Skyblue, one of my favorite passages in one of my books says the following: "It is unrealistic to reassure patients directly about fears the therapist will abandon them. In fact, in a successful treatment the patient will feel abandoned many times. Patients will create situations in which they believe the therapist is threatening termination in spite of everything said or done to the contrary; or the therapist will make a mistake or do something else to indicate that the patient has been misunderstood, and this will cause the patient to feel abandoned. In these and many other ways patients will feel their therapists never really cared for them or were just looking for a chance to be rid of them. Not only can these experiences not be avoided, but also they ought not be avoided. Over time, the patient should have the chance to find that the relationship endures in spite of moments of tension and instances of being misunderstood. Patients cannot experience relationships as constant without first realizing that people do sometimes fall out with and fail one another, but that such disappointments do not destroy the relationship. The psychological atmosphere of the session is more important to the creation of object constancy than specific interventions. The therapist is trying to create a psychological space or a psychic cocoon, within which the patient can simply be--a setting of safety and belonging in which the patient need not do anything or fill any function to be welcome." (Charles Cohen & Vance Sherwood)

I know that I have engaged in this with my own therapist. In the beginning, I would NEVER enter her office unless she came out and invited me in; this was even after she told me that if her door was open I could "come right in." I told her that wasn't possible, she needed to "invite me in." Often people with abandonment issues don't feel, deep down inside, that they are welcome anywhere. But over time, each time my therapist welcomed me into her office with a genuine and caring smile, that frozen disbelieving part of me began to thaw. I can now enter her office just by noticing her door is open and she calls out to me, "Come on in!"

I have also struggled with the idea that I am "too much" for her, that she will tire of me or if she sees the "ugliness" inside, she will turn away. It wasn't her reassurance that she welcomed me or wouldn't tire of me or that she looked forward to my sessions with her that eased those feelings. It happened over time. It happened by me going to my sessions and her being there each and every time. It was being in her office and feeling safe. I still have those feelings from time to time, but they have lessened.

One of my most striking realizations that things have changed occured last night. I awoke from a horrible nightmare. I was sobbing and said over and over aloud, "Oh, God, I've got to get this out of my head! I have to think of something pleasant to drive this dream out of my head!" I tried thinking of my favorite place--a beach that I swam at when I was a teen. It made things worse because the dream took a piece of that place and made it part of the dream. I continued crying. I then said, "Think about T's office. Think about T!" So I conjured up her office and then I visually put her in her chair across from me and a sense a peace began to settle over me. I had to really work at the visualization but it finally held and I was able to back to sleep. This for me was a sign of "object constancy", my therapist now resides inside of me. In the past, she would disappear or I would dismiss her interest as just a part of the monetary transaction.

I'm glad her phone call made you feel reassured and gave you a small sense of belonging. I hope you keep going and working on all of this. It takes a while, although I'm pretty sure it's taken me longer than most! LOL