Yeah - I bruised his ego when I wrote him this letter about how we were spending too much time on him and not so much time on me in the appointments and I said we needed to get down to business. It was a scary letter to write and then I avoided him afterwards. He caught me in his office dropping something off and pulled me in when we didn't have an appointment to discuss it. I was so afraid he'd never see me again. I remember walking after him eyes downcast and even covering them with my hand. I felt I had done something bad.

And these days he feels I'm attacking his professionalism because I go on about how he doesn't return calls when he says he will etc. I no longer feel bad about it though - now I just get irritated with him. I think I'm touching him in areas where he already feels inadequate because he is not yet working for himself so he can't do things the way he wants to.

I think you're right about the "way" instead of the "what." He's said that to me before too. That I am too, I don't know, blunt? I'd like to learn how to be otherwise. Where's the balance between being honest and dissembling? Truth is always hard for someone to hear isn't it? I figure if it hurts me then it must be true. Wait - that sounds illogical.

Thanks for the thoughts about why it's important to me. I guess you're right. I do admire him greatly and his humility is one of the characteristics that cause that. (I do realize I have some mirror transference, idealizing transference, and twinship transference going on with him.) It's nice to know that he won't go away when I make a mistake or hurt him. Plus knowing he was hurt makes him human and real.

I think my biggest frustration is that I want to work these things out with him and I feel that we're so disjointed. We never complete/finish/close something. We only meet once a month for half an hour. Then we both get distracted because we both have ADD. And so many emails go out between sessions that I don't know what we should cover if I could remember it. And I get embarrassed about stuff too - easier to write than to speak - but for him easier to speak instead of write.

So I'm going to be brave and talk with my therapist about the relationship. It's so hard for me to talk to her about my transference with him because I feel so embarrassed that it's this important and that he's important to me. I think I've been shamed by being continually reminded that relationships with professionals can't go beyond the professional. But I think it's ludicrous to separate your life that way - especially when you have such a close relationship with therapists and psychiatrists - I mean could you share what you do if you didn't trust them and feel that they were your friends. You don't just turn that off and on.

OK - that last bit was me ranting on. Just ignore.