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Originally Posted by velcro003
You would regret it 100% if you didn't do another session. I feel like you are putting SO much pressure on yourself to be done with therapy. I am confused, because it seems to be coming mostly from you, yet you seem to be in real turmoil over it.
I know I don't know any details about what happened in the session where you said "awful" things to her...but, I don't think it means you NEED to end it right now. I don't know. It all seems very complicated, but just from an outsider's point of view--I can't see your T kicking you out of therapy all together. I maybe am confused on this email you sent after that session, and got the impression she thought you were done?
Anyway, I wouldn't cancel it.
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Thanks Velcro. I suspect you are right. The email I sent that really mucked things up was after last week, a couple weeks after the really bad session - after she said she needed a month off. But couldn't just take it because of other commitments so she just wanted
us to take a break. I was so in shock I didn't really react until I got home and I emailed a really needy thing saying that I was already missing her and I felt a little bit like I was being exiled but I didn't ask to come sooner. I was just saying what I couldn't say there. She interpreted that i wanted to come sooner and said i could come on 8/9 a day she had in my session said she would not be available. so naturally i said no that's ok, 8/23 or whatever it was we had scheduled would be fine. So then she emailed back the "are you in or are you out" thing and "Is the longing more interesting than the work?" question and that hurt MY feelings so I (yes, impulsively) said I guess I'm out, but asked if we could have a closure session in about a month, and she wrote back that she cancelled what we'd already scheduled and said her door would be open and that she understood i was processing feelings but didn't want to process them in email.
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Originally Posted by stopdog
I think it might be prudent to go back and clarify what is real versus what you have possibly placed on the therapist. I agree there is no perfect anything - but a lot of this seems to be mind reading on your part and it appears to me that usually when you go and actually talk to the therapist - things are not always as you have imagined. I also don't understand why you spend so much energy and angst over the end therapy when you seem to derive something from it - at least it seems like you do when you are not waiting for signs or dreams etc that it is over.
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I don't know. I ask myself that so much. It's like I have something inside of me that is just driving me to end - like I
can't not - like I HAVE to. I don't understand it and she doesn't understand it and we go round and round trying to figure it out to no avail. I don't get it at all.
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Originally Posted by anais_anais
I thought you had agreed on a termination session? In a month or something like that?
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Originally it was supposed to be in November. this in a month thing just happened the other day. I am perplexed.
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Originally Posted by ruh roh
Art, I don't think it matters what others think about a closing session (I only had one and it was not helpful at all, but I didn't have the number of years into it that you did). I do think, based on everything you've posted, that you can't rest without a closing session, so why not just plan on that?
Also, you can make this look like however you want it to look: a closing session with the door left open for occasional check ins; a final closure with no open door; or something else.
I wish I could have options, but my therapist is going to retire and move away. She said we can continue long distance for a few years beyond that, but who knows if that will work out. If I had my way, I would not end at all. I don't see a problem with therapy being any way a person wants it to be, if it's helpful.
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Thanks. I think you're right that I wouldn't be able to rest without a closing session. I really don't understand myself why i think i have to figure this out right now. It's really no wonder that she wants a break from me.
I'm sorry for what you're going through.
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Originally Posted by Pennster
Art, I have been following your posts for a long time, and I really feel for you. I agree with the others that you are putting a lot of pressure on yourself and it would be helpful to at least have a termination session.
But I guess I don't understand why you feel you have to end? Do you really believe you have irreparably ruined the relationship? Could it just be that your relationship is simply suffering one of the little blips that mark many or most long-term relationships, and that you could work through it and be fine?
I remember one time I had a blip with my therapist- it was probably the only thread I've ever started on here. I remember how terrible I felt, and it was like I couldn't quite imagine there was a way I could get back to normal. But we survived it, and now it's just a little episode in the background. I think these things just happen in long-term relationships, and getting through them is part of what makes them so rich.
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Thanks so much. Like I said above, I really don't understand it myself - this drive to end. I guess something in me just can't tolerate the level of intimacy anymore. I feel closer to her than to anyone else. And that scares the **** out of me. I constantly want more from her than she can give in this convoluted professional relationship. Not that I really talk about that much with her. My bad, it might help if I did. But yes - I do feel like I have ruined everything. It was such a healing relationship for such a long time and I somehow imploded it, made her question her work, pulled the rug out from under myself, etc.
I don't know. I'm just trying and trying and trying to talk things out and find some understanding.
I think you guys are right. I would 100% regret not having a closing session. Maybe after all this talking I can put this to rest until after my trip in mid-August and make a decision then after a weekend with my friends who have known me for umpteen years.