Apparently, the consensus on this board is that therapy can help some people sometimes if they have the right mindset and the right therapist. Having had several unhelpful therapists and one helpful therapist who is becoming significantly less helpful as time passes, I agree with this completely. I guess what I need in a therapist is less someone to explain why I act the way I act and throw out psychological theories (because I know all this stuff already; I'm already way too analytical and read too many books on attachment theory) but more someone who can care about me and be with me as I sift through some really painful emotions and experiences and who can potentially provide some sort of corrective attachment experience.

I have no idea whether this is really possible; ideally, a therapist wouldn't be the one to fill this role, but this is where I'm at, and I think maybe a therapist is only the one really capable of it, although most aren't. But for me, therapy is also an issue, so much so that I'm doubting its effectiveness. "Good" therapy will create maternal transference, which will then become an obsession, which will then undermine my ability to form other relationships with people other than the therapist. But without therapy, I will form unhealthy transference-y relationships with people who can't handle it.

"Good" therapy will make me hyper-aware of emotions and boundaries and ways of speaking that are really only appropriate in the therapy room, which will undermine my ability to form healthy relationships with others on an interpersonal level rather than an analytical one (sometimes I find myself playing therapist to my friends and even if they don't mind it, I cringe). But without therapy, I can't form relationships, period. Therapy has made me doubt my competence in forming relationships and has made me feel really pathological in my attachment style. But my attachment style actually is pathological. I can't fix it without therapy, but therapy is making it even more complicated and making relationships even harder.

If I had a support system and people I could talk to and trust, I probably wouldn't need therapy. But I can't have those people and that support system until I fix my issues, which will take therapy. But therapy is also preventing me from fixing my issues, at least in the short run, and magnifying those issues. So part of me is just like, "Screw it, what's the point?" But if not therapy, then what???