Ouch, that sounds very difficult

I'm sorry that I don't know your "story", but have you moved on in any ways since she stopped being your therapist? Like have you started to see someone else, has it been awhile since you've seen this former T as your therapist?

Hi Beautifullybipolar. I like your name.

I think the initial shock has worn off a bit now. In a way I'm happy to have seen her as it had crossed my mind that I wouldn't know if anything happened to her (is this an attachment thing? Fear that she might disappear completely) and at least I know she was alive and well only a week ago.

She was a blank slate type of therapist so I only know what I've managed to find out on the internet. Photos of her and her friends on a night out is more intimate than I was expecting.

I'm not seeing a new T yet. I had one session with a new T but not sure if I'm going to see her again. Therapy with the old one terminated at the end of June.

Hello tygr

Yes I think this is an attachment thing, the fear that she might disappear completely. I´ve felt the same kind of fear with my T. And sometimes I google her. One time during summer break the first thing that came up in the google search was an obituary, about a person with exactly the same name and last name as my T.
And for a second I thought;
"omg I am right she´s dead"

Then I realized that this person died few years earlier. He he Then I realized how deep inside my heart this fear was, and that this fear was a real fear of abandonment.

tygr why did you stop working with this T?
Did you work with this attachment thing with your T?

quote:

Originally posted by Moomin:
tygr why did you stop working with this T?
Did you work with this attachment thing with your T?

I was only ever offered a time limited period of counselling by the organisation she volunteered with (a mental health charity). I was told that they only worked with people for a maximum of a year but I was extended twice so I eventually worked with her for 2 years and 8 months. I don't know if they made a special exception for me because I was slow at making progress or had lots of issues or whether they changed the rules for everyone. I was very pleased to be given the extra time.

I don't think I really did work on attachment with her because it was really hard for me to admit to myself that I was attached and it wasn't until right at the end and after termination that I realised. She did ask me persistently for the last 4 months or so how I felt about ending but I couldn't access the feelings. I find it very hard to access my emotions unless I am right in the moment with them and even then I often can't put words to them. That's what we spent a long time working on.

I admit-I am obsessed with Facebook, and only because I found T's page and I can see all her friends. So, I sit for hours trying to decide who all these people are to her. It drives me crazy. BUT, I can't stop. I want to know more about T, and she's so closed up in sessions that I don't even know if she's married..has children...where she lives...or anything.

I like that I can see her pic!

--broken

It's a strange one isn't it, Facebook.

After I found the night out photos, I kept searching and found two holiday albums from 2 years ago that I've never found before. And there were some nice photos there (as well as one of her in a bikini ). I can't bring myself to download the nicest as that really does feel like crossing a line but I'd like to. I've looked at it several times and it reminds me of sitting in that tiny room, digging my finger nails into the arm of the chair with anxiety. She's smiling in the photo, and that reminds me of when I amused her and she'd try not to let it show but occasionally couldn't hold it back and we'd laugh together.

Broken, I agree, I like that I can see her pic too.

I think I might have first seen this Therapy Tales cartoon link posted here but I'll post it again as it's very apt.
Therapy Tales

Oh wow! A bikini shot! YIKES! LOL!

Thanks for sharing the therapy tales link. I haven't seen those before. LOL! They cracked me up.

I found open profiles on her friend's list that have her comments. BUT, it's never anything exciting. LOL! I feel so pathetic scouring the internet in any possible way to find details about T. One thing I wish I knew was if she had children of her own. I guess I want to know because I am a mother, AND because I want to be her only "kid!" If that makes sense.

She's sooooooooooo strong about bounderies, I am sure I will never know. Unless I run into her with her family..

When I am feeling distant--looking up her picture helps me to connect with her.

((((Tygr)))

Pics of my old T once came up on my uncle's facebook page... it really was hard...
I was so jealous! They had been at a party for a mutal friend.

I have actually intentionally looked up my current T on Facebook... and I think it was right after they made changes to privacy rules bc one photo album of hers was public, and I don't think she knew at that moment. Her profile pic is public, and still is, and I actually blocked her on facebook... but now and then, I unblock her and see the profile pic. It reminds me of her, the sweet way she looks at me when we laugh.

The photo album... I almost told her I looked at it bc I felt so bad I looked at it. She marked it as public...

I think Ts who post online have to be responsible for their own privacy and be aware of the risks. It is awfully confusing to sort out. I just feel so weird...

My T is not so much of a blank slate, so in some ways, the pics probably didn't affect me as much as they would have if she was more of a blank slate. She doesn't self disclose about her life so much, but she does self disclose about herself in relation to the therapy - so her expressions in the photos were all familliar. I almost told her that it was a public album, just so she knew - but then it went back to being private.

Now on facebook they have a setting where people can make sure any photos they are tagged
In by friends are kept private or to ok for them to be public, so it is all even more up to people, including our Ts what they want public.

Facebook is confusing, for sure. I don't think you did anything wrong and yet I know how weird it can be to see stuff like that. Especially an old T and that pang of missing them.

jd

And here I thought I was the only one to be sucked into the wormhole obsessing about my current T. Mine is pretty tight when it comes to her personal life and her profile is locked but I was able to find others she was friends with including her sister and it was amazing all I was able to discover. Now I don't know what to do about it. I found many pics of her and its only made me like her more. I have never been drawn to a T like this before and its freaking me out a bit. How did you get over your curiosity?

Hi All,
Goggling Ts is a topic that has come up a number of times on the forum and I thought it might help to read some of the old threads, so I'm posting a link to another post of mine, which in turn provides a number of links. I think it might help you work through this.

Hi Hoosier!

Welcome to the forums! I'm glad that seeing other people go through this is helping you feel more normal. Looking forward to getting to know you.

More Questions

AG

Thank you AG. There's some really useful stuff on those other threads. It does help to know that lots of us do it and perhaps some of the reasons why we do.

I wonder what people did to find out more about their Ts before the internet? What did Freud have to put up with?!

I think for me, it's bringing up issues of unrequited love. I seem to have fallen for people over and over again, who couldn't return those feelings to me. I seem to have fallen into a similar pattern with oldT. I fully accept that I've transferred these feelings to her. I suppose the trick is seeking out where they come from in the first place.

I wish I had something wise to say but I hope that sharing this is helping some people.

quote:

I think for me, it's bringing up issues of unrequited love.

Tgyr,
I think this is very true. I know for me these intense feelings for my T was a continuation of a pattern that's been present in my life for a long time. I would meet someone whom I felt really connected with, and this obsessive intensity would kick in, only to have the relationship not pan out because the feelings weren't returned and/or I usually learned later that I placed a template over the person and it turned out that they weren't really like that.

For me, in the end, it proved to be about the love that I didn't get as a child and the unmet needs that I was still unconsciously trying to get met. So when my T held his boundaries, it would evoke the deeply painful feelings of not being loved. I had to learn that it wasn't about that now, but I also had to mourn the loss so that I could stop looking for something I couldn't find.

The other aspect for me was that my T became an attachment figure, someone with whom I could form an "earned" secure attachment (earned in that you have to work to form the attachment as an adult NOT as in you must be worthy of it!) and complete the developmental steps of emotional regulation, identification of my needs and learning how to get my needs met. These are vitally important needs and central to who we are. In my case, my T totally understood the process and accepted who he was in my life and handled the responsibility of it very well so he is someone who is very important to me and always will be. He's the closest thing I've ever had to a real parent.

I'm not saying that this is what it will turn out to be for you, only that you're wanting to look at where these feelings come from in the first place seems to me to be a good instinct.

Therapy is about bringing our unconscious patterns of relating into consciousness so we can understand why we do what we do and be able to change what we believe needs changing in order to live life more fully.

Glad you found the other threads useful. And never doubt that sharing is helping. Knowing someone else is struggling with what you are is incredibly important (and usually a big relief. )

AG

Hey thanks for the links. I read through them all and it really did help give me some insight. I just found this site recently so I am mostly just lurking and getting a sense of how it goes. Some of these posts I could simply cut and paste and sign my own name they are so familiar. Its oddly reassuring.

Oh AG. I'm going to have a little tantrum now. I was beginning to get somewhere with an attachment to oldT and maybe we could have worked through some of these feelings and got to the bottom of them but I'm not allowed to see her anymore and IT'S NOT FAIR.

To think that I need to start all over again and find a new attachment figure. Yikes. I think finding someone who works with attachment would be very helpful. Your T sounds great. But then so do you AG. You two really deserve each other.

Hey Hoosier. I was lurking until very recently too. I've just started to dip my toes in with a few posts. I really like this forum. There's loads of experience here.