Posted by rskontos on October 8, 2014, at 22:44:38
In reply to Re: MIA but back now...Triggers!Possible » rskontos, posted by baseball55 on October 4, 2014, at 19:34:04
> Actually, my heartache with my therapist was not because he was a problem, but because I had terrible issues with transference. I wanted to be his daughter, to be his friend. He handled it all very compassionately and professionally, but it was very painful for me.
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> I still see him every month or so, though I'm doing well. I love to see him. He is kind and validating and knows me better than anyone. It makes me very happy to see him.
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> As for "fit" - we have been a good fit. I had met with him and two other p-docs and just knew, after I saw him, that I wanted to do therapy with him. I'm not sure why. I just had this intuition and we have worked very well together. It is true though that all 3 docs I saw were male and significantly older than me. I guess, on some barely conscious level, I wanted a father figure. The way I thought about it at the time was that I was more comfortable with men, but I wanted a man too old to be sexually attractive. I understood, on some vaguely conscious level, that I would become obsessed and crazily attached to any man I did therapy with. I had never done therapy before, but I just kind of knew this. I didn't want that attachment to include sexual fantasies and longings. It would just be too much.
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> So I found him and we fit well. I had an intuition we would. I left his office after the first time feeling that I really wanted to talk to him again.
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> OTOH, I also started seeing a DBT therapist at his urging and have found her to be a good fit as well. Or at least I find her very helpful and trust her and feel I can lean on her when I need to. So that was pure luck. I wasn't nuts about her when I started, but DBT therapists are hard to find. It's just worked out. I don't adore her the way I do my p-doc, but I respect her and always find her helpful.
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> So how do you find someone who's a good fit? I don't know the magic formula. I was lucky and just did. Twice.
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I am glad you found a good fit with this one and transference is part of it. sounds like he handled it well. That is always a great thing when they know. My p-doc/t told me up front transference would happen and that it wasn't necessarily a bad thing but as the professional it was up to him to handle. I am not sure how much it happened. I fought him for years....I did not want to care about him. He got that too. and never took anything I said to him personal. I still hold back so much of myself that i am not sure I have much transference. I understand how you would want a father figure....my pdoc/T took on that role on his own and he said I am not going to stop because you deserve a father figure in your life. I still think he was a better father than my own. When he died I was crushed. It is still hard to think of him as dead.I am not sure how to go about the fit. I think it is trial and error really and following your gut/intuition. that gut/intuition I think helped us survive to this point. IDK really...
poster:rskontos
thread:1071747
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20140702/msgs/1072015.html