Quote:
Originally Posted by growlycat
I think that you have a point, that she is possibly overwhelmed in her own life/schedule.
Much of what you relate, to me anyways, screams "I can't humanly take care of you to the extent that you need it". She probably cares very much but sounds stressed and yes, defensive. I have found it helpful to point out defensiveness to T. Usually, T will go back and think about it.
Sorry, this sounds painful. I've had times where T has told me to go call friends--that hurt!! The things I needed to talk about were not friend-safe topics.
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The thing about that is just that I don't think I've really been asking her for anything unreasonable. Which is why it was so upsetting for me; it felt like she was discounting all my hard work and the changes I've been making to be more independent/less needy. We cut down sessions from two a week to once a week and I've been fine with that; I didn't see her for three weeks over the break and was just fine with that too. The things she was "upset" about were two anomalies, both of which I asked her explicitly if she was okay with.
I called a few weeks ago between sessions and told her if she could do a phone session I would appreciate it but if it was a boundary for her or if she didn't have time or didn't want to, not to worry about it and I would deal with the thing myself (to which she said no, it was fine, and she was glad she could be there for me).
The other time was yesterday when I asked her if we could do another session today because I was very upset after that discussion (I've never asked for this in the past) and I told her if she wasn't okay with it, I would be fine and deal with it myself and I would leave it up to her, but I would appreciate it if she was fine with it. To which she agreed. So I don't understand why she would have agreed to things she felt uncomfortable with if she was uncomfortable with them.