When he uses the word "abuse" to characterize what I have been through.

"You are better than 90% of the people who walk through my door." I hated when he said this the first time and later variations on this theme. It made me feel he thought I didn't need to be in therapy, that I didn't need his help, that he didn't understand me because there was so much I had problems with and he didn't "see." We did talk about this once, and he explained more of what he meant, which was not so bad as I was interpreting (he meant that I was very honest and direct and easy to do therapy with; he didn't need to pull teeth to get me to speak or delve beneath the surface). He still says things like this regarding me and my husband (we have been in couples therapy with him). "You and your husband are better off than many divorcing couples I work with." Sometimes I feel like I get in a competition with other couples he works with to prove my marriage is somehow worse than other people's and therefore that this is a really painful and difficult experience for me. I hate that feeling of having to justify my pain.

Early in therapy, whenever he mentioned other couples he worked with in therapy or doing couples EMDR, I was terribly threatened and fearful and would just stop talking. I felt like by bringing up these topics he wanted me and my husband to see him for couples therapy (which we later did, lol) and I did not want to. And no way in hell was I ever going to do couples EMDR with my husband, so just don't even mention it! (and we never did, BTW)