Posted by onceupon on February 5, 2009, at 10:59:22
In reply to If my Therapist doesn't call......, posted by Sharon7 on February 4, 2009, at 19:14:33
I apologize if I'm repeating here, as I haven't had time to thoroughly read everyone's responses...
I've certainly felt similarly with previous therapists (but less so with my current one - I'm not so sure why). It hurts to feel like just a number on a file, or a time slot in a week. And it's not much of a stretch to start assuming that therapists don't care or that they don't notice when you're gone. For some extremely overworked or burned out therapists, perhaps that's true. But if your therapist noticed that your pattern is to write after particularly intense sessions, then it sounds like she's paying attention (in the sense that she has to remember previous sessions with you in order to piece this together).
You said that your therapist has brought up this pattern in the past. I'm wondering how your conversation around that went. Were you able to come to a mutual understanding about that process, why you feel the urge to write, what it says about your relationship with her, etc.? If not, it seems like that might be a fruitful topic to revisit.
"Even if I do go, it would be hard to not express my disappointment and sadness that she didn't care enough to see how I was doing since our last session was so rough."
I'm curious too what would be most difficult about expressing your disappointment and sadness. Don't get me wrong, I know what would be difficult about it for *me* (I'd probably fear being ridiculed) but gaining more understanding about this might be helpful for you.
"I've read others post about how their T will call them, or tell them they can call, or email. My T has never said I could call her and has never offered her email. She knows I'll call her if I need to, and the few times I have, she's always called me back, but she does not by any means encourage it. And I get mixed signals from her, although admittedly, my radar is shot."
My therapist has never encouraged me to call. In fact, I don't think I ever have, outside of scheduling stuff. Not because I haven't wanted to, but because I'm balking at asking her if she has a policy about phone calls. For me, this is about simultaneously wanting and fearing further contact with my therapist. Have you ever discussed your therapist's phone/email policy? And as far as radar goes, I struggle with this a lot. I'm hypersensitive to the slightest signal of rejection and can, in fact interpret just about anything to signal rejection. What I'm working very hard on is reality testing these perceptions with my therapist. Whether or not I believe her responses is another question :) Could you imagine directly talking about any of this with your therapist?
As for continuity, I've found it hard in the past that my therapist does not bring up previous difficult topics, as much as I might like her to. And she doesn't always remember what we've talked about either. This is tricky in a lot of ways. I think that sometimes therapists want us to take the lead, and so they won't suggest a direction for a session. And sometimes, they just forget things about us. It's human, so I'll give them that, but it's devastating too. I know there have been previous posters who have discussed how upsetting it is to have therapists forget critical past events. Hmm, what am I trying to say here? I think just that, even though we have different expectations for our therapists than, say, our hair stylists in terms of the care and attention they pay us, in the end, therapists aren't perfect either (darn it!). What I'm finally figuring out is that so much of the work for me in therapy is about experimenting with interpersonal behaviors with my therapist that I'm reluctant to try out IRL, because the consequences are probably going to be different. For me, that means trying to be as direct as possible and getting to a place where I can believe that my therapist isn't lying about her intentions and that she does care about me. I'm maybe one-fiftieth of the way there :)
poster:onceupon
thread:878066
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20090129/msgs/878207.html