<font color="purple">When I first started to see my t and she sent me a letter outlining all of the 'housekeeping' stuff, like how to get to her office, how much she charged each session, her phone numbers etc etc, she had originally written that we would have one hour long sessions (the full 60 minutes) once a week.

But from the very first session, my t has always extended this 'one hour' to 90 minutes ... and I really dont know how I'd cope without a session of that length. It takes me so long to articulate the thoughts and feelings that I'm experiencing ... not to mention that I have dissociation problems that tend to cause disruption to my sessions and move things off track during therapy.

I dont know whether my t routinely has 90 minute sessions with other clients, but this is the way its always been with me.

(Although 'always' isnt exactly true - there have been a couple of sessions where my t has had to finish up on the hour, coz she had other commitments directly after our session. Personally, I found it very intriguing how badly I reacted to this news! I had become accustomed to my t spending extra time with me, and was upset when she was unable to do so ... but I also felt extreme guilt that I was upset, coz my t did me a favour by regularly going overtime - it wasnt something she HAD to do!)

The way my t explains to me about her going overtime, is that she doesnt want to spend our sessions 'watching the clock'.

I think though that the situation with me and my t is a little different than most therapy set ups though, as my t only has 2 or 3 clients that she sees for regular therapy sessions, because her major source of income is through lecturing and supervising psychology PhD and masters students (she works at a university).

I have no idea what the rationale is behind one hour sessions ... I would have assumed that it originated from the days of Freud, where people were seeing doctors and therapists, for analysis ... and maybe those 50 minute hours are best for that sort of thing.

But speaking as a trauma survivor, 50 - 60 minutes per week is nowhere near enough time to be of benefit. During alot of my sessions, I end up getting sucked into a flashback which can last quite a long time ... and then I need time with my t to be able to talk about what happened and settle myself so I'm okay to go home. I reckon if my t was strict with our sessions ending after 60 minutes, then I'd either be too reluctant to get into any specific trauma memories, for fear of being cut short right in the middle of something that is really horrible and disgusting ... OR .... I'd end up starting work on some difficult memories, but then running out of time and having to finish up while I am stuck in the deep end of the pool, feeling extreme panic, struggling to breathe and keep my head out of the water, and findnig a way to survive for a whole week until my next session.

I would have hoped that most ts nowadays realise that some flexibility is needed with regards to session time, depending on what problems the client may have, how easy or difficult they find it to self-disclose to their t, and what sorts of things they have to cope with outside of the session. Of course, there is the flipside of this issue, and there are a number of different practical issues that need considering, and the t may not be able to give more time to a client ... or the client may be unable to afford longer sessions etc etc.

Definitely an interesting issue to ponder, Sunrise! Thanks for posting about this. </font>