ECHOES, thanks for posting that - very interesting!

After I read the first part about integrity, I though oh, I have integrity! And then I read the second part about shame and all the feelings that go along with that, and I thought - hey, wait a minute - I have all those feelings, too!

Obviously, I only know what went on in my infancy from photos and from what my mother has told me. I do know that when I was 18 months old, my parents separated for awhile after my father had an affair, and I also had eye surgery. Based on my history with my mother, T and I have surmised that my mother must have leaned on me even at that young age, when my father wasn't living with us. But I definitely got love from my father and my grandparents. Those feelings of being unworthy of being loved are very real in me, though - it's hard to pinpoint where they originated.

The therapist in that article writes about mirroring and idealizing as part of transference and developing a positive attunement with the patient - it almost sounds like the therapist is saying that the patient needs to idealize the therapist in order to build the relationship. Did anyone else read it like that?