Hi Empty, your post made me want to cry...I wish I could give you some advice but I am going through something similar now with my T...where suddenly the rules of the relationship change and you feel like it's your fault/punishment for something you are doing...my T seems as though she is now asking me to seek support elsewhere after giving me so much care and love...she seems overburdened with me...I feel so depressed and angry and sad!!....and I am so sorry you are going through something similar...it sucks!! It is so very painful...I'm so sorry...I wish I could offer something helpful...something to wipe away all of the hurt...I'd like to hear more...I hope you can keep posting...Sincerely, mlc

Hi Mic, thank you so much for responding. I am so sorry you are going through the same thing. I too can't believe how much it hurts. I wish I could take away your pain as well. A very wise love one just told me that he read a quote once that stated, "Rejection is God's way of protecting us from a relationship that will not be healthy for us." It's something I am pondering at the moment and thought I would pass it on to you. Please continue to share your feelings...talking with someone experiencing the same situation might help us both.
I'll be thinking of you,
Empty

Oh Empty, I'm so so sorry. This must be horribly confusing.

I just want to say that I firmly believe you did the right thing for you and your healing - you did the strong, brave, alert, healthy thing by bringing up a situation that was causing you a lot of pain and trying to talk about it and resolve it.

My read on this situation is that your commitment to your healing, your desire to not be in a destructive situation, and all the serious thinking and research you have done about this has prompted you to grow in ways that your T actually hasn't herself yet. She was quite right that she has bad boundaries. She may well feel that she cares for you and loves you, but because she doesn't understand boundaries - or herself - she has not set up a therapeutic relationship that can protect or heal you - instead what she set up causes you harm.

Her response tells you A LOT about her. When she said you 'seduced' her, she was denying her fundamental professional responsibility for the situation, which she also doesn't understand. She was also saying that her needs were so great and so important to her that she decided not to resist them. She decided to let you meet her needs in your therapeutic relationship, instead of focusing on you, which is her job. For a therapist to let therapy (that she is being paid for) be about meeting her own emotional needs instead of yours is a kind of exploitation.

It might be that giving and giving and giving is part of an unhealthy pattern in your life. Maybe you do that with the wrong people or at the wrong times, or in other ways that are harmful to you, I don't know. We all have these unhealthy patterns, that's why we go to therapy. But she didn't stand back and look at the pattern with you and help you understand what it was about. Instead she jumped right in and became part of the pattern.

It really troubles me that she blamed you for that, even for a moment. And I'm not surprised that you feel like you're being punished - given that she blamed you, it would be impossible not to feel punished. But it's terribly unfair.

I think you're quite right that you are in mourning - you had a lot invested in this relationship, and suddenly it has changed irrevocably - partly because you are understanding a lot more about it and why it was causing you such damaging pain.

I don't know what you will do now, but I hope for the moment you will treat yourself extremely gently, because you are going through a great loss. I think it is a loss that will really open up your healing in time, because you are understanding that certain kinds of destructive relationship are not okay with you any more. I think a time is coming when you won't feel so empty anymore. But for now, this is a great loss nonetheless, and I'm sorry.

((((((Empty))))))

Dear Jones,
Thank you so much. I am breaking down again as I read your response but I plan to read it several times tonight. I can't believe how much this hurts...my heart aches similar to death of my dad. I don't know how to make it stop.
Empty

Hi Monte,
Thank you for your wise words...they are so comforting and validating. My therapist has a PHD in Clinical Psychology but I don't know how long she has been practicing.
Empty

You're welcome, Empty. It is a huge loss - you bonded with her deeply, and it's a great great shame that she didn't take care of that bond.

What I am finding with my own pain at the moment is that the more I try to make it stop, the more it stays 'stuck'. My T is leaving for good in a couple of months, and in the meantime we are trying to do some stuff looking at my childhood that I am finding really painful and heavy.

I want to make it stop too... but when I admit how painful it is, and that I need care, and I do little things to take care of myself, it eases a little bit - it's weird, it's like the pain feels sharper but I can comfort myself too. When I fight it, I feel more numb and angry and I can't feel comfort.

My self-care this morning involves 1) going for a swim, 2) posting here, 3) telling my husband how I'm feeling and best of all 4) pouring a pot of tea instead of a cup. For some reason this makes me feel looked after!

None of these things fix the hurt. They just help me get through this little bit. I hope you can find some little things to give yourself care in this awful time too.

J

{{{{{{{{{Empty}}}}}}}}}}

I am so, so sorry to hear about how your T reacted to what was a very courageous move on your part. You've been working so hard to do the right thing, even going out and educating yourself on how therapy is supposed to go, your husband is supportive and rightly questioned the boundaries, so you gently brought it up...and then you were basically attacked for it, by the very person you trusted to care for you. My heart just hurts to hear how much you are suffering, and I'm so glad you are here talking about it and getting much-needed support.

I agree with all of the excellent feedback you've already received on this thread. I couldn't have said it better so I won't even try. Please keep coming here for support and encouragement as much as you need to. I'm so glad your husband is supportive too, that's so important. You need all the support you can get right now. You really need to hear in as many ways as it is possible to say, you've done absolutely nothing wrong!!! Not this, and not before this, either.

Your T messed up and she knows it. Calling you later to admit that she shouldn't have made that appalling crack about your husband was a beginning. I really hope she continues in that direction and gives you the more thorough explanation and apology you deserve, both for bending the boundaries, and for the awful way she treated you on Friday. From your posts I can tell how much you've come to love her and care for her, so I very much hope that your therapeutic relationship can be repaired. But IMO she needs to take all the responsibility and initiative for doing that, since it was her behavior that caused the problem. Please hear this one more time: You've done nothing wrong!!

Please keep coming here for support so we can help you get through this. {{{{{Empty}}}}}

SG

Whoa! Jones, this is why I thought you were a therapist-

quote:

My read on this situation is that your commitment to your healing, your desire to not be in a destructive situation, and all the serious thinking and research you have done about this has prompted you to grow in ways that your T actually hasn't herself yet. She was quite right that she has bad boundaries. She may well feel that she cares for you and loves you, but because she doesn't understand boundaries - or herself - she has not set up a therapeutic relationship that can protect or heal you - instead what she set up causes you harm.
Her response tells you A LOT about her.

Your words to Empty were so insightful. (good for me as well)

Hi Empty,
I am so sorry for your pain. Monte and Jones have your back. They are wise, and they read situations (based on posted material) rather well. There are lots of good people here. Stay connected- this site will help you sort stuff out. I have learned so so much.
Monte has it right to when she says-

quote:

My point is, these 'rejections' trigger old hurts. The pain we often feel seems so blown out of proportion to the 'crime' our T has committed, but the pain is surely about the old stuff lost in our sub-conscious. That 'stuff' just floats in there, unacknowledged, undealt with, unexpressed, unconnected, and when something remotely like the original source of pain comes along it latches onto it and comes out wailing and thrashing. I think. But of course that's not to dismiss the very real pain of being treated badly in the here and now.

Thanks for that Monte- it helps me too with my current dilemna. A great description of triggers. I did not know this- but it makes perfect sense.

Strummergirl is right (by the way- I like the capital- you will all be addressed with capitals by me- becausee you are important)

quote:

Your T messed up and she knows it.

and-

quote:

Please hear this one more time: You've done nothing wrong!!

Empty- did you know that all of the brackets/ sometimes parentheses around your name mean -many HUGS??

I offer mine too. ((((((Empty)))))Keep talking- it really does help, and hey you may have actually done your T a favor. Maybe she will start doing her own homework. A good T will see someone for their stuff when they need to. I just makes them better at their job.

Monte may I lift your description of triggers to incorporate into a letter to my T?
I am seriously considering taking a break from Therapy and trying to get my ducks in a row.

Hi again "Em",

I hope you don't mind my shortening your screen name...I just cringe at that word, because even though you may feel "empty", I can already see that you're really not. You are clearly "full" of compassion and intelligence and generosity.

One other thing I wanted to mention...

quote:

When I tried to explain something that "Strummergirl " wrote about me repeating a pattern of behavior with her that I engage in with others, she didn't understand me and instead her comments made me feel like she was accusing me of tricking her and that our whole beautiful relationship was just my way of getting something from her. This is not true!

Your T's not understanding this must feel SO crazy-making...it was the same kind of reaction I got at the other clinic I used to go to when I tried to tell them about all the reading I'd been doing here, and on a couple of other really fantastic websites, and about attachment theory and trauma. I had three T's trying to tell me I was just getting confused, reading too much and getting it wrong.

So when I went to find a new T (and let me make it clear, I am not saying you are going to need to find a new T - that's just how it worked out for me), I looked for the word "psychodynamic" in their treatment approach. Here is the definition of psychodynamic from the Psychology Today website:

"Psychodynamic therapy, also known as insight-oriented therapy, evolved from Freudian psychoanalysis. Like adherents of psychoanalysis, psychodynamic therapists believe that bringing the unconscious into conscious awareness promotes insight and resolves conflict. But psychodynamic therapy is briefer and less intensive than psychoanalysis and also focuses on the relationship between the therapist and the client, as a way to learn about how the client relates to everyone in her life."

That part I bolded is what you were trying to explain to your T. I just wanted to affirm for you again that this really is a valid approach in therapy. You are not crazy or misguided or not understanding what is going on. Your T apparently is not aware of this kind of approach. It is her lack of understanding, not yours.

Here is a link to a website that was very helpful to me in explaining this approach in a lot more detail:

Guide to Psychology - The Unconscious

When I first met my current T and started hesitantly explaining my understanding of these principles, she responded with full understanding and enthusiasm and confirmed for me over and over again that I understood these principles very well. Can you imagine my relief? So there really are T's out there who understand this.

From the stories I have heard, it seems like there are a lot of T's out there who have more of a "coaching" approach, where they challenge the patient's thinking and try to propose new ways of thinking about things, and that's as far as they're willing to go. There's nothing wrong with that, it is a very effective approach in many cases. Maybe that is the case with your T? But the fact that your T doesn't understand a more relational approach at this time, doesn't necessarily mean that you can't work with her. There are others on this board whose T's have become open to learning a more relational, "psychodynamic" approach, when it became apparent through the therapy that it's what their patients needed.

The learning curve can be really bumpy, though, and usually starts with a crisis like the one you've just experienced, so again I'm so sorry for the pain you are in right now. It is terribly painful and confusing, I know, and your tendency will be to keep wanting to think that this is your fault somehow and that you're doing something "wrong". Which is why you need to keep hearing that you are just fine, you are actually being very courageous and honest and strong, gently asking for what you need and actually taking very good care of yourself in bringing all of this up.

Please keep posting and reading...I'll be thinking of you.

SG

quote:

Everything I have done or said is because I love her so much. I told her so many times how much the amount of love I have for her scares me. I would do anything to make her happy

Hi Em (I like that SG) I am so sorry for all the pain you are in and I understand how much it can hurt when a T changes the rules in the middle of the game. We feel punished and humiliated. This has happened on a much lesser level with my T but each time it hurt like heck until I confronted him about it and we were able to discuss it and repair it. I am fortunate in that he is pretty open to hearing my feelings about how he behaves with me. But as someone said, the learning curve can be very bumpy.

What I quoted above really resonated with me because of something my T told me recently. He told me he did not want me twisting myself into something I thought I should be for him... that all he wanted was for me to be myself and that being myself would help me to discover who I really am (I struggle with this) and by knowing who I really am will enable me to also know him better. I guess because by being genuine with him I will understand his responses to me? In any event, what he wanted me to understand that being ME was just what I needed to be and that I would find his complete acceptance on the other end because who I am is a lot of really great things (again a struggle to acknowledge...but getting better).

You got a lot of great advice from the others who posted here. Your T did not have good boundaries and that was HER problem not yours at all. It is HER responsibility to set and maintain the boundaries and ours to test them and find them held with gentleness and care. She needs to keep YOU safe so that you feel secure enough to do the work that needs to be done in therapy, which at times can be scary. Therapy is about you and not her and she needs to keep her feelings out of it and by telling you how SHE felt about things she was taking the focus off your feelings and focusing on herself which is wrong. YOU did nothing wrong by bringing up this topic and being courageous enough to try to discuss it with her. That is a real sign of growth in therapy.

Sometimes we "attach" to our Ts because finally we are getting some of our needs met that were ignored in childhood. The level of intensity of this attachment can feel like life and death because that is how it really was when we were little, we needed our attachment figure to survive and if they turned away from us for some reason we could not survive. So the loving her so much it's scary may come from that. It also gives us something to lose when we admit how important someone is to us and that can also feel threatening.

Once the intensity of what recently happened lessens a bit perhaps you can try once again to discuss how her behavior made YOU feel. Her feelings should not be the focus. Hopefully this can be repaired. Having disruptions in therapy and then repairing them is an important part of therapy. I do this frequently with my T and we seem to come out stronger afterwards. The relationship with T is vitally important in processing any type of traum or attachment injury. I like to say the relationship IS the therapy. One of the things it teaches you is that disruptions do not mean the end of the relationship.

I hope you can work this out with her. Please keep posting and let us know how you are doing.

TN

quote:

If I never addressed it things could just be the way they were. I could live without the reciprocation but I need my therapist.

Hi Em,

My heart is so heavy as I just read your post. I feel your pain, as I've been struggling with my own issues with my T. They aren't as bad as yours though, and I really just am so very sorry that you have had to deal with this awful mess. I agree with everyone else here that NONE of this is your fault. Those of us with attachment injury long for love and support and kindness and care, and when we get it from our Ts, we can't help but love them and long to do whatever we can to secure their love. Your T clearly has boundary issues, and this is 100% her fault. She needs to own every bit of this and do all of the apologizing and repair of this relationship, even though you may feel you are responsible for what has gone wrong. Please don't blame yourself for this. She dropped the ball and then tripped over it, stumbled and fell flat on her face! I know you are confused and your heart aches. I agree that giving this some time and giving your T a chance to make some serious amends to you would be worth your while, but you do need to take some good care of yourself right now. Your quote above bothers me because you feel that things would be better off had you left this situation as it was, but I think you know that you did the right thing. As you can see by all of the supportive posts above mine, all of us know you did!! Yes, you need your therapist, but you need her to be doing what it healthy for you, not what harms you. If she's harming you, it's not therapy and it will only lead to more pain. Remember, what you did was very courageous and really does show that you are growing and stretching yourself and taking some huge steps in your life that are signs of wonderful changes within. Keep pushing yourself toward the positive! And keep posting here. We're all here to help and support you how we can!! ((((((Em))))))

MTF

"Em" - Ug. So many shrinks seem caught up in their own countertransference issues.. and then when we call them on it, they get defensive and blame the client. (I'm still stewing over my P telling me I "misconstrued" something he said to me. ) I'm so sorry you are hurting right now. No one deserves this sort of rejection.

quote:

Originally posted by helle:
Whoa! Jones, this is why I thought you were a therapist-

LOL. I've accused Jones of being a therapist, too. We'll get a confession out of her, yet!

Hi Echo-
Thanks for that!

Em- (Love that too, Strummergirl)
Hang in there, (((((Em)))))
This is good-

quote:

Please don't blame yourself for this. She dropped the ball and then tripped over it, stumbled and fell flat on her face!

I am writing- but gathering advice too.

Hello to all of you and thank you for your amazing support. I have read all your posts over and over again as I continue to try and process what is happening with my therapist.
I have started to think ahead to my planned appointment on Friday and I just don't know if I want to continue to have her as my therapist. I noticed that some of you posted that you hope I can work it out with her and that working through the problem might even be heathly for me. I must admit that my first instinct is to run and never see or talk to her again but I have done that before with other relationships in my life and it has left me feeling terrible.
However, in this situation my brain is really telling me to end it. There are many things I haven't shared that have happened over the last year that I finally shared with my husband this weekend and he feels they are quite dangerous to my well being. For instance, when I put pen to paper I realized that my gifts totalled close to one thousand dollars. Also I first began researching boudaries because some of the conversations my therapist engaged in with me included comments about sex with her husband and other highly personal information. These conversations left me confused and I had to work hard between sessions to block them from my mind. I started questioning her behavior but I am so attached to her I just try to ignore the uncomfortable stuff and focus on the good qualities of our relationship. So, I guess my question is are these issues too big to fix? Are these "red flags"? I don't know if I am strong enough to leave but like I said my brain is telling me something different.
Em

Hi Em,

"You got to know when to hold em, know when to fold em," as they say... I was thinking of you when I posted the clip on the other thread: especially, "every hand's a winner and every hand's a loser."

So, surely quoting Kenny Rogers as advice puts me out of the league of suspected therapists?! Seriously though, I don't mean to make light of your situation - it's a really tough call.

And no one else knows you and your situation and resources as well as you do. Different people will have different opinions, and they'll always be coloured by our own experiences as well as by the limited amount that we know of yours.

I can only say that if I were in your situation, I wouldn't want to keep working with this therapist. It wasn't a once off mistake, it was a range of problematic stuff that she let go on for a long time. She didn't stop it, you did. And when you did stop it, she reacted poorly. If it were me, I would now have great difficulty trusting this person's ability to help me develop emotionally, even if we were able to repair the loss of trust.

I've put a lot of time in my life into trying to get stuff out of relationships where that stuff just wasn't available. So one of the things I need to learn is how to 'fold', so to speak. In a situation like this, that's what I'd hope I could do. But for other people, it might be more beneficial to learn how to sit tight and try to grow together, depending on the situation.

I figure, though, if I'm putting the pain and hard work in to grow a therapeutic relationship, I want it to be with someone who can teach ME, not someone I have to keep an eye on. So that's my take... hope that you'll balance it with what other people offer and what you know for yourself.

If you ARE going to 'fold', though, maybe there's a way of doing it so that it's walking, instead of running (oh man, I can't believe I'm still milking it...) - maybe you can act thoughtfully and purposefully, and say what you need to say before ending, so you don't end up carrying all that stuff and feeling terrible.

J

What do you mean, Jones? My T quotes Kenny Rogers every week. Is this a red flag? Wait, are you my T?!
(Apologies, Em. I am a very silly and immature person.)

I agree with Jones. This therapist has caused a lot of damage, and it doesn't look like she's learning a lesson from it either. Run.

Em,

I hear your fears here. I have faced my own fears lately wondering if I should run and find a new therapist or stick with the one I'm with. I have had to wrestle with my head and my heart both and try to decide which one to go with, and it is tough. One thing that I have heard is that when we're faced with what to believe, the thought is always the lie, and the emotion is the truth. So for me, I realized that what my head was doing to me was making my confusion worse and I had to trust my heart. It took some prayer (but I'm a religious person, so that was MY angle) and really searching out what my heart was saying, not my head. It's not easy. I wish I could tell you what to do, but that is a decision that you alone can make for yourself. It's a hard situation that you have found yourself in, and your therapist has made A LOT of really big mistakes. You have to decide whether or not they are things you are willing to forgive and if you can get past them in your heart.

The first thing that needs to happen in my opinion is that your T needs to apologize. She needs to own all of this herself. Will she actually apologize for all of it? Will she own her mistakes honestly and feel the shame for what she has done to you and do all that she can to make amends to you for the wrongs she has done? Can she see her mistakes on both a professional and personal level? She has really goofed with you, and admitting to all of it is really saying that she doesn't know what she is doing as a therapist. I don't know that she is big enough to do that. Personally, I don't think there is much hope that you'll find any help with her. I know that accepting that when you're so attached to someone is really gut-wrenching. It is hard to walk away when you really just want to make it work. But like Jones said, for people like us that already don't do relationships very well, we need to find someone that can help us learn how to fix the problems we have within ourselves, not make them worse and not actually bring them out of us and nurse them along and intensify them. That is so incredibly harmful, and it pains me to think that is what you have been through. It actually makes me heartsick. Your therapist is there to help YOU grow and work through your stuff, not put you in a position where you feel like you're supposed to help her with her growth and her stuff. It's really sad that all of this has happened to you.

Please focus on YOU, and do what YOU need to do to help yourself get through and beyond this terrible situation and the pain in has created for you. I'm glad you have a supportive husband and that you are seeing things as clearly as you are. It's tough, but you are the most important person in the therapeutic relationship here, and you need to get the help and care you deserve with a therapist who can meet your needs and give you the right kind of support so that you can flourish in a healthy and nourishing relationship. All the best to you, Em.

MTF

PFFT! "Prooomise me Echo, not to dooo the things I've done..."

"Oh Eeeeeecho.... don't take your love to town..."

Sorry Em - hope you are having a little giggle too, through the tears. ((((Em))))

Hi Empty and welcome to the forums, sorry I'm late to the game! You've gotten a lot of good responses and I just wanted to reinforce a lot of what you've heard.

YOU HAVE DONE NOTHING WRONG! And we'll repeat that as many times as necessary until you believe it. The boundaries in therapy are ALWAYS the therapist's responsibility. A lot of people in therapy need to have good boundaries modeled because they weren't modeled for them as children. Therapy is supposed to be all about the patients' needs, so the patient is free to say anything or even do anything and it is the therapist's responsibility to not allow inappropriate behavior to stand or continue. If you do something inappropriate, then the T should gently let you know.

So as far as being seductive, I don't think you were being manipulative or seductive at all, you were using gifts to express your feelings. Therapy is a place where we will act the way we do in our other relationships but with a person who is supposed to remain non-defensive and objective so that we can examine our feelings and learn about what it is we do that gets us into trouble. Even if you were being seductive (which I posit only for the sake of making my point) it would STILL be your Ts responsiblity to MAKE SURE it didn't work. My T does accept gifts, but only on occasion and never expensive ones. And even at that we thoroughly discuss the gift. Why I gave it to him, what it meant to me, what I was trying to say. I once made him a counted cross stitch and when I gave it to him we spent a whole session discussing it. (He was extremely gracious and hung it in his office.) The truth is that the second your T felt any discomfort about your gift giving, it was her responsibility to gently confront you about what was going on and put a stop to it.

That part is bad enough, but what really concerns me is that when you did her job and brought it up, she got defensive and blamed you for the problem. Even if you had done something wrong, which you didn't, she shouldn't have gotten defensive. And her blaming you tells me she's making it more about her needs than yours.

I very much agree with what Jones said (excuse me, Dr. Jones ) that only you can make this decision but I must also say that my gut reaction to what you've said is RUN and don't look back. You need a therapist who will do their job and make it about your needs not their's.

I am so sorry for what you're going through, I can only imagine how very painful this is, and how confusing it must be to have her suddenly change her behavior so suddenly and even attack you. Please keep coming and talking about how you're feeling, the support here is really good and we can understand how you're feeling.

AG

quote:

I figure, though, if I'm putting the pain and hard work in to grow a therapeutic relationship, I want it to be with someone who can teach ME, not someone I have to keep an eye on.

Dont ask me- because I will tell you that it is a big RED FLAG
(((((Em))))))
The fact that you feel this badly about it, when all you did was to try and please her- says that she has work to do because she is placing the blunder on you.
I wont say any more because I can feel my self getting angry at your therapist, and clearly you are getting some good info from others.
Hang in there, Em,
Helle
Jones- I know many therapists that quote the ol Kenny Rogers, and they don't do it half as well as you do. Tee-he-he

Echo- I just read your reply- we think alike.
(That could be very scary for you- as my mind is often a scary place to be.
I only bought my T figs and an apple. We didn't discuss it. He ate them. (AG would make a good T as well.
Monte- I wont use your name, and what do you mean by stuff?