I have been to my college's counseling services for about 2 and 1/2 years now, and have developed a strong attachment to my therapist. It took a long time for me to trust her, but now I know that she truly cares and won't judge me. I think about her all the time, replaying significant things that she said to me, analyzing her every word, and imagining what she is like in real life. Part of the reason that I started seeing her was because of family issues; my father was a constant criticizer and my mother was very emotionally distant. A few times in my life, I have developed intense (even obsessive) transference toward teachers because of this, seeing them as parental figures. Now the pattern has repeated again with my therapist.

Recently I talked to my therapist about wanting to tell her something big (my feelings for her), but being afraid that she wouldn't want me to or that it would affect our relationship. Because of the way that she responded, I am almost certain that she knows that I want to talk about my feelings toward her. She told me that she is prepared to hear anything that I want to talk about, and that if it's important to me, it's important and a big deal to her. But she also said that we don't have to rush it.

Because this is my college's counseling center, I cannot see my therapist over the summer. I may only have about 5-6 meetings left with her this year. I am trying to decide whether I should tell her this year, or if I should wait until next year (my senior year).

If I told her the next time I see her, I'm a little afraid that I wouldn't have a chance to say everything before we end for the summer. Or maybe our relationship would be different by the time I got back to school next year. Also, I am currently having a lot of difficulties making eye contact (I usually only look at her right in the beginning), but maybe with a new start next year, I would be better able to. Maybe it would be more meaningful to talk about this when I can actually look at her? I'm not sure my eye contact will ever get better though. And I'm afraid that since she said that we don't need to rush it, she thinks I should wait.

Despite all of this, I do feel ready to tell her everything, and it has been building up for a long time. I am confident that she will handle it well, and I do think that we would have a lot of meaningful and helpful work come out of it relating to my past. I have been waiting to discuss a lot of this for so long, but I don't want to screw it up by telling her at the wrong time. Do you think I should go ahead and tell her now, or wait until next year? I figured you all might have some insight, and any opinions would be greatly appreciated!