Posted by mair on January 12, 2005, at 12:46:10
In reply to Update and thoughts (long), posted by Skittles on January 12, 2005, at 3:59:31
I doubt I could add much to what daisy has said, except to stress that even working through the mundane details of how to handle telephone messages has value. My T and I have had the "when I can call" discussion on countless occasions, and I'm sure we'll have it again, because calling her is such a huge deal to me, and I'm far more like than not to talk myself out of calling her, even in fairly dire circumstances.
I think your recent experience points to a couple of things which have been raised by others. First, your safety is paramount to her and if she thinks it's endangered, she has to take fairly radical action. Maybe your T has been seeing through your facade well enough to worry that your phone call was more critical than it was.
Secondly, I think you need to accept that she is going to react as she did if she's worried enough about the possibility that you may hurt yourself. Thus, you owe it to both of you to work out the kind of message system Daisy is talking about. This is particularly true if you're someone who almost never calls. I think I mentioned that I've only ever called my T at home once. I have called her office a couple of times to cancel appointments, and even in those calls, I've left a detailed enough message for her to understand that I'm only cancelling on account of a scheduling problem and not because I can't face her.
Last, I think it serves neither of you any purpose for you to withhold information about how poorly you might be doing. If you bring it up, you can always use it as a vehicle to explain to her the difference between thinking about suicide, say, and being prepared to act on it. These types of conversations may make her understand the type of support you may need from her, and may reassure you that it really is ok to ask for that support outside of a session.
I think it's important that you not run away from this, because it sounds like you and your T otherwise have a good relationship. I'm pretty sure that working through this issue will strengthen that relationship, but it may take persistence on your part, and don't be surprised if you need to bring the subject up several times.
Mair
poster:mair
thread:440519
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050111/msgs/441177.html