Sorry about your experience with your T, Brown Owl. It sounds frustrating to me.
Both my ex-T and new T will try to help me figure out where my feelings are coming from. If I was crying, they let me cry for a few minutes, then try to get me to talk about why I'm crying. If I wasn't understanding why "this" feeling was so "strong", I would get a series of questions that would draw the answer out of me. It was like they already knew the answer and knew the questions to ask. I guess a lot like a teacher trying to get students to come up the answers themselves.