Wow, first of all, to Loco4, I completely understand why the situation would make you feel jealous. My T is currently single but occasionally goes out on dates. I required an emergency weekend session about two weeks ago and when I saw him, he had just come from dinner... boy was he looking sharp and I just wanted a piece of that SO bad... I wound up wondering who he was out to dinner with, whether or not it was a date or with friends. I Presumed it was a date because the charm was laid on thick in his appearance. Of course I may have just been imagining that part because I am not used to seeing my T during personal hours and while I've seen that shirt before... something about him just looked and felt different. Anyway, needless to say, I felt jealous. I ached so bad to be the girl that I imagined he had just been out to dinner with. I longed to be the one he was pursuing and pretty much would have done anything for that to be the case.
IDidItMyWay - I really appreciate your point of view, it does seem to only make sense that those things would be easier addressed with another therapist. I tried to do that but I found it was not helpful at all in my case. It could have been the therapist I tried to do it with, she was a female and seemed far too judgmental. I walked away from every session with the impression that she thought I was delusional for developing such strong feelings for my T and in some ways I also felt she blamed me for it. So I guess it's also crucial to make sure you choose wisely when you pick someone else to work through these things with. Because I believe you're right, the therapist that you have these feelings about could never possibly be truly impartial but at the same time, discussing it with the object of those affections is also tempting but I don't think that many of them can handle it well. I don't think it's their job to crush those feelings, I honestly think it's their job to allow us to explore the depth of those feelings in an environment where nothing crushes that fantasy until it has matured into an experience we can learn from. I'm reading a fascinating book on that very topic at the moment.
BudFox - I am with you, if I didn't need therapy to get out of the mess I am in, I would be completely against it. I think it is inherently flawed to induce and seduce feelings and emotions and intimacy out of an object/subject, just for the sole purpose of rubbing it in their faces that those feelings mean nothing, quite likely aren't even real and that they can never have you. It does show an element of sadism if you ask me. I mean seriously, why make me need you and want you so bad only to crush me? Is trading my previous problems for this... really any better? I am not so sure. In most cases, I would say no... but in my case, I sadly did need this but I could have done without all the extra complications and I genuinely believe there were ways to protect me from this aspect. Why not an initial speech about how entering therapy puts us at risk of developing transference/feelings and explain to us that never, under any circumstances, can this relationship turn into a romantic or even platonic relationship outside of therapy, regular check-in's to make sure we aren't keeping secrets about how we feel and fostering and feeding feelings like that, etc. But maybe it' just wishful thinking that that would prevent things.
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