Quote:
Originally Posted by StickyTwig
This feeling in therapy is all too familiar to me, and like you in my case I think its some kind of transference from the past.
To add an extra dimension to what you have said (which I don't disagree with in any way) - I would say that also its a case of your T failing to notice the importance to you of the issue of the phone calls and their length. In other words, an empathic failure - (not that there is anything wrong with that, they happen all the time in therapy). Anyway, it hurts.
Personally, I try to avoid talking about things that are important to me but I don't know why until I have done some sort of analysis of them, and then I bring up the analysis instead, if that makes sense. Otherwise I just end up getting upset. But whether thats the most healthy way of dealing with these things I have no idea!
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Thanks for your comments. Good point about the "empathic failure"--maybe that upset me just as much as what it was about. Like, "Can't you tell I need to talk about this? Doesn't you know at this point, after 6 years, when I say something like, 'I'm not going to tell you about x,' I actually mean that I *do* want to talk about it, but maybe am nervous, so I want you to draw me out?"
Yeah, I know, I probably should have learned enough in therapy to *not* do things like that...to just be more direct. I just find it more difficult with T to state my needs, which I'm pretty sure has to do with maternal transference stuff. It's easier to tell MC what I want/need from him--that is, when he doesn't sense what that is on his own.
I guess some of it also comes down to feeling like T just doesn't fully "get" me--not quite to the extent that my mom doesn't, but there are times T just seems mystified or confused by things I do, say, or feel. I mean, I know I can be a bit odd sometimes, and I don't perfectly fit the clinical mold of someone with OCD, anxiety, and depression, but by now, I'd think she'd have a pretty thorough understanding of me and what makes me tick (which...I also think about my mom).