Hello Melba and welcome to the forum.

Oh I’m so sorry you’re feeling like this. When you say you feel like you are back at the beginning, do you mean that you have finished with your T, or that you don’t feel like you’ve gotten anywhere, or have you been out of therapy and now feel like the time you’ve spent in therapy hasn’t helped after all? Sorry for all the questions.

I can relate to feeling like exploding with rage - it sounds like you’ve been let down big time. Do you want to say anymore about it?

I’m sorry I’ve not been there and healed, as you ask, I’ve only just started with a new T and don’t know yet how it’s going to pan out. But in relation to talking about it - I believe that talking about the pain does ultimately help heal it. Ultimately. But that it depends on who you’re talking to. I think the pain has to be properly heard and understood by whoever is hearing you talk, just talking for the sake of talking gets nowhere IMO.

I hope you feel able to tell more about your story here, they’re a very supportive and understanding bunch of people here.

As an aside, your post might not get many views down here, as most messages get written on the boards above. You might want to think about moving your thread to one of the other three main forums?

Welcome again.

LL

Hi LL, Thanks for the reply, sorry I wasn't very clear in my post, I've been with my current T for 6yrs. What I mean about being back to the beginning is how I was during my first yr of analyst with her, accusing her of not doing enought etc, until I learn what a enought is. Actually as I wrote that last sentence I have a voice inside my head saying, thats your answer, you know she is giving you enought, but that very young part inside doesn't see it like that yet again. It feels reawakened and back to those first early feelings. My therapist says I have my volume set to high that I am not able to take in the quite caring. Right now I just dont understand how her listening and me talking and protesting about my pain is going to heal it. Its like I just want to be with her 24/7, merged, nothing less then that feels enought. I am afraid I won't have the ablity to take the time it takes to keep up this level of pain and just talk about it, it feels like I will attack her if I have to sit there as she "empathetically listens". I am afraid my anger will become uncontrollable.

sorry I dont know how to move this thread now its here.

Hi again Melba. Oh I think I see what you mean now - wow 6 years is a long time and to feel as if you’re back at square one now must really be hard to live with. (For what it’s worth, I don’t think you’re really back to square one, this sounds like an important and necessary stage of your healing, it just feels as if you’ve not gotten anywhere - does that makes sense?)

Others on this forum have a whole lot more experience than me of younger parts emerging and needing more caring than mere words give, and also share the need to be with T MUCH more than just once or twice a week, but I can imagine how you must be feeling right now. I certainly relate to the anger that’s roiling away - that’s such a hard thing to bring to therapy (or to have to feel anyway!) If you’ve been with her six years, chances are she will be able to cope with whatever anger you throw at her - can you use words to start off with and try telling her how angry it’s all making you feel? You may find that what feels like really destructive anger and rage may not come out as destructively as you fear. But yeah it’s a bad place to be in. I hope you are able to stay with your T and keep working with the pain - it doesn’t seem like nearly enough, but can you see any other way out?

I don’t quite understand your T’s words about the volume being set too high - does she mean that she’s saying she IS giving you all this care and understanding but that you’re not hearing it? Hmmm.

I wish there were something I could say to reach you and give you some comfort with all this. Just know that you are supported here and even though we only have words (damned words!), they will be kind words.

By moving the thread I just meant maybe you want to start a new thread in Coffee Talk, or Stories, or Questions forums - and copying and pasting in the posts from here. Those are the three forums that people use the most, and I know there are other people on here who would relate very much to what you’re talking about, but they might not see your thread down here.

Sending you lots of good thoughts Melba

LL

Melba,

Hi and welcome. I have found that T is not a linear process. In other words, the same issues are revisited again and again and each time they are explored the depth of the exploration changes. So, while it may feel like you are back at the beginning, you really are not. You have just dived in pretty deep into an area that I'm guessing you have already explored on some level before.

Reaching those younger parts is hard and when you do there is often so much overwhelming raw emotion there that it can be hard to deal with. It sounds like this younger part of yourself has what my T calls a nourishment barrier. Your T is telling you to know that she cares, but you can't feel that she cares because for whatever reason it sounds like this caring or experiencing of the relationship is triggering the defenses of this little part. Little ones are programmed biologically to need their caretakers 24/7 and it is a life and death situation. So now, even though your body is all grown up, this little part is still experiencing the life/death threat of being separated from her safety and support with T. How open is your T to working directly with this part? What about the use of transitional objects to help soothe this part between sessions? Is it possible to have more sessions during this period of time?

I hope that what I've said makes sense or at least resonates with you in some way. Thinking of you.

Thanks for the replys. T does allow unlimited email, in the past I use to take books from her shelves, but to be honest I feel theres a blockaged there too, I look at the transistional object and feel as if its a "pretend" thing, I think perhaps thats because I was adopted and having transistions isn't a positive experience in my case.

I'm sure this will pass too, but its hard to experience such intense emotions as you all know so well.

Thanks

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ply

I know how you feel. I yelled at my first shrink the he did nothing, and I wanted to hit him too. My current T has endured a lot of abuse too. I also wanted to hit her. I told her this and she looked a little concerned, I have a history of being VERY aggressive. My psych said to me during one of my visits I was making good progress in my therapy. Really? I asked what does that mean? He told me I was much calmer and I didn't worry as much. Really? I asked my therapist what does it mean I am making progress, "What do you think is means." ahh! she always asks that question. So, I asked my husband if he thought I was making progress, was I different. "Yes," Really? "You do not get as angry as you used too, and you are not explosive." Really? I had changed, made progress after two years in T and I had not even realized it. Ask people around you if they see a difference in you.