(((SD)))

You know I'm the wrong person to answer you here so take what I say with a grain of salt.


The part of you that is resisting is resisting for a reason. Do you have any idea what is going on in your mind that is causing you to shut down? For instance, I didn't think my old therapist was safe enough to expose but now I realize I just don't like doing it at all. Aside from other things, I felt a certain amount of pressure to "act" or "feel" a certain way and the process didn't feel authentic to me. Now I am doing EMDR and the therapist I work with asks me to recall certain events but doesn't ask me to share them with him. If I do, I do. If I don't, I don't. I can just close my eyes and recall the event by myself, to myself. It takes a lot of pressure off and I like it quite a bit. It's much less intense than my old therapy was. The intensity was getting to me, I think.

My guess is you have the secure attachment with her by now. Maybe you are just tired and need a break? Sometimes I felt like I kept banging my head against the way trying to get something I couldn't get but until I gave those intense feelings a rest, I couldn't develop the space to figure out what it was I wanted and the pain was just too unbearable and destructive for both T and I, at that point, to continue on the path I was on. Just a thought. I'm sorry things are so hard for you right now.

SD, This is similar to what's going on with me right now. First, make sure you really are comfortable with this T and if you are not or your gut is speaking to you, maybe you need to change. I know my T values me and has demonstrated it and jumped through many a hoop to show me. Pushing through has always worked for me. Especially, when the urge to quit is paramount. It is the hardest work we will every do. The amount of energy it takes to keep something down or covered is not worth the toll it takes on you. Keep working at it and don't give up. You have value. Go slowly. The right direction is critical. Try to practice being more gentle with "you". It helps me. I have a problem with having to be perfect and it's a pain in ass to maintain.

SD, I am not sure if this helps but I have never made steady, gradual progress in therapy. For me it has always looked like a series of very long plateaus followed by movement and I can never predict when I'm going to enter a phase where some shifting happens. Sometimes it's got to do with my own capacity and the things going on around me. Othertimes, I don't know why I've remained mired and stuck and resistant for a period of time. I try to tell myself that change happens on its own timescale and stuff is happening unconsciously that I'm not always aware of even if I cannot detect any difference in the situation.

I don't think I have ever managed to work through an impasse successfully without talking to the T I was working with. Sometimes I've had to put an issue down and pick it up again in the future (either with the same or a different T).

Liese, I wanted to say that personally I do think you are good person to talk about this stuff. You remind me that pushing on through isn't always the correct choice (I tend to be dogged in my actions - not just therapy but many aspects of my life!)

I'm sorry it's so hard, SD.

I think it is reasonable to keep going only because my experience has been that way. I re consulted someone before and they challenged me a lot more than just agreeing with me - facilitated my thinking and it helped to have someone ask the questions I was too afraid to think about or honestly look at (a deep attachment I claimed not to have was my personal problem!).

I think part of the 'keep going' means addressing what you can't have. You said there are things you can't have - some people leave their therapists for that reason, some work through it - neither is right or wrong since each situation is so different. I think ultimately accepting what you cannot be offered is a good path toward trust (just in my experience with one of my Ts last year).

If it festers and won't go away or can't be moved through or accepted... It will stunt so much. Whether it is entitlement, transference, help, past failures of others and our T, reasonable expectation, etc that drives our needs I think the "keep going" is what CAN work it out but won't ALWAYS. Sometimes the thing we need to work on is put on to the relationship (I can't have therefore ____ instead of "I can't have. What does this mean to me?"

So... If the impasses at continuous it may be time to try a new flavor so to speak. When we try something new, when our new T trusts our strength enough, we can talk about the patterns we carry or run from in most of our relationships... And our Ts usually keep the doors open so we can go back and do that if we want to.

I hate needing therapy for my therapy...

((((SD))))

I couldn't handle the sense of powerlessness the relationship evoked for me and it was less painful for me to suffer the loss. Seeing T twice a week evoked longings that I couldn't work through because they were so intense and wouldn't let up long enough for me to create space in between them. I also couldn't, oddly, make the transition back to once a week but maybe that would be an option for u to give u the chance to have a break from the intensity.

I wasn't able to work through the feelings but since I left T, I did create space and that has been helpful. In the meantime, I realized how tired I am trying to get my needs met from people who can't meet them and when to move on and maybe that in and itself was just as important and therapeutic or even more so as staying would have been. In my FOO, it was my responsibility and there was a sense of letting go of that burden and forgiving myself that occurred in relation to my FOO when I left T. A HUGE burden lifted off my shoulders after all these years. So oddly enough, leaving was very beneficial in so many ways. Not that I am telling you to stay but just that leaving doesn't mean failure either.

I'm typing from my ohine and can't really edit so please excuse if I repeated myself.

((((MALLARD)))

Thanks for saying that.