I think it's important to look closely at our beliefs that our therapists aren't willing to talk about traumatic things. First of all, I think this can be a really old message, as most of us were programmed from quite young to be silent about it. I think even when we really want to talk, these old messages can be quite subtle and sophisticated in creating obstacles to talking.

Unless your T said, "I refuse to talk about this with you," I suspect that there was a lot going on inside you that you may not have realized, that was making it difficult for you to talk and for your T to realize that you needed help to do this.

It took about a year with my third therapist until I could say "I need your help to talk about xyz." Even then, he thought that my difficulty in getting it out mean that I wasn't ready. I said, why don't you push me to get closer and he said that he thinks it's important for the client to be in control of the pace, and he wouldn't want to be coercive in "making" me talk about it. It took a few conversations, I think the talking about talking about it, where he really understood that this was that I wanted. I think that me taking charge and saying "I want to talk about it" helped him understand where I was and also helped me get myself in the place where I could talk.

Some of therapy at its core is getting to the place where you can tell your therapist what you want and then they can help you talk about it. But you can't just sit there hoping or wishing it will happen, you have to speak up and say that you want to talk about it and you need help. There are powerful forces within us to keep us from adequately communicating what we want and the therapeutic beliefs of the T in not wanting to retraumatize people can both create difficulties in getting directly to the thing that needs to be resolved.

I'm not trying to talk you out of being angry or whatever you want to be, but I think that when you return to therapy, it might help you to discuss what it is you want out of therapy and what it is you want to talk about. I think that while it may be easy to blame someone else or the process, the reality is that we can often figure out how we can do better the next time, empower ourselves more in our own therapy and not depend on our T getting it right for us. Much of how therapy turns out is up to us and how well we can communicate what it is we need. And I have found that for me, I'm already most of the way there when I do this. That I've already gotten through the stuff that has held me back by the time I am able to say, this is what I want.