Quote:
Originally Posted by peaches100
Obviously, i didn't expect her to say she loved me too. But I hoped she would say she appreciated knowing how i felt, or she valued my feelings, or that she cared about me in return. But she said nothing like that. It was very hard for me to say i loved her, and I guess I hoped that it would move her. But as she read it, I couldn't see anything change in her expression or in her voice to indicate that I'd said anything other than just a bunch of words.
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It is hard to remember we are going to therapy, not to get someone to express themselves to us but for us to express ourselves.
In a sense, your disappointment is a real breakthrough too! You would have denied wanting/needing/having such feelings at first, wouldn't you? You would not have even "seen" them. I think you should get up the courage to tell your T you were disappointed and wanted more

It's okay to want what you want! That's very hard to learn. Too, it's okay for T to respond however T does (or anyone); what is harder to learn is that it's okay not to get what we want, to experience the disappointment and how to use it to steer a different direction, to go express ourselves truthfully to someone who will give us the experience we want and hope for.
That's the whole point of therapy, sorting through the people and understanding our feelings about them and theirs about us. But T is a "tool" rather than one of those people, she is working to help you express your feelings for her (or anyone), to be disappointed and know it and to be okay with, express, and use that disappointment to change your approach in positive ways. It is a little like "anger", you express that you are disappointed, or angry and the other person engages in a conversation with you and you understand yourself and them better and directions you need to take to move forward.
I was disappointed in my husband, told him, and he explained his position and it turned out that I was replaying experiences with my stepmother, I was trying to hold him to rules she and I had had 30 years previously that were not "true" or good for me now. The disappointment and talking about it was one of the highlights of that day!