Posted by pseudoname on July 16, 2006, at 17:22:51
In reply to Love and Affection, posted by orchid on July 16, 2006, at 2:29:46
I guess we are all different. Well, different in where we need help, at any rate.
I would like my therapist or pdoc to *respect* me, hear me out, take me seriously, etc, but I don't think they're in a position to love me. When Ts & pdocs showed that they really were touched by my situation, it was nice, but therapeutically beside the point. (For ME.) I would look for love from somewhere freer, where the relationship could go somewhere. I don't mean just romantic love. For me, the therapy relationship, as I said in the previous thread, is too constrained for me to take seriously the idea that the T loves me.
Where I've gotten respect from a T, it hasn't translated into feeling worthy of respect in the world. Feeling respected is essential for working with them, but it wouldn't itself for me be therapeutic. I've thought it's probably the same for those who need affection from a T, but I'm clearly wedged into a perspective.
But as I've been crawling out of my decades-long depressive dungeon, I'm finding that I undergo therapeutic change by looking to see how much *I* love *others*; I'm surprised to find lots of feeling there sometimes.
I also wonder about cause-and-effect in people who seem cured by being loved. When I was severely depressed, I could not have felt loved by anyone. Maybe now I'd be more open to it — as long as I loved them, I think. (Some confusion; it's a new landscape I'm dealing with.)
poster:pseudoname
thread:667430
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060703/msgs/667554.html