Hello MLS

It must be very scary for you to think that perhaps your T is gaining some sort of pleasure from your pain. If that were the case then your therapst would be being very cruel. Can you tell your T about this worry? - otherwise it could get in the way of your work. Perhaps you have past experience of others getting pleasure from your pain? - if that is the case I am very sorry that happened to you.
I have lots of experience with abuse from past girlfreind who used to get a lot of pleasure from my pain, she loved to make me suffer and from my mother so maybe this has interfered with my perception of things. I don't mean that the therepist gets ANY sort of sexual gratification from this but I think that get something from being the only person allowed into some peoples lives.

I know I have also had such fears in my own therapy and when I could speak it my T was able to help me with it - it caused me to feel very small and powerless, just as I was as a child when I was being hurt.
Yes, its horrible to admit these fears and face them
As a therapist I most certainly do not gain any gratification from my client's pain - It does move me and I do enter into it in order to be able to help - but from a place of care and compassion - I do not gain anything for myself from the pain but do gain pleasure from the healing I witness.
Tthnk you for sharing your experience Moon, I really appreciate hearing that and it does ease my worries a little but I still have a niggling feeling about my own t.

Edit - I don't share my personal details with my clients to enable them to tell their stories, not to make me powerful (although the transference may be I am powerful - or voyeuristic!) - I do not want to get in their way or contaminate their transference by putting myself in to their process - the therapy is theirs and they deserve the space to get to those deep places without my stuff in their way or needing to look after me. How they see my not telling them about me is all part of the process and is valuable work in itself.
I do understand this Moon but you explained it better than I ever could. Sometimes it hurts being in such a one sided relationship but it doesn't mean its not intimate or healing. It is only lately that I understand why they don't tell us anything because it does interfere in the process greatly. I know because mine own t tells me things al the time and sometimes, well a lot of the time our sessions becaom about her.

Moon

Question is: is your T being stalkery or intrusive, or is this part of your transference? Is she asking out of interest or because it's relevant or because she's more nosy than she should be? You said she gave you numbers of where she stayed. Isn't that so you can contact her if you need to? When she asks questions is she trying to satisfy her curiosity or find out more about you and your world so she can help you?
TR, thank you for bringing this to my attention. I was stalked by two girls before. They followed me everywhere, my ex before we got together and this other girl too before I met my ex and maybe I am obsessed with my privacy a little too much and t asking questions sparks off some kind of panic button in me.
T gave me the numbers of hotels she stayed in because I am going on a trip in a few weeks and she has stayed in the town lots and it felt like she was trying to control me a little and she wanted me to change to her doctor before aand tells me what to say and do to people and once I went to a see a physical therapist and she said, oh we(her and her friends) dont' like her, we don't like the way she works anymore. I felt a little too much.
I dont think she is trying to help me but maybe I could be wrong here. I hope I am.

Yes, Ts are interested in people's lives. But you seem to see this in one way - that it's for some kind of personal gratification that means they are essentially voyeurs - which differs greatly from how I see it, so again it may be part of your transference. In my case, I don't expect my T to be interested in me. That's my transference. So it makes me happy to think that he is interested in people and how they understand the world. I was a neglected, overlooked child so to have an authority figure take an interest in what I think and actually listen to me is astonishing. It's not voyeuristic to me as I am intensely grateful and surprised.
Sorry to hear about your childhood , I hope things are better for you nowYES, that is exactly how I feel too but then sometimes I feel as T is using me to make herself feel better.

Maybe your T is asking for too much detail. The million dollar question is: does it remind you of anyone else you have known?