SG - amazing that you saw your ex again just after having those feelings of acceptance - well done on walking on when you knew it was what you needed. And well done on going *into* the feeling and exploring through your writing and guitar - that's a beautiful thing to do with the pain, to let it fuel your creative experience. Seems to me that that kind of turns it into a willing exploration of being human, rather than just a necessary tolerance of the misery of life!! I love this... it feels...Read More...

Hey there TN. Thanks so much for updating us! I've been meaning to reply, but I have been pretty busy. I'm free now though! First, I'm really glad that your t suggested you two have a second meeting. Sometimes, it just takes more than an hour, and when THEY notice that, and don't want us to suffer for a week, it feels pretty good (even if we feel shitty and are having a hard time!). I SO understand this! Something about the fresh memory of something t says or does can really help to "melt"...Read More...

Yeah, I will keep yall posted on how it goes with the new people and if it helps imporove things with my P, since thats part of the point. Dealing with transference with somone you only see once a month is difficult and he wants someone near by that I can talk to weekly while trying to work through it with him. I am very thankful that he didnt drop me as a patient like I have heard other people on here say theirs did, but he said if I didnt have the therapist then he would stop seeing me.Read More...

Hi K, That's funny about the coincidence. A member of the other board I belong to also asked me whether my name has anything to do with Joe Strummer. It doesn't, I just made it up because I took up guitar a couple of years ago. But I guess I'm also a dork cause I like The Clash, too. My former T was actually very upbeat and had lots of that "giddy" energy you mentioned, especially in the beginning. Sometimes I saw him in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon, so no, I don't think time of...Read More...

Strummergirl- That poster is made of kick-a$$ LOVE ITRead More...

Hey, Helle! I'm so glad this helped... what you say here really matches up with what I understand - hopefully that means we are both on the right track, rather than both wandering down the garden path!! There are a couple of other things I'd add that have been helpful to me. One is understanding that we got those defences for really good reasons. If they are not helpful any more, we can still honour the little kid we were who was smart enough to come up with that defence when we needed it.Read More...

Whoa SG- this is me. I don't have anything to add, except thanks for this revelation- something for me to look at.Read More...

Free-on-Thursdays, I think I need to add something here. I, we (my T and I) do or try to do some work on my feelings (transference) for him. This is what my therapy is about now. It is mainly about how I feel and what I think while with him, without him, about him etc. Since he is "the transference object" now that should allow him to get better understanding of me, my feelings and eventually to proceed to "corrective emotional experience" (??). There are still things that I didn't tell him...Read More...

Married, and has a daughter.Read More...

Hmmmm SG I needed to hear that. I know that all of what you are saying is the same as my Old P is doing to me. But I am still not ready to stop going. He makes it all about him each and every time. At least I am only seeing him monthly now and also I am able to hold the boundaries better so that I don't stroke his ego. You are right we want to feel that we are special. Hopefully soon I will be able to lengthen the time between visits to every three months and just sit at that time distance...Read More...

Dear Echo and Free on T, Yes, it would be good to have someone to talk to that you did not have feelings for. I think you are right that some Ts probably do not know when someone is hiding feelings for them....or they do not want to admit it. I wonder if it is a trip for them to have people idealize them. I do have a P that i see every 4 mo for meds management. He is one great guy, but insurance does not pay for therapy from Ps. He does see me for an hour, though and has been wonderfully...Read More...

Hi CT, thanks for the really nice message. I do so many extreme swings in a week & it wears me out. I guess they are not so extreme on the grand scale of things, I can still get up, work, and so on but for me when the anxiety kicks in everything feels so total. I make myself keep going but inside I'm just racing and racing. Then when we fight I get these flashes of really violent images in my head, not memories, just images, and that scares me. One of the things I find hard about the...Read More...

Reading your stuff helps me, but why do we have to stick or stay with the garbage feelings? Why should we focus on the crap. My T says something about process, but I prefer avoidance. I too can not handle when T does not get back to me. I still hate talking to him ( or anyone) on the phone- much prefer txting. I too relate to the rejection issues.Read More...

J, at the end of my last session I started to mildly dissociate and my T brought it to my attention by saying, "You've gone someplace else. What is it? Do you want to talk about it?" It was only then that I realized I was rocking myself. I must have been acting child-like. I wasn't too far gone though because I was able to both comprehend her words and reply back to her. I said, "No, our time is up." (I thought this would get me off the hook.) She said, "It's OK. I invite you to talk about...Read More...

Hi Amazon I'm seeing a CBT Therapist, but not really doing CBT as of yet. I've only seen her three times so far and all we've talked about (other than getting to know my family history)is the transference. Is it working?? Not yet .. but she is trying to help me with it. After the holidays I imagine it will become more intense and I'll let you know how it goes. Merry Christmas HolzRead More...

Hey Halo I had told my P that I was attracted to her about 8 months before I quit. She's a Jekyll/Hyde person so at first she smiled and blushed then it was like she shook it off and became very brash with me. I don't think that it affected our therapy (which wasn't good anyway) but we never spoke of it again. I do feel much the same as you do .. I can't even drive in the area of her office without feeling a pull to go and see her, and the pain that comes with not being able to. I've even...Read More...

Wow, thanks, you guys. I take a step out of hiding and get virtually tackled. You really know how to make a girl feel welcome! *GROUP HUG* (((Summer, Mad Hatter, KS, Jones, Hummingbird, echo, Amazon, everybody else ))) It really is fun how your names just naturally come up when I’m talking to my T. It’s like you are intertwined with me and there’s no getting around it. So you know you really do make a difference to me, you all help me so much that you’ve become a part of me. Thanks for...Read More...

hi hb and jones, i have been bouncing around in my head and trying to get a handle on myself for a while now. sometimes i feel like everything is crystal clear and at other times it is muddy water that im swimming in. i sometimes feel that i am on the verge of discovering something yet cannot quite find the right words, know them or see enough to reach something. thats probably why i need therapy, to have someone nudge me in the right direction to get there to that moment of clarity where i...Read More...

Well, thanks HB, at least I know I'm on the right track. But then I don't want to be on the right track because that leads eventually to the end of the road and not seeing him anymore! Well, thanks anyway. I will try to enjoy and make the most of the wacky therapy worldRead More...

That was lovely...thank you for posting!!Read More...

Thanks, HB, it does feel very special. It's particularly strong because it feels like this approach, this way of managing the separation, was so perfectly tailored for *me*, it maybe wouldn't have worked for others but it was a result of her hearing what I needed and what I could handle. Yesterday I came home with waves of crossness for her having gone away at all, and that's subsided into feelings of just wanting to *snuggle in* to the relationship as I think about all the ways she cared...Read More...

TN - Right now I am trying to get brave enough to move closer to my T. She seems to be encouraging of this, but I would freak if she moved away as soon as I moved closer. I am so glad for you that you not only confronted your T, but that you recognized it wasn't you that was the problem. I think some of us blame ourselves for our T's shortcomings by saying to ourselves that since they are the expert then surely it must be ourselves where the problem lies. Perhaps this is often true, but not...Read More...

HB... I'm so sorry that I have been missing in action lately. I know that you are going through a rough patch and I have not been here to support you. I just wanted to say that I think you are handling things in your usual graceful and classy way. The story you wrote touched me deeply because I understand so well your journey as it mirrors mine in many ways. I wanted to ask you how you knew all those things about me. I think, though, that it was your description of meeting that "stranger"...Read More...

Welcome, Emma! I'm glad you took the step to introduce yourself and share some of your story. I know it can be really scary but I think you will find that you're among friends. It sounds like it's hard for you to make connections with others. I have that problem too. But the good thing is now that you've taken the first step here, you can keep practicing with us by continuing to post and maybe, eventually, it will help build the courage to make connections with people around you. SGRead More...