Posted by Dinah on September 8, 2006, at 10:11:43
In reply to Falling off the pedestal, posted by littleone on September 6, 2006, at 21:52:08
Littleone, how are you feeling?
I can understand how upsetting it can be to hear things about people that don't fit your view of them. Even if it wasn't a pedestal knocking thing, I think it'd be discombobulating for a while, as you reassess things.
Is your main concern that he can't protect you if he's not perfect?
It sounds more like you are afraid you'll harm him if he's not perfect.
Littleone, that isn't true. Therapists are trained to take care of themselves. On a pedestal or not, you don't have to take care of him. He can take care of himself. They know how to do that through supervision, through getting therapy themselves if they need to, through many many ways, some of which they try to teach us.
It doesn't matter whether you're afraid you'll harm him by telling him things from your past, or if you're afraid you'll harm him by saying unkind things to him.
You won't. The boundaries of therapy that are so annoying to us are the real protection for us and also for them. It allows real imperfect beings to be therapists and to help their real clients.
Sometimes... Sometimes knowing that therapists are flawed can help as well. I was disclosing something I was ashamed of the other day. And I said something along the lines that he'd never do such a thing. After a bit of thinking, he said he probably would. It felt better than if I had disclosed the same thing to a paragon of virtue and strength who would have probably thought "*I* the great would never do such a thing."
To me, there's something rather lovely about the idea of flawed human beings helping flawed human beings.
poster:Dinah
thread:683806
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060826/msgs/684223.html