Quote:
Originally Posted by SoupDragon
Although my father is dead, he has had a hold on me for most of my life and I realised that did not stop with his death.
I realise that he is always "with me" and finally shared this with my T.
My T thinks we should look at that together - to let my dad "speak" to T, to stop him being in control of me - I understand logically why this may be useful for me, but that bit of me that is caught up with my father finds the whole thing terrifying. It feels like there is to be a battle between my father and my T and I will be stuck in the middle of it. I feel disloyal, that I can't abandon my father, that he will be angry with me for talking with T about him - maybe I am scared that he will abandon me.
It all seems so weird just writing it down, he's dead afterall, yet this issue does exist within me and feels so real.
Has anyone else experienced this?
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Your feelings about this are exactly the same ones I had almost word for word when I dealt with this. In my case it was my mom, and she is alive.
Mom was so powerful in the room going after my Therapists in a figurative sense. The images of her in the room with a rifle ready to shoot my therapist for interfering with her right to parent — badly — came with Mussolini and hitler on her side. My therapist fed me the dialogue to fight her, because I just did a lot of whining, screaming, and clinging onto to my Therapist for dear life, even though I was trying to protect my Therapist. It took a number of sessions over several months time for my Therapist and me to finally win out. We did have a an imaginary place to put her so I wouldn't freak when I was out of session, and sometimes in session. I wanted to send her to a concentration camp or the Russian Gulag, but I know she would have haunted me from there, so I got her on a luxurious private jet, and set her up, at the most well appointed hotel Japan has to offer. Anytime she came back to interfere with therapy we would get her to the hotel, and eventually she could be in the room as long as she behaved herself, and she learned how, and eventually she, her rifle, and her companions never came back to
MY THERAPY! I still have these sessions on several audio tapes, and as I review them I can now laugh with that little girl about the fears she use to have of
MOTHER.
My mom has dementia that progresses each time I see her, and I love her dearly, yet it is hard for me to believe that this is the same lady that had me quaking in my boots for five decades. Dad wants to take over where she left off, but the process allows you to put many in the right perspective at later dates.
It will be hard, and many times torturous. You may fill like a sellout to your dad your family. You are not. I admire you for going back to your therapist to do the real hard work. Trust her to get you through this's process. Good luck to you, SoupD!
PS: no quitting in the middle of it
.