![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 12 of 12. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by pinkeye on April 5, 2005, at 19:24:57
Transference - CounterTransference?
Replaying of childhood?
Looking for an authority figure?
Ethical or not ethical?
To write or not to write?
Care or not care?
Keep in touch or let go?
Trying to find out what the underlying need is?
How great your therapist was/is
Let go or keep hanging on?
Purely professional relationship?
Friend or just a patient?
Miss the therapist?I think I am putting an end to everything - all my confusions about my ex T and how the relationship was etc etc. I am just going to let it be whatever it was.. and not torture myself anymore. I am not going to allow myself to wonder about it anymore.. enough of it. And I am not going to try try try to hang on. Whatever it was, let that be ... now I am going to just move on. And I am not going to care anymore either. I am going to be indifferent.
What say you all?
Posted by Tamar on April 5, 2005, at 21:22:34
In reply to Enough of it., posted by pinkeye on April 5, 2005, at 19:24:57
It's hard to try not to hang onto someone you love (I don't know if you love your ex-T but many people do, including me).
Eventually you will be able to let go. But it may come slowly and naturally, instead of by your effort in trying to let go. Perhaps you might be trying too hard to let go and so it's harder for you than it needs to be.
Is there a middle ground between torturing yourself about how he might have felt and trying hard to let him go? I imagine that middle ground involves acknowledging the pain of never knowing who he really is and how he really felt about you. I think that pain lasts a very long time. And maybe experiencing the pain is part of a wider process of learning to cope with the pain of all kinds of other losses.
Now, if I could only apply this to myself :)
I wish you peace.
Tamar
Posted by pinkeye on April 5, 2005, at 21:39:51
In reply to Re: Enough of it. » pinkeye, posted by Tamar on April 5, 2005, at 21:22:34
Wow .. that was so wise.
Have you ever wondered how we all become very wise when it is our turn to be the ones to give advise, but just fail miserably when we need to apply it to ourselves? I feel that a lot about myself.
I don't think I am trying too hard to let him go. I have been trying to let go of him for nearly 2 and a half years now... ever since I started with him.. And I have failed failed failed again and again and again.
I do care about him. A lot. And I am attracted to him. But what is the use, when you know they are indifferent to you? And when both of you are married anyway? It just adds to the guilt.
I am done with it now anyway. I know I won't be seeing him again or talking to him again, and he won't be writing to me anymore.. So really there is no option left other than to just close the deal and move on and just hope time will fade things even more. I am tired of it. Believe me, I have really tried all these options - to not take it too hard, to try to be busy etc etc. Somehow there is a profound need in me that gets satisfied when I write to him, and I am tired of trying to find what that need is, and how I can satisfy that otherwise.
I am just giving it up.
Posted by 10derHeart on April 5, 2005, at 22:08:26
In reply to Enough of it., posted by pinkeye on April 5, 2005, at 19:24:57
Well, you may not like this at all, but...
While I understand, I think, the overall idea of what you're saying, I have a lot of misgivings about the very last part.
I'm fairly sure it's not 100% possible to *decide* not to care about someone.
Or to will yourself into indifference.
Maybe you can do those things, but I just can't wrap my mind around how that would happen. I know I can't, and I don't believe most people really can. Denial or some other defense...maybe? But that is temporary, IMO.
I hope for you, pinkeye, you can just decide not to ruminate, or obsess, or do anything to cope with feelings for him that's destructive and useless to your getting back peace of mind, bit by bit. And I think you've already come a long way with that. In fact, you are the person who got me really looking at my own rumination about my ex-T. a while back. So now, although I'm not all the way through my struggle, I rarely dwell on all those questions, over and over. I think you can stop ruminating, with hard work, and maybe another T's help, and friends, etc., etc., without stopping the caring, too. But please, don't ask me to explain *how*. I wish I could, but I can't exactly.
For me, I won't choose indifference, even if I could. Not for someone I had/have such complicated, wonderful, terrible, beautiful, crushing feelings for - like my ex-T. I won't choose it. I don't mean to sound like a martyr or anything, but I mean this with all my heart.
It's something I learned from him - and am still reinforcing with current T. The depth of the suffering validates the importance and depth of the relationship - for me. If this was the price I had to pay for what I learned, for all the blessing and healing he brought to my life - so be it. I absolutely KNOW I will handle separations and losses better in the future. I know becasue he gave me a living model of how it can happen with gentleness, flexibility and most important of all maybe - openness about ALL the feelings as they happen. He has instilled hope and strength and the idea it's possible for these things IRL to go much better, too.
Pinkeye, of course, I do want you to do something to lessen pain, if it's unnecessary. I firmly believe some pain is necessary, though. I just can't tell for how long, how much, for anyone else but me, obviously. I've just learned to sort my own out with lots of help.
And maybe, I have no right at all, to post any of this. Because from almost all the scenarios on Babble about painful terminations (that I can remember), mine was among the very, very best. The least traumatic.
I did pretty much what you talked about to ShortE, too, as far as clinging to him. Oh yeah, I moved toward him after he (literally) moved away, not the opposite. By writing, then emailing. Together, we managed to construct a transition that allowed a healthy separation. I am so, so, so blessed, I know. In my situation, this was best and has worked out as well as I can imagine possible. We have tapered off email contact, my current T. knows everything and is totally fine with it, and I am better each week. It took 6-7 months, but it's finally about complete (whatever that is). I think.
Do you see why I rarely post about this any more? I know I don't need to feel badly about having this go so well (thanks messadivoce, for keeping me straight), when I was/am so deeply attached , but I still do. I feel no one needs to hear me say how skilled my ex-T was at this - blah, blah, blah. Rubbing salt in wounds, even by mistake, is not something I take lightly.
I'm sorry. Please don't take anything wrong. We are all so different, even when going through a similar thing.
I actually liked what you said, where you identified all the parts of it so clearly. I just got scared for you at the end, thinking if you *force* yourself to be uncaring and indifferent, then some days, you have feelings that he matters and you care, you will feel you've failed. Maybe I am just all confused myself. There are no "one size fits all" answers, I suppose. ((pinkeye))
Posted by fallsfall on April 6, 2005, at 7:59:53
In reply to Re: Enough of it. » Tamar, posted by pinkeye on April 5, 2005, at 21:39:51
> I am just giving it up.
I guess I wish that you could be saying "I am moving on" instead...
Posted by Shortelise on April 6, 2005, at 10:58:01
In reply to Enough of it., posted by pinkeye on April 5, 2005, at 19:24:57
Do what is healthy for you, whatever that is, that's what I say.
(((((((((pinkeye)))))))))))
But the "friend ot just a patient" thing ... all I want is to be a patient, cared for in the way I need to be cared for. Ethically. Honestly. The way a T should care for his patients/clients.
ShortE
Posted by pinkeye on April 6, 2005, at 12:55:32
In reply to Re: Enough of it (too long) » pinkeye, posted by 10derHeart on April 5, 2005, at 22:08:26
10derHeart, I get what you are saying. Thanks a lot. And I am really glad your termination and your relationship with your ex T has been great. Don't feel bad about it.
I like my ex T a lot - still do and always will.. and I care deeply about him. I think I never can be indifferent towards him. I was wrong yesterday into thinking I can force myself to be indifferent and not care anymore. Not with him.
I think I was just trying to imitate what he said to me - he said there was no question of him liking me or disliking me..all he was trying to do was to jsut help me. And I think that comment really upset me so very much. And I am thinking if he could be so indifferent towards me, I could be too. But thank you for writing this, I think I am not capable of it - ever - to be indifferent. Not sure if it is a good thing or not, but I think it is beyond me to be indifferent towards a person like that. Maybe I will just stop all the rest of the ruminations and will try to move on slowly instead of shrugging it off and forcing it.
Posted by pinkeye on April 6, 2005, at 12:59:23
In reply to Re: Enough of it. » pinkeye, posted by fallsfall on April 6, 2005, at 7:59:53
:-).. yeah I wish I could have said that too.. But I think I was trying to adopt CBT approach instead of psyhodynamic - "just do it" kind of thing rather than analyzing analyzing and trying to heal the root.
Posted by pinkeye on April 6, 2005, at 13:01:03
In reply to Re: Enough of it. » pinkeye, posted by Shortelise on April 6, 2005, at 10:58:01
I am also realizing now that I could never have been a friend to him. He could have been to me, but I couldn't have been to him. Not with the mental state I was in - I was mostly like a child and needy and clingy. I was not ready to be an adult and friend ... partly maybe yes, but partly, I was not ready to be treated like an equal.
Posted by pinkeye on April 6, 2005, at 17:58:43
In reply to Re: Enough of it (too long) » 10derHeart, posted by pinkeye on April 6, 2005, at 12:55:32
Truth is, my ex T is really a nice person. I wish I have little more maturity to be more stable myself, and be able to take my attachment to him in a right way, and not cause myself so much of pain. That is what I have been trying to do, but unfortunately, it has been a roller coaster ride. On the days when I like myself more, I am fine with things.. on the days when I don't like myself all that much, then I start behaving like a kid - and then be angry with myself, frustrated with him etc etc.
I think it is all my own makings.. and nothing really to do with him. he has tried to help me as genuinely as possible and he has behaved to his best. And I think he was quite sincere. Only sometimes I try to read too much meanings into what he says, and trying to interpret it in ways he didn't mean it. And I keep wishing that he likes me a lot more, when I know he doesn't. And it hurts me and then I end up throwing up all sorts of fits to myself.
But writing about all these in babble freely without fear has been putting more sense into me lately.
Posted by fallsfall on April 6, 2005, at 19:44:10
In reply to Re: Enough of it. » fallsfall, posted by pinkeye on April 6, 2005, at 12:59:23
I'm not sure I see it as CBT vs. Psychodynamic...
I see "giving up" as leaving something, while "moving on" is moving towards something else. It is really hard for me to leave something if I don't know where I'm going instead.
Sort of like training a dog - if you say "Don't jump" the dog doesn't know what to do. If you say "Sit" then the dog will sit - and it is impossible for him to sit and jump at the same time.
Posted by pinkeye on April 7, 2005, at 19:37:49
In reply to Re: Enough of it. » pinkeye, posted by fallsfall on April 6, 2005, at 19:44:10
I think I am moving on as well. I have beaten this issue to death - and I think I am getting bored of it. And I like him, but I am becoming more loaded with lots of other things that I am not ruminating about it as much as I used to. Not sure if that is moving on or giving up, maybe a little bit of both. I think just kind of made peace and let it rest..
This is the end of the thread.
Psycho-Babble Psychology | Extras | FAQ
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.org
Script revised: February 4, 2008
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/cgi-bin/pb/mget.pl
Copyright 2006-17 Robert Hsiung.
Owned and operated by Dr. Bob LLC and not the University of Chicago.