Quote:
Originally Posted by sunrise
My understanding is that attachment is what is supposed to happen in therapy and it's healthy. Just thought you might want to know so you don't keep beating yourself up about this. It's a good thing! It has nothing to do with how big your problems are. It just shows you are capable of a healthy connection. Also, attachment facilitates deep work. Do you think you are experiencing insecure attachment? If so, yes, that can be hard. But it's possible that you can work with your T to transition that to a secure attachment so that you are more comfortable with the alliance. Also, you mentioned transference. Attachment to one's therapist doesn't always involve transference, so maybe you needn't look for that if it doesn't seem to be there.
I wonder if being so concerned that you are attached to your therapist is a way to avoid tackling some difficult topics in therapy? Just a stab in the dark...
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Oh yes, I'm well aware of the therapeutic necessity of attachment to T - at least with the psychodynamic/humanistic orientation that my T has. I suspect it's not such a big issue in cognitive therapies, although I don't know for sure.
Amazingly, I share with her all this. It began a few months ago when I got quite upset that I was feeling so needy. I hated it and I hated her for not preventing it from happening. Boy, did I light into her. She was great. It was then I learned the word 'attachment' as related to therapist/client relationship.
I guess I've been thinking that my issues have been resolved so there's no more need for this attachment but maybe I'm wrong about the resolution of issues. I guess there are more issues than initially meets the eye. Man oh man, and I thought I was done.