Posted by estrellita on December 2, 2007, at 22:48:20
In reply to Re: Yet another T attraction thread--trigger, posted by beautymarked on December 2, 2007, at 19:15:47
Hi beautymarked,
If it is not possible to have more sessions with this therapist (and it sounds like it's not), could you see someone else for a few sessions to help you get through this? It sounds kind of silly to me to suggest this (trying to address something that's hurting you by doing more of the same, sort of), but maybe if you see a woman instead of a guy you'd be able to get to the point where this isn't eating you up. I think you said something in your first post about not feeling comfortable with female therapists, but maybe that in itself would be a help. You might care much less what a woman would think of you, and she could be like a sounding board with an insider knowledge of therapeutic techniques. And (assuming you're more or less hetero), the fact that there's no risk of attraction there would probably be less appealing but easier to approach in a way where you're trying to reach a point of peace about the whole situation.
I think someone suggested maybe trying to contact him again. Personally, this sounds like a bad idea to me. I understand what you're feeling, though (not even necessarily about him being a therapist - just that feeling of wanting to be close to someone who seems unreachable). If you do decide to contact him, say what you want to say, keep it as short as you can, tell him what you hope to get out of contacting him, and then leave it at that. Don't contact him again after that. (I did this with a long-time crush - wrote him one email, and never heard back. I gave it a shot, he apparently wasn't interested, and once I realized he wasn't going to respond, I honored my agreement with myself to move on emotionally.)
The other option is to figure out a way that you can, on your own, put this to rest. I know that feels pretty near impossible right now, but find a way to do it. Imagine that you did get to know him, and you found out that he has some really bad qualities, or something? Try to make him more real, and less idealized, in your mind. Because you know what, he IS real. And being real means we hurt people's feelings, we do selfish things, we don't recycle as much as we should, and do all sorts of other horrible things. This might not work at first (even if he does do those things, I still want to be close to him!), but over time it might put a dent into your idealized, mysterious version of him and you'll gain a little distance from the strong feelings you have right now. A starting point for me would be wondering what kind of therapist refuses to tell someone what their style is...maybe I'm wrong, but to me this is a perfectly reasonable question and there's no reason not to answer it truthfully. What the heck was he thinking when he refused to answer that?!?
It's okay to feel the way you do. Just try to realize that the feelings you have right now are preventing you from focusing on other things in life. I'm saying this not in a scolding way, but in a completely empathetic way (as you probably realize from my question last week). The more time we spend laying around, dreaming about "what if," the less time we have for getting out there and actually finding out what if!
It sounds like you're feeling really unhappy with yourself right now because of how you're responding to this situation. Know that eventually, it won't be this way - you'll get tired of putting so much energy into thinking about this person. Maybe try to turn it around in the meantime and ask yourself what it is about the situation that is causing YOU to spend so much time/energy on it. Make it about you, and use it as an opportunity to gain insight into yourself. If you find yourself obsessing even about this, then find a way to escape those circular thoughts for a while - watch a movie, read a book, cook an amazing meal, go shoot some hoops or kick a soccer ball around...whatever. Do something that requires your focus to the point where you have no room to think about anything else but what you're doing right then.
Finally, your situation reminded me of this saying: Suis-moi je te fuis, fuis-moi je te suis. (Follow me and I run away, run away from me and I follow you.) There's something about wanting what you can't have, isn't there? We try to tell ourselves that that's not why we want it so badly, but I think there's a lot to the idea...
I hope something in what I've said will help you!
poster:estrellita
thread:798087
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20071120/msgs/798382.html