Posted by Susan47 on September 9, 2004, at 11:20:15
In reply to Re: Pantt how old is this guy? Could it be a midlife?, posted by pantt on September 9, 2004, at 9:34:13
Gosh don't think you're feeling sorry for yourself. What you're going through and the stuff you're finding out about your poor confused-sounding therapist is really rough stuff.
I have a gut feeling he *has* been there for you (not that a gut feeling means much from overe here I guess). Let me continue with this gut feeling stuff, as it's the only thing I have to go on anyway, okay? Here's my feeling: he's doing the best he can and he likely cares about you very much, but he has his own life issues to deal with and I'll bet they get in the way. Maybe he has a secret desire to be cared for in the same way he cares about you. Sometimes I wonder how therapists cope with losing clients. I mean, it's their livelihood to care about clients; what happens when clients leave? Just a stray thought anyway. Maybe by telling you he wasn't married, he thought he could keep you around a bit longer. This is tough. Didn't you also say he wasn't charging you for sessions? See that seems a bit over the top too; maybe he fell into a trap the same way you might feel? I'm just throwing things out there so if something doesn't fit just discard it!
My personal experience is that when I was feeling as though I couldn't trust my therapist, I began to dislike him, and that made me extremely anxious; I had a few anxiety attacks (first in my life) where I thought I would die. I made a conscious decision to trust him no matter what. Most of the time that worked for me.
Psst... this is how hung up I was ... I drew a couple portraits of him and they're on the wall behind my computer screen so I look at his eyes a lot. They're his most prominent, caring feature. That helped me get over distrusting him. Anyway, now I'm just chewing the fat and not really being very helpful. What are your thoughts?
poster:Susan47
thread:385216
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040905/msgs/388693.html