From my own experience with paternal (and some erotic) transference for my marriage counselor, I'm not sure this is always the case. For me, MC represents a more idealized father figure, like the father (and at one point, the husband), I wish I'd had. Like, he's talked about how he's dealt with his kids' anxiety issues, and I'm like, "I wish my dad had dealt with me like that."

To go back to OP's original question, I have to some extent been able to work on my transference with MC. We had a couple individual sessions (without H--he was OK with it) to discuss it, then we've discussed it a bit in joint sessions, as wells as over e-mail and the occasional phone call. MC said he's experienced it before, and he's been in practice around 25 years, and he seems fairly comfortable with the topic. I mean, I've said stuff like how sometimes I wish he could just hold me like a child and things like that, and he hasn't pushed me away. I've told him some stuff in e-mails about feelings, and he's said he's OK with it and not weird ed out by it. And I've thought before that I'm all over it, only to have it come roaring back. Which he's said is totally normal. It's not 100% dealt with, but definitely a good percentage.