When I think of attachment, I think of trust and connectedness. A feeling that says, "I carry a part of this person with me, and I LIKE this."

As opposed to, "You mean nothing to me at all. You could disappear tomorrow and I wouldn't care."

I am not attached to my coworkers. I like them "okay", but if they were to disappear tomorrow, I wouldn't care (as long as I didn't have to do extra work).

Now, I think the level of attachment you *should* have depends on your particular issues. Some people treat therapy just like they do going to the dentist--with not a lot of emotional investment in the matter. I like my dentist but I'm not attached to him. I don't carry his words around in my head when I live his office. I don't feel anything when I can't make it to an appointment with him. There are probably some people who are like this with their therapist and it works for them because of their personality style and/or the nature of their problems.

And then some people need a strong attachment to their therapist because of their personality style and/or because of the nature of their problems.

I think if you're in therapy long-term, attachment is both required and inevitable.

I recall that you once responded with shock when I revealed that my therapist told me where she lives and occasionally asks if I've checked out her garden lately. My therapist obviously has looser boundaries than most, but she also knows that I have pretty rigid boundaries...that my curiosity is limited JUST to her garden. She knows that I'm much more interested in the kinds of trees and weeds growing in her yard than I am of who is behind the living room curtains. If your therapist gave you permission to check out her garden (why does that sound so dirty?!), do you think you'd be able to keep yourself from peeking through the windows? With a secure enough relationship with your therapist, you'd probably find it easy to do. You just have to find someone willing to trust you enough so you can find out.