Bill - I've not wanted to leave this therapist and so haven't tried. I had past therapists I didn't see as much and never attached to, so leaving wasn't a big issue. I have never left an attachment like this though, in my life, out of choice.

I have a lot of abandonment trauma, with my own dad, my mom, and then with an almost step parent who after living with me for a few years as a kid, dumped my mom and never even said goodbye to me.

I agree that I am reliving abandonment feelings. He says I want more than he can possibly give me as a therapist, and I admit to him that is true. But that will always be true of a therapist I have attached to, considering it's become very clear I am still in search of a parent figure even though I am now an adult and a parent myself.

It seemed to me that I am doing real therapy now, I went in yesterday and cried about the pain of my step dad and how he left. I talked about my longing and my pain related to my therapist, and I thought, made it clear I knew it was coming from my childhood issues.

Anyways, I am presenting all my grievances here, but in four years he has been a great therapist. I am not one to throw in the towel quickly, my life has been improving a lot, but then I have these major backslides into depressed thought, like this one. Recently I have been having stretches too where I am not so obsessed, but then it comes back with a vengeance.