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7 replies

emotional closeness and approaching end of therapy

jacksonjacksonMember
I am truly struggling right now. I am approaching my fifth year in therapy, and will be ending therapy in the near future. I have visited this site many times to find information about therapy, the therapeutic relationship, how therapy works, feelings, etc. I feel so emotionally close to my thrapist. It didn't start out that way, but after all of my thrashing about, pushing away, coming closer, etc. finally, after what felt like forever, we formed a close relationship. It just seems like it happened yesterday. When I think about termination and what that means, I have a pretty difficult time perceiving the end of therapy for me. I feel like I have been through so much in therapy, from feeling the most painful feelings ever from the depths of my heart, to feeling the most healing feelings related to closeness, connection, and warm affection for my therapist. I just want to know how to do termination without losing ground, without throwing all of my therapy away, and pushing my therapist away. These thoughts and feelings along with some anger towards myself and my therapist are at times becoming overwhelming for me to deal with. I don't want to react the way I used to, through numbing out, acting out, etc. But at the same time I find myself unable to process all of these feelings and thoughts, as though they start to become too much for me and I want to just run away. I don't know how to do this. I have never felt closer to anyone that I have to my therapist. I have seen his tears, felt his caring and concern, learned from his personal sharing, and have felt so emotionally close to him. He has helped me to heal from CPTSD. He has helped me to ground myself, feel safe, and regulate my emotions, but I still struggle with some of these things. Please share with me about how to do termination when you've become attached to and emotionally close to your therapist, without falling apart, doing self-destructive things, or throwing therapy away. Just so you know, a few months ago the little girl inside of me gave my therapist a carving of a little girl hugging her dad. In case you think I am delusional. I really am aware that he is not my father, although I have wished he was or would have been. It's just that he provided to me many, many things I never had before. If this helps, my background was a very abusive mom, and a father who became ill when I was 2 and was hospitalized for 12 years, and then died. I have come to feel a warm affection for my therapist, pretty close to a feeling of love. I guess there are times I wish I could take him home with me or go home with him. I know those are completely unrealistic. I am heppily married to a great man. What adds some humiliation to this is that I am several years older than my therapist. Please help me to do termination without all the emotional baggage, overwhelming feelings and thoughts, that cause me to feel overwhelmed and wantiing to run away, push away, throw away, and numb out.
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sapphire-bluesapphire-blueMember
Hi Jackson,

I felt emotional for you reading this. What an amazing relationship you have with your therapist.

After 5 years hard work to get to this point I would think termination is a lengthy process - rushing it might leave you very vulnerable.

Have you began to talk to the T about all these thoughts and feelings? Are you leaving because you feel you OUGHT to (not a good reason), or because truely you are ready and feel safe now to move on without this support? Or is your T pushing you to finish up? If it is not him, then it might be worth thinking through all the reasons you feel NOW is the moment?

Also you maybe could explore with your T what ending means - does he have a policy that you can come back if you feel you need to?

Those feelings of being overwhelmed and having baggage suggest that these must be attended to before any positive ending is going to be achieved.

Thinking of you,

SB
N ninnMember
Hi Jackson,

Sorry if you mentioned this and I already forgot....how often do you go? Are you going longer between sessions getting ready for termination?

I'm trying hard to get to 1 session a month, but I still go weekly. Even after 3 1/2 years with my T. Since I have Bipolar Disorder I probably won't ever quit completely, but spacing out the sessions slowly is a way to termination. Every so often I go two weeks between sessions. Sometimes it feels just fine, but sometimes it feels painful and I need her. When I tell T I want to go every other week, her response is, "That sounds really good. Let me know when you want to start that." I'm every Wednesday and sometimes I just cancel one if I'm feeling good.

And I agree with SB, can you go back if you need to, therefore you're not really 'ending' it?

I've talked to my T about "when therapy ends" and it really helped talking to her about it. She told me the door is always open for her clients to 'come back if they need it.'

I really hope you can talk to your T about it more.


Ninn
exploringexploringMember
Jackson, my therapist is also younger than me and that does feel weird at times. Once she said to me, "It's not about how long you've been on the planet, it's about how you were affected by the things that happened to you." That helped. But my attachment to her is often a child-parent kind of attachment, like you described, and I am aware at times of our age difference and that I am older.

As an aside, I have a friend who I am sort of in a friend/therapist/older sister role for, and she is older than I am. For years, she would ask me my age, and when I would tell her, she would say incredulously, "You're younger than I am??" It was actually pretty cute. :-)

I bet it doesn't bother your T that he is younger or that he tends to represent a father figure to you.

I like the suggestions you have already received and can't really think of what else to say. If you have to stop therapy, maybe you can make a plan for self-care? Journaling, support groups, walks, all that kind of stuff. I also suggest getting some phone numbers to call if you get in a bad way, both hotline kind of numbers and numbers for other therapists if you cannot contact yours again. If the stopping is financial, if you go to church maybe you can talk with your pastor to check in? Or find out about mental health services that are low-cost in the area?

I guess I did have some thoughts after all. As the others have suggested, I hope that you are able to taper off and have the door open with your T in a way that keeps you feeling safe and healthy.

Best wishes.
Smiler
jacksonjacksonMember
quote:
Originally posted by sapphire-blue:
Hi Jackson,

I felt emotional for you reading this. What an amazing relationship you have with your therapist.

Have you began to talk to the T about all these thoughts and feelings? Are you leaving because you feel you OUGHT to (not a good reason), or because truely you are ready and feel safe now to move on without this support? Or is your T pushing you to finish up? If it is not him, then it might be worth thinking through all the reasons you feel NOW is the moment?

Also you maybe could explore with your T what ending means - does he have a policy that you can come back if you feel you need to?

Those feelings of being overwhelmed and having baggage suggest that these must be attended to before any positive ending is going to be achieved.

Thinking of you,

SB


Thank you so much for your insight and support. I think I was leaving because other people thought I had been in therapy long enough. Then I realized that I really have become somewhat dependent on my T, and I am concerned about that. I guess I still have some stuff to talk about with him. I'm not sure what terminating really means, so I better find out... It helps to know that others are aware of how scary this can be, and it is scary...I will check in again after my Thurs. session. I see him once a week.
Thanks again everyone for your support. I don't feel so alone now...
jacksonjacksonMember
Well, I talked with my therapist on Thursday, and I feel much better about my struggles. He reminded me of the Circle of Life video that we watched towards the beginning of therapy. It took me a while, but now in retrospect I think I understand the longing feelings I've had when we take a break, or when getting from one week to the next week of therapy seems to take forever. I think this also explains some of the fear and dread I have of termination. What also helped was that my therapist looks at these feelings as OK, or normal. That helps me to look at these feelings in a more accepting way instead of pushing them away, numbing them out, or disowning them. So I am learning that termination is a process, not all or nothing. My therapist mentioned how much all of your remarks to me were very supportive, too. I told him he was a hero on this blog because of my emotional closeness comments, but he said all of you are heroes, too, and he can tell you have really awesome T's as well! This week is going much better. I do feel longing, but am able to put it into perspective, and to know I can talk about it at my next session. Finally I can feel this longing and realize it's not an emergency, but a feeling...It sure took me a while to realize this, but it feels good to know I am making progress.

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