Hi Lady... I'm so sorry to hear of your rough session today. It struck a chord with me because I just last week told my T I felt he was getting frustrated with me or losing patience because I was not going "fast enough" in therapy or I was taking too long... And he reassured me that however long I need that is how long it will take and that I was doing just fine. I was relieved to hear that. I don't think there should ever be a reason for a T to get really angry with a client. If he does then maybe some countertransference is getting kicked off in them. My T HAS gotten defensive on more than one ocassion and that has really thrown me because I felt that he could not handle my feelings and that scared me. Now I call him on it when I see him get defensive and he has been much better about monitoring his own emotions. I asked him once if he could let me know if I was getting him angry and he told me that he could not imagine I could do anything to make him really angry. (Was that a challenge??) Anyway, I would react the same as you if that happened to me. When someone is that aggressive with me I "freeze" and am unable to think straight. That comes I think from growing up in an abusive situation where you have disorganized attachment.

I'm glad he went back to his usual self eventually but I'm sure it cast a shadow on your session. Maybe he thinks by asking those questions you were somehow being resistant to talking about things on a deeper, more intimate level?? But, in my opinion, the relationship you have with him is an important part of your therapy and you should be free to discuss it at any time.

Don't know if that was much help. But I can identify with your feeling of leaving the session "reeling" as I have felt that way on a number of ocassions for different reasons. I usually end up either emailing him or calling him before my next appointment when that happens.

TN

Thanks TN - I've just emailed him to tell him that I'm now throwing up and it feels like I'm in shock...

L

lady
so sorry you had a bad time in therapy. perhaps it will lead to a better understanding between you and your T. I personally have not experienced this, but probably because i do so much editing with my T that he doesn't have time to show anger with me. he's too busy figuring out why i'm even in the office to see him usually. he has even asked me why on 2 different occasions--which in my mind is the equivalent of him telling me he wishes i was not there! i have my 1st session in 2 months scheduled this week (I had stopped because we both agreed i was "finished" awhile back). how embarrassing is that gonna be to go back so soon ?!!!
anyway, hope your next session gets everything all cleared up for you. i'm glad you were able to let him know how he was coming across. it does sound like some counter-transference to me too.

Thanks AJB

Oh Lord I hadn't considered counter-transference. Things are complicated enough I don't even want to consider going there....

L

Hi Lady

Sorry to hear that you had such a bad meeting with your T, it certainly doesn't help you deal with your issues by adding stress/anxiety to the pot does it!

You asked if anyone else had been through what you had described, so I thought I would share my story too.

I had been seeing my P for about 14 weeks, during that time I had spoken very little, despite how badly I wanted to. One visit after looking around the room and not finding the strength to talk about anything, I looked at her and said "I really have nothing to say today" (in hopes that she would lead me to something). She stopped me there, turned to her desk, opened her book and said "Fine, we'll stop our sessions and when you feel that you are able to participate, call me and we'll try again". I broke down at that point and cried like a big baby, (which I don't do) and was able to tell her that she couldn't end the visits because I needed to be there, I didn't know what I would do if I wasn't going there and I was just very scared to do this.

She said that she would carry on and was glad that I finally had made some progress. I spoke to my GP about it the next day and she told me that chances are the P had to try a drastic technique to get me to either open up, or go away and think about it. It seemed to have worked, I'm glad to say that the last three sessions I have been able to talk about issues, but am struggling now with "owning" them.

I wonder if your T was thinking the same thing and his technique was to display frustration with you in order to get some sort of reaction from you!?

Hi Lady
It sounds to me that he was experiencing a counter transference. Regardless of his reason (concious or unconcious sp) it is his responsibility to manage the counter transference. Often the counter transference can be explored in sessions for.

My suggestion is to tell him exactly how you feel. Let him know how you are managing as a result of the session. Ask him to clairify what he said. It is important that you dont run from this. There may be great healing in this for you personally. Hopefuly your therapist will learn too.

Pls let him know how you are feeling. It is my guess that talking with him with strengthen the theraputic alliance.

Be wel
Megabyte

Thanks Hollybaby and Megabyte for sharing...I think it may be a mixture of both counter-transference and a deliberate tactic to jolt me!! However, as I said earlier I contacted him to tell him that I'd been sick etc and HE HAS NOT REPLIED!!! This has not happened before so now as you can all imagine my mind is working overtime. Is he really fed up, is it another ploy, what can I do...wait until next session?

Lady

Hi Lady,

I would say that you have to wait for your next session and start it off by talking about how you are feeling about this. Hopefully you don't have a long period between sessions!

Has he always called you back in a timely manner on other calls? Think of the positive side, maybe he has been off for a couple of days

I hope that everything works out for you!{{Lady}}

LOS,
Sorry its taken so long to reply, life is insane. I can see why that session left you reeling. Either your T did a really bad job of holding the boundaries by letting WAY too much of his own emotional reactions leak through OR he was being deliberately provocative which reeks of manipulation and could be very damaging to the trust.

Do I remember right that you have been working with him long-term but the transference is fairly recent. I am wondering if he hasn't had a lot of experience dealing with transference and/or is frustrated with his own feelings of not being able to help you, so he's projecting that frustration onto blaming you. I mean if we want to experience a relationship in which expressing our feelings and doubts gets us treated with scorn and anger, we just have to go visit our family of origin.

And he's compounding the problem by not getting back to you in as timely a manner as usual.

I think (yes, I am that predictable) that you definitely need to talk to him about this. You need to be able to talk about how you felt about his behavior. I am hoping he's going to be able to give you an explanation that you are comfortable with. As much as we hate to admit it, our Ts are human and sometimes can be dealing with someone in their own lives that prevents them from being with us the way they should be. An important part of boundaries is a T keeping their own emotional turmoils to themselves, but sometimes it slips.

I remember going to a session with my first T once and when I sat down and looked at her it was evident she had been crying. I asked her if she was ok; that we could skip the session if she needed to and I loved the way she handled it. She looked straight at me and told me that she had just got some upsetting news in a phone call but she was ok and felt like she was fine to go on with the session. I really appreciated her being honest and confirming that my perception was correct.

So talk to him. The best thing about having a disruption like this is that when its repaired the relationship is stronger than ever.

But I know how painful and scary this must feel; I'm not suprised you were throwing up. BUT please keep in mind that more than likely his behavior has nothing to do with you. We have a tendency to go straight to it being our fault or about some wrong with us when that's really not true.

(((((LOS))))))))

AG

AG, HB et al...thanks so much...I go into my session today so will keep y'all posted. Still haven't figured out the time zone on this site...reckon I'm about 10 or 11 hours ahead of y'all.

L

Well...here goes. I had my follow up session yesterday and a lot of stuff happened. Essentially I told him I think I seem to have a problem with male anger (no idea where that's coming from and we didn't pursue it for the moment).

Anyway, as some of you suspected, there was a bit of 'tough love' here in that he believed if he responded to me after the session then I wouldn't learn anything. Now, he did, in fact, respond and in his own words 'broke my own rule' by doing this. In other words he responded to me when he felt he shouldn't. Now I did ask if this was more about him than me and to be honest I don't remember what the response to that was. I have a strong sense of being pushed to stand on my own two feet and that he reckons that supporting me in the way he has been doing so far will no longer be as valuable. I understand this but I don't feel ready for such a change but that may be just what I need. I did manage to say that I'm not ready to finish with him and he got that and reassured me that this was not what he was suggesting although it felt like it to me. He did say he does not have all the answers and I found myself saying 'well you're the expert so don't be asking me how you should do this'...then we got on to talking about my feelings for him and he told me I wasn't being explicit enough...oh dear here we go again I thought...I'm going to have to spit this out and then time was up so relieved until next week.

L

Lady,

I've been getting some of the "tough love" thing recently, too, and the "stand on your own two feet" thing, as well. Of course, they don't make any suggestions on HOW to go about this. Again, it's the DYI School of Psychotherapy. It pisses me off and makes me wonder, yet again, what the role of the therapist is...I mean other than to create mass amounts of confusion, then tell us to "stand on your own two feet."

Yeah, I'm struggling right now to find the value in this whole business. So far, it seems to have done more harm than good.

Russ

Hi Russ

I saw your other post on just how pi**ed off you are. To be fair to my guy I have known him a very long time on and off over the years so I don't think I'm coming from the same place. Your other post suggests you don't seem to have much faith in your guy at the moment whereas I do, really, trust mine fundamentally. I can, however, identify with your 'more harm than good' comment. Sometimes I feel like I came into this with one set of problems and now I have a whole new set!!!

L

Lady,

It's not that I don't have faith in my guy. In fact, I think he's highly competent and insightful in his analysis. It's his style that I find maddening.

The bottom line is that I'm finding the lack of actually feeling better infuriating and depressing. I'm sick of feeling like hell all the time and I just want the whole thing to end. I don't really know how symptoms go away via therapy. I'm starting to think it's pure luck when/if it happens.

I don't mean to sound so defeatist. I'm just losing patience.

Russ

Hi Russ

Gotcha! and I fully understand the not knowing when the symptoms go away. I think of it as when I'll be 'cooked' and I have no idea of what or when that will be or if I'll even recognise it.

I so, so , so identify with how you're feeling..from being fed up to just running out of endurance and stamina.

Not to trivialise anything but have you seen this?
http://www.theonion.com/conten...urce=tv.theonion.com

I found it on another post on this site - inspired!!

L

Cooked! I love it. "When will I be done baking!"

Oh man, that Onion thing is hysterical. I love the part of "The Natural Way to Feel Shitty" being a diet of corn syrup, white bread and a total lack of exercise, and the bit about reducing costume theme parties is priceless.

Great stuff.
Russ