Posted by mair on May 15, 2003, at 21:14:03
In reply to Re: Mortification » mair, posted by judy1 on May 15, 2003, at 12:00:13
Thanks everyone
Cancelling appointments is not a very realistic option no matter how much I might like to skip. If I left a message on my therapist's machine, I know she would track me down to persuade me to come in even if to talk about why I don't want to be there. She's been pretty clear that she thinks it would be a very bad idea for me to terminate or even cut back on therapy and that she would be proactive in making sure I didn't do that. I know she'd probably convince me to come so if that's the end result, why put her to the trouble of having to persuade me? I'm also too polite to just not show, so what happens is that I ruminate alot about whether I should cancel until it's too late to do anything but show up.
I went back there today with some trepidation. The first thing she asked me was how I felt being there. She could read me well enough from the time before to know that I probably wasn't going to feel great about how things had gone, but i think she was surprised that I was upset enough to want to hurt myself. Of course it doesn't take much to trigger those impulses anyway.
We went through things pretty carefully about what causes the paralysis that seems to overtake me sometimes mid-session. We've worked this through before so it probably shouldn't bother me as much as it does when it happens.
Without going into great boring detail, suffice it to say that I know that all of the difficulties I have opening up to her arise from the reasons I'm still in therapy to begin with; she's pretty well convinced that alot of this is transference and I'm playing out with her numerous barely remembered encounters with my father. I tend to think that transference is a convenient explanation. I think, although I can't really say it well, or even at all, that I'm pretty uncomfortable with the fact that I'm starting to care too much about what she thinks about me. Feeliing totally disconnected from her was an easier place for me to be.
I so much appreciated the thoughtful responses I got from you, my most excellent sages. I think this is just something I'll have to keep plugging away at with varying degrees of distress. I felt not as traumatized leaving my session today, but I am emotionally on edge and pretty well spent. I hate this low grade persistent state of anxiety I'm in now - maybe I just need to step back and go at things in therapy more slowly.
BTW Noa, I'm so impressed with those of you (Dinah too) who are able to show things you've written to your therapist. I'm not quite sure what I'm trying to hide, but I really can't see doing that at all.
Fondly,
Mair
poster:mair
thread:226377
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20030407/msgs/226934.html