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Originally Posted by zooropa
I went to group this morning. It's at my Ts office, and it's for people who have completed the regular DBT skills training group. It's more of a process group, and it just started up again last month after not meeting for about 6mos or so.
We started out with a mindfulness exercise that lasted about 5 minutes. By the time that was over I was ready to leave, and I told the T that. But I stayed and we spent the next 90 minutes talking about what happened between M and I.
It was pretty awful, nobody likes to hear someone's thought process in decided to stop being their friend. She pretty much said it was because I shared too much of my history with her and it was "too graphic".
What really hurts about that is that she kept asking, and as we became closer I trusted her. I told her details I have only ever told my T and one other person.
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Mmhhm.... and here I see:
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And M doesn't have a history of abuse at all, so it's not like she got triggered. It was just too "distasteful" for her.
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How do you know she doesn't have a history of abuse? For someone who doesn't *have* that history, she sure responded in a way that makes one have doubts about that. She might not be where you are at in terms of sharing it though. Either way, her reaction was rather cold for someone with such a "normal" childhood/life experiences (although probably not intentionally inflicting pain on you in any way).
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I have struggled with this so much in my relationship with my T. I felt guilty at first for telling T those details, because I didn't want her to have to think about that. It is really REALLY hard right now to not feel like I am damaged and dirty and disgusting.
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T's hear really super horrific things almost every day. The longer they are in practice, the more they also hear over time. This is a part of their reason for existence. I understand the shame and the re-traumatization and the fear involved in sharing such details with someone. I have only recently been able to discuss certain things with my T and certain people. Don't worry because when it comes to your T, they aren't going to *break* from the painful memories and experiences you share with them.
You are NOT dirty or disgusting. That's a lie the traumatic experience tries to push on people who deal with that sort of abuse. It's not your fault that your fellow group therapy person doesn't know how to handle such information. Probably better you found out sooner rather than later that your "friend" was going to abandon you because it would have been really bad if you reached out to her when you are in a bad place and THEN she abandoned you. Personally I think her behavior was abhorrent.
What did your T say about this specifically, if anything?
