Posted by Racer on September 15, 2005, at 20:00:53
In reply to sending letter to ex-t --- good or bad idea?, posted by shrinking violet on September 13, 2005, at 13:27:27
I am in the process of writing a letter to an ex-pdoc, to tell him how betrayed I felt by him. For me, it's great to be able to express some of what I felt, and to clarify some of it by having to write it down so that it's comprehensible.
But I won't ever send it.
I'll probably take it in to my therapist's office and use it as the basis for a session, because I think that there's a lot of good that can come out of that. Talking to her about how the whole situation made me feel, what my reactions to it were, how much time and energy I've put into thinking things that start out with "if only I'd done..." All those things are valuable, and will help me learn how to avoid blaming myself for all the bad things that happen to me.
Sending the letter, on the other hand, won't do anything good for me. What would happen if I did send it?
1. He'd read it, but I'd never know that he had or what he thought about it. No satisfaction for me there.
2. He'd read it, and get a restraining order. Certainly no satisfaction there, plus the humiliation of the whole thing.
3. He'd read it, and he'd respond with his side of it -- since I can virtually guarantee that, even if he thought he'd made a mistake in his treatment of me, he certainly wouldn't admit that to me. So that response would be all about how I was wrong -- same thing that hurt me to begin with.
Those are about the only outcomes I can think of, unless you believe that pdocs can send flying monkeys to do their dirty work. ;-)
I guess what I'm trying to say is that you might find it more useful for yourself to sit down and spend some time trying to work out what you want from this? What are you trying to get out of it? It's very unlikely that your ex-T is going to respond saying something like, "Oh, I just didn't understand -- I"m so sorry I hurt you, and you really are a brilliant star. Please forgive me!." Much more likely that you'll never get a response at all, in which case there might not be all that much point in sending it in the first place, don't you think?
I hope that makes sense. Good luck, whatever you decide.
poster:Racer
thread:554680
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050912/msgs/555408.html