in with really good feelings towards my T and somehow my head maybe tried to resolve it...

I feel so bad about this and I don't even know why...

I think I just hate feeling these feelings...

I think I want to be able to feel them and feel safe. I feel safe with my T...

but this just feels all so mixed up to me.

I dunno...

Jane, I think I know what you mean about the feelings getting all mixed up together. It's wierd. I'm glad you feel safe with your T.

At times when things get all muddled up - I just keep repeating to myself "Cut myself some slack - things are tough right now" and that mantra sometimes helps.

You have a t you feel safe enough with, even close to, even intimate with. this is good. What dreams create from that are all sorts of things, quite normal.

Please don't feel bad about it, it is all just normal for the therapy process. Hugs.

I think this is an important dream. Maybe it shows that you are in fact transfering with her, even though you try very hard not to, in your real life.

In your dream, you drove to another country where she told you that the two of you were in fact dating.

Maybe you have to think of this like you are dating her, but in another country, another world, where there are completely different rules of love and relationships.
Maybe you have to allow yourself to love her on that terms. Just let the feelings flow and explore how wonderful the feeling of love can be. It´s alright while you are visiting this other world, just remember that this new world also has rules and boundaries, just like the world we live in everyday.


I´ve struggled with transference for the last 25 years, on and off. I´ve hated those feelings, wanted to get rid of them, felt shameful having them, tried to deny them, but nothing seems to work, I always end up in the same pattern of really deep emotions of transference.

Just over a week ago I was hospitalised. Too many stressful things have been happening in my life on the same time for the last few months (Financial problems, termination of my rent lease, caus I couldn´t pay, had to quit my medicine, my job was jeopardised, custody-fight with my ex....). And in the middle of all that my T was trying to reduce therapy. The little girl inside me was devastated... It had taken years to built that trust I had in her and I really felt she didn´t care about me anymore, she was abandoning me... that hurt me deeply.
I tried to be strong, I tried to tell myself I didn´t need her, I hated her, never wanted to see her again. But the sorrow and the grief was too much. After few days at the Psychiatry, she came, I hadn´t seen her for three weeks. She works at the hospital and we decided that our session would be on my ward. I was a total mess when she came. Felt I was exploding from anxiety and my head was spinning, I can hardly remember what went on in that session.
But the most wonderful thing happened, I decided that I would no longer fight the fact that I was transferencing with her. That battle has been going on for over a year, and now its over. I admit that I love her deeply, and with all my heart. I know it´s dangerous to love somebody so much, it makes me absolutely vulnerable. But the desire is stronger than the fear, and hopefully I will heal through the progress of admitting my feelings without judging them.

Janedoe, what I´m trying to say to you, (and now it´s gotten all to long, and too much about me) is that maybe if we think of the love we have for our therapists as different kind of love, love from another world, love that has not the same boundaries that love in our world has, we can be freed from our judgements about our feelings, these feelings are real.

I think that your dream can be an exellent example of that. Please do not cancel your next appointment. It is wonderful that you are able to love, now you can choose what you do with that feeling!!!

Liese ~ thank you so much for your support. It helps.

Sadly ~ oh, if only I could be as kind to myself as you are to me. Good mantra. Thanks

Moomin ~ great insight. I think what you say about different rules of love and relationships makes sense. I'm so sorry you ended up in the hospital, and are dealing with so much! I am SO glad you accepted your own feelings for your T, especially in the midst of so much pain - it seems quite wise. I hope things are going better for you. Thanks for your great feedback and compassion while you deal with so much.

~ jd

I love sweetP deeply and I admit that to him, he knows how important he is to me.But as I admit it, more each time, I feel MORE and MORE vulnerable and then I want to be angry with him and push him away as I am very scared. It is so hard.
Love for our therapists is often love of a child for the main attachment/parental figure. I think sweetP gets this. I have told him often enough not to think I am falling in love with him in the adult sense, though there are days that blips in and out.
"Just keep swimming" (quote from 'Finding Nemo') JD, just keep swimming and keep cutting yourself some slack. WE are in hard times, inwardly and need softness from ourselves to ourselves.

Sadly ~ I can really relate to how you feel about your sweet P - I start to feel good and close feelings about my T, and then I want to run or get away so fast. I wish I had the courage to admit all of it to my T. Thanks for your kind words of support and encouragement.


I managed to not cancel my appointment. I have been trying to not move closer to my T, not futher away, but just see if I could just stay where I am at in the relationship with her. (I'm not sure why I have been trying to do this.) But I want to run - close and far from her! ugh.

I saw my T yesterday, and I felt ok around her. She was fighting a cold, and kind of out of it, and I was in a weird place in my head in general, but I didn't feel any feelings of wanting to date her...

Then, last night, I had a dream where I was dating her again, and I woke up from it sleepwalking. I talk and walk in my sleep every now and then. It seems to happens whenever I am trying to deal with big stuff in my life in general, like I am now.

But it makes me wonder about me and my T. Especially to have it all keep coming up in such intense dreams. This is really confusing...

I think what comes up in my dreams is a sense of being known, and accepted and close to someone. I want that. I don't want it with my T, not in this romantic kind of way... I want this kind of connection with *someone* in a romantic way though, and in a non-romantic way too...

feeling very sleepy,
~ jd

quote:

But I want to run - close and far from her! ugh.

This is exactly how I feel, Jane. Being in the middle feels intolerable to me. Either closer or far, far away would be best. One works for my inner Kiddos, the other works for my caretaker. In the middle works for nobody.

I really don't think the dreams of dating T have to do with wanting to actually date her. It may be about wanting a romantic relationship or just a relationship of closeness/connection/trust. For example, my dreams about my T (which I shared in your post in the sensitive section) are not about actually believing that my T would invade or violate me...they are about a fear of closeness, an internal certainty of certain parts that people can't get close to me without hurting me.

Well, that is my interpretation.

Over the past two weeks, my relationship with my regular T has fallen apart. I saw my other T, the same one I had these dreams about awhile ago. Those dreams stopped pretty quickly after I started this thread and first posted about them. I have no idea why they stopped. Now, since seeing that other T 5 days ago, I have had two dreams about her that have been simillar to the one I posted about here. I don't idolize this T (I don't think I do). Our relationship isn't perfect and dring my waking hours I dont't have any feelings of wanting her to be anyone other than a good steady T. Yet in my dreams... it is getting more intense.

I may have to find a new regular tB and I find this to be a very daunting idea. I do't know if my regular t will terminate me, or if I will just take a break from her for awhile, or if we will be able to continue on... I do have a growing sense I need to find someone who does EMDR or somatic experiencing or something like that and its been something I have been trying to sort out for about 7 months now. Both Ts have been long supportive and even suggesting this. Maybe things being a mess with my regular t is a chance to take a break and try something new for a bit without ending up with 3 ts (which is just not doable financially or emotionally). My regular t was going to do EMDR herself but then consulted with someone about 6 weeks ago and told me no too much trauma for her to do it at her level of training. She said she didn't ask her trainer if she should do it with me or notB but that something else came up. And it lead to reconsidering my case. We did all the prep work so I was pretty frustrate but she was so reassuring and kept saying she just needed to get a little more training. She said it was a good idea to do EMDR and she was getting more training and we could do it in September. She so wanted me to hang in with her and not go through the painful process of trying to find a T to do something like this with because everytime I have triedB it has been really hard on my heart and stressful. She was also supportive if I wanted to find someone to do it withB but in retrospect... shiesh... I think something was off kilter about all of it.

My browser is being weird - sorry, I have to finish the above post in a second post here. I'll see if I can fix it later when I can.

Anyhow...

So I'm thinking of finding a t to do emdr or somatic experiencing with and it has me thinking of what I like and don't like in ts. I don't want someone who is quite like either of my ts - not like an exact copy. I don't find myself wanting a t who is more like my eq t than my reg t. I do want someone who is steady and who is more optimistic and right now my eq t is more like that than my reg t. However, its really actually hard to compare the two ts even with each other because the kind of therapy I do with each is so different. But both are counseling proffesionals and when I think of finding one to do emdr with... I think of my current two ts.

And somehow, I think all the confusion and hurt I'm feeling with my regular t, and the steaduness but very limited connection I have with my other t - it all has me dreaming of someone who is safe who would hold me and accept me and... well I have no idea why this turna into dating my t in my dreams. They are not sexual dreams at all. Yet I'm dating her in them.

Eh, I think a lot of things in my life are getting mixed up in my dreams right now.

Mostly, I just want to stop dreaming that I'm dating my t because when I'm awake, it makes me want to not see her again because u feel so awkward.

There is no way I would tell her of these dreams... I just want them to go away... or at least know why my heart and mind keep playing this out in my dreams. Maybe it is something I ate, and maybe it is reflecting something deeer I want in my life that isn't about my t specifically. And if so, knowing what that is, what I'm wanting, would help... just knowing it...

Maybe I just want to be held and physically comforted. And if so, well that is also hard to face because I get triggered by touch. And I don't find myself wanting to be held while in the presence of either t. Just making eye contact is hard enough and seems to be enough... and it is finally getting to be easy much of the time for me to make eye contact with either t... yet maybe somehow

(Sorry, browser problem again)

Maybe somehow this longing to be held, just he'll and touched in a totally not sexual way is getting stirred up...

And I have no idea what to do with that, especially right now. I'm just baffled. Especially because I never feel any of this when I am actually with either t in person.

Any suggestions/thoughts/feedback?

jane

Jane, I know that in my case the longing to be hugged and held safely, in a completely non-sexual way, has been just below the surface for about half of my therapy. My T officially said no to physical contact when we started doing the interviewing. I told him that means most likely no access to young ones, because that's where they're at. He said he would pray about that, so who knows, maybe at least a pat on the shoulder or something sometime in the future.

Anyway, I think if you have been feeling like you are wanting to try SE or EMDR, this is, as you say, an opportunity to do that. I also think it would be good to have some sort of resolution on what is going on with your T before leaping into anything new. I am just so frustrated that you would be left hanging like this. I don't get it at all...