I've been thinking a lot about boundaries lately. I never gave them much thought before, but I've realized that I'm terrified of crossing someone's boundaries. Therapy is a great example. I'd been going to therapy for a little over 3 months when my dad went into the hospital (he's since recovered). My therapist told me in one session that it was okay to call him if I was really worried about my dad. I remember being so surprised. I just assumed it was taboo to call outside of the therapy hour (except for rescheduling). And I didn't call even then. Just couldn't bring myself to do it though we talked a lot about my dad in session. Then much later on in one session he said "I find myself wanting to tell you that I'll be away the rest of this week, in case you needed to call, but then you never do call." And again I thought about how it doesn't occur to me to do that. I started wondering if he thought I didn't care about therapy or something since I never called between sessions.
Since then I've called maybe 3 times between sessions (when I wasn't just looking to reschedule an appointment). It takes me forever to get up the nerve. He's always called me back. This week I called him once again upset about my father (who now has some different problems that I won't go into here but which I mentioned in the health forum). When my therapist called back I told him I was looking for comfort. And he tried to talk to me some, but I got afraid that I shouldn't keep him on the phone so I ended the conversation very quickly (though I still appreciated that he'd called). I think we talked maybe 2 minutes. I know he would have talked longer.
I thought about this more afterward. I realized I'm terrified of somehow crossing people's boundaries. I mean, to me that would be so humiliating, to be told that I was somehow out of line & being inappropriate. And I'm now realizing that chances are, I'm not even coming close to anyone's boundaries. What would happen if I did? Once in a while I've even wondered on here if maybe I was posting too many times and somehow being overbearing. But I see lots of people posting often so I'll assume it's okay.
What happens if I cross someone's boundaries? Seriously I don't even know. If someone crosses a line with you, what do you do? Do you ostracize them? Or just say "back off"? Besides my feeling humiliated, what would really happen if I crossed boundaries? I'm even afraid to experiment, but I'm trying to pinpoint what it is that causes me to be so damned careful all the time.
This of course is more stuff I would never have thought about pre-therapy....
Sidony
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