My Support Forums - View Single Post - Therapy Gone Wrong (Unethical; Possibly Abusive)

toomanycats · May 31, 2017, 11:28 AM

I forgot that, a week ago, I'd written out a much more thorough explanation of our relationship...........

I'll post it, but it's long... sorry if it's too much >.<

Quote:

I've been seeing a therapist -- we'll call him S -- for 3 years. I saw him 2-3 times a week for 90-minute sessions. He was more than just my therapist to me -- he was my big brother, my parent, my best friend, my protector, my safety... at times, my world. The transference was very strong; I believe the countertransference was as well. He told me that he saw himself in me -- that he wanted to give me what he wished he could've had. He identified with the gaping hole I had in my life from my past and told me he wanted to "fill in that hole." Give me what I didn't get when I should've gotten it. He gave me 24/7 access to him; I had his personal number and could email, text, or call whenever -- about anything. Once, when I came to him having SI-ed in a dangerous way that flirted with disaster/ending it for good, S set up an agreement with me where I had to text him every hour on the hour to let him know I was safe from the time I woke up until I went to bed. I did this for about 3-4 days then every few hours for another few days. I often mark this as the point where my dependency on him became obsessive... I had never ever had anyone "check in on me" so much... transitioning off of this arrangement was horribly difficult...I wanted it back forever and ever.

The bulk of our work over the last 3 years has been dubbed "attachment work." We spent most of our therapy time dealing with our relationship, honestly. My intense fear of losing it -- my perceptions of him "taking away his caring," "abandoning me," "being annoyed by me," the list goes on. Our relationship was intense -- dramatic -- excruciating. It progressed slowly. We grew slowly closer -- my trust in him greater over a long period of time. I was terrified. All the time. First, he moved from his chair to an adjacent couch so we were sitting in closer proximity. Then, he moved to the couch beside me. After about 1.5 years, we hugged. At the 2.5 year mark, we were sitting, leaning on one another, his arm around me in comfort...for usually about 30-60 minutes per session...the bulk of the session now just us touching...because I craved it. He was my safety. I loved him -- not romantically (or so I believed...now, I think I can say, yes, there was romantic feeling involved as well, which I denied and denied because "if he ever tried anything, I would be devastated, so I must not have those feelings if that would be my reaction, right?") -- but like a child loves its mother.

Our relationship was not one-sided. When his aunt was diagnosed with cancer, he asked me to listen, and I did. He asked for support, and I gave it. He asked me to describe the dying process -- as I had been on my grandmother's home hospice team months before -- and I walked him through it. I listened...offered feedback...encouraged him to seek his own therapy (which he admitted he needed but never took). When he went to her funeral, he asked me to text him silly memes from the internet to distract him, and I did. When his dad was diagnosed with cancer, I listened, supported, put aside my own feelings of pain when he had to go be with his dad -- because, of course... he needed to be there. I set my feelings aside. He was important to me. He was more important than my feelings.

There were things that were blatantly wrong...missteps on his part...I admit. We made a lot of sex jokes. He enjoyed it when I told him I'd had a sex dream about him. He told me he'd had one about me as well, and told me about his positive physical reaction to it. We joked about how he loved to be naked all the time -- how he'd seen my breasts (because I had breastfed my daughter for a month or so in his office) -- he told me about his "intimate" piercings... in detail. It was fine, though, because as he said -- I wasn't just another client. I was a friend. I was special. Yes, I know -- it's a red flag when a therapist tells you that you are special. I didn't care..I wanted to be special to him. God, I wanted it. I loved him.

I told him I loved him; he told me he loved me. We would sometimes use my session time to go out to eat. We also got together a couple of times outside of sessions...for lunch, or so he could see my ride horses. He always promised me we would be friends when therapy ended. I didn't want therapy to end. I didn't want S as a friend; I wanted him as a therapist. I was terrified of therapy ending. I told him all the time that I knew...knew he would leave me someday. He told me he never would. He promised to never leave me. Though, after the cancer thing, he amended the promise to say he would never cut me out of his life. Life can take people away, after all.

Our therapeutic relationship was a roller coaster. In the past 3 years, I can't remember ever being at peace. I can no longer remember what occupied my mind before S. I think of him all the time -- from the moment I wake up til the moment I fall asleep. I knew when he broke up with his girlfriend; we talked about dating...his dating life...his sexual preferences (and mine too)...like friends. We'd sometimes spend a session sitting outside...once, I remember, we sat outside around this same time...drinking some starbucks drinks...and he said...he had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. That he needed therapy, but that he needed a therapist who was like him...and he couldn't find one. (He joked often that he was the best out there.) I knew so much about him -- I cannot possibly put it all here... I loved him. I love him. More than I've ever loved anyone. Ever. He is a part of me. And, I don't think it's just transference. I love him... I knew him. Ours was not a one-way relationship. Except... I always knew something wasn't right as well. I just ignored it, because keeping him in my life was priority 1. Besides... he told me that my perception of the world and how it worked was wrong -- flawed by my past history. He encouraged me to ask him what was real and to work to adjust my world view to whatever truth he told me. And, I tried. I was the client, after all. He, the therapist -- with my best interest in mind. Surely his perception of the world was far more correct than mine. After all, I was the one seeking help... I was the damaged one. Not him. (Although, I knew of his damage -- knew of his own past that was very similar to mine.)

I told him the DAY I found out I was pregnant. S has sonogram pictures of my daughter... he swore that he'd be there for me... I still remember him saying "lean on me. I mean it. Please use me." God, it felt... so good. To not be alone for the first time ever. Except.....it never really did play out how he'd promised. That was the theme of our relationship though... things never really did play out how he'd say they would. When I got horrible post-partum anxiety...it was my mother who finally hospitalized me. S couldn't be bothered to answer the phone when I called to ask him for help getting into a hospital. I had to beg to even get to speak to him. And when I did ...it was just... all on me. He didn't help. Gave me no advice or names of a hospital. I had to figure it out without him.

2.5 months ago, S told me that he was going to be interviewing for a job across the country. He wasn't sure if he'd take it or not, but he wanted me to know. My world ended. Truly. Ended. It was like cutting my lungs out of my body. I don't honestly know how I am still alive. But, it got worse. 1.5 months ago, it became official -- he's moving. Worse still.....3 weeks ago, S was diagnosed with cancer. The same cancer that killed his aunt and is killing his dad.

How is this real life? Have you ever hit that point...where you are convinced it's not real...this has to be a dream... it doesn't feel, look...real. I am at that point. I am stuck at that point.

I'm seeing a new therapist now...thank god, or I would be dead. Truly. And, honestly, not a day goes by...not an hour goes by when I don't think about ending it. I'm slowly realizing, though, that my life, my health, my happiness, my sanity is so tightly enmeshed with this person...... with a person who never really existed, honestly... not as he described himself, at least. And, the mental games have continued since the therapeutic relationship ended. When I asked for a final session -- for closure in our therapeutic relationship -- denied. Do I get to say goodbye to his office -- the place where I've spent so so much of my life these last 3 years? No. Denied. But, we've gone out to eat. I've driven over countless times just to hug him after work... waited 20 minutes in the parking lot for a 5-minute hug. I'm addicted. Disguised threats, in my opinion... threats to cut me out completely. Currently, he is 100% ignoring me. Silent treatment. I feel I am being punished. I am. I'm being punished.

I don't know what to do. I don't know how to move through or past this. I cannot bear the idea of him not being in my life. I cannot bring myself to say "that's it" and cut all ties. I have every email -- thousands...thousands of emails -- and every text message...that we've ever sent. Ever. I don't know how to exist without S anymore. I don't know where I stop and he begins. I don't know where my imaginings of him/who he is stop and the real him begins. My current therapist says...that it's a lot like someone protecting their captor. That's how I feel. That's how I respond.

I don't know what happened.
I don't know if this was simply bad therapy...or actual abuse. It probably doesn't matter.
I do believe he genuinely cares about me. he's invested too much time and energy for that to not be true.
Can you care and abuse at the same time?
Have I spent the last 3 years...paid $30,000+ out of pocket...to be abused? Sorry. I feel shame even saying that word... because... I wanted it. I wanted to be special. I know that I hold at least half of the fault in this.
I just don't know how to survive it.