Posted by partlycloudy on May 31, 2005, at 10:02:53
My therapist I'd seen for over a year closed her practice last December because she felt stressed and overworked. She gave me a week's notice when this happened. Now I get to read her advice column in the local newspaper every Sunday. Her advice is invariably, "get professional help" LOL.
So I found another therapist with whom I've been working well. She has a really heavy casesload as she is on call every other weekend at a hospital's ER for psych consults, plus she sees patients privately (like me).
Last month she became quite ill with pneumonia. She's still coughing and wheezing and is talking about closing her practice. We did not schedule another appointment after I saw her last week as I am doing so "well".
I don't feel well. i feel repeatedly abandoned. No wonder I don't form any attachments to my therapists. They bail out on me because they are burned out.
At this point I fail the see the value of therapy for me. At my last appointment my T said I was going in a great direction - I left my stressful job, and I'm working with a local women's support group for my alcoholism. My depression and anxiety have not abated, but my anxiety is not situational - I can go out and function in social situations and realize where my limitations and boundaries lie. if anything, this therapist and the one before expressed admiration for the strides I've taken.
So - it's OK for me to be depressed and anxious, then?? Just keep taking pills as prescribed and don't drink. My melancholy is persistent, though I haven't cried for several days. I'm in a horrible temper, though, and royally pissed at my therapist, who now I realize, specializes in treating those in crisis, and perhaps was never interested in ongoing long term treatment.
I don't want to go through finding another therapist and having this happen all over again.
I feel pretty lost right now.
poster:partlycloudy
thread:505736
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050528/msgs/505736.html