Posted by Lucie Lu on June 30, 2008, at 11:12:40
that seems to be getting worse rather than better. It concerns how I feel about my relationship with my T. There are two opposite poles in terms of how I experience him and our relationship. Try as I might, the two "realities" never seem to get any closer to each other, much less become integrated. Black and white.
At one pole, I am able to recognize, and take in internally, my T's warmth and caring, our strong connection, his helpfulness and good will, the great lengths he has gone for me, affection between us, even the quirky or irritating things about our relationship. At the other pole, I experience him as this person who is cold, artificial and uncaring, dismissing and disdainful of me, who's only in this for the money and who forgets about me the minute I walk out the door. This is completely unlike him, and it seems like a stranger inside me who seems determined to paint such a dark picture. I can't keep on working in therapy, as I have been, with this "stranger" tugging at my sleeve, demanding to be heard. My T and I have covered this ground many times, but still don't understand exactly WHAT it is that demands to be heard.
I know that many or most patients experience such ambivalence at one time or another about their T's. The major problem here is that this mistrustful part remains completely untouchable, almost like someone else. It is like arguments going on inside my head; I can hear and respond to one "voice" or the other but not both. It was a major problem early in therapy (admittedly when I was a complete basket case) but then subsided, became less important as I worked on other things. Then recently, despite several years of good therapy and lots of progress, it returned with a vengeance. It seems completely resistant to my T's positive words or actions. Sometimes I feel there are three in the room him, me, and someone who is sitting back, resistant, suspicious, challenging. Anyone see Lord of the Rings and that memorable scene where, while the hobbits were sleeping, Gollum argues with his "other self" about whether to be nice to the kind hobbit or kill him?
Sometimes I find myself wanting to quit therapy to avoid the internal conflict. My first post here talked about an impasse that I thought was about my T, but now I suspect that the impasse is within me instead.My T and I have talked about this problem ad nauseum but haven't figured out how to neutralize or integrate "the stranger." Lately I have begun to insist that what I need is for my T to be more real with me, more and more emotional disclosure, to help me block out this other voice (transference?). The last session we had before I went away was extremely tense for both of us, as I just kept going on with this and he was increasingly frustrated and exasperated because he just didn't know what he could say or do in response to my distress. That last session was about 3 weeks ago.
Now I see him again tomorrow. I am terribly anxious about seeing him again. Not because I think he's angry but because after sessions where this conflict has dominated, I tend to fall apart afterwards and dissociate, which is scary and painful. Ultimately I don't think he can help me until I can shed more light on what's going on inside me. But the more I try to figure it out, the more it scuttles away from me and I just can't catch hold of it :(
poster:Lucie Lu
thread:837294
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20080616/msgs/837294.html