Quote:
Originally Posted by LonesomeTonight
I'm not entirely sure, especially because, I mean, when I first told him about the transference a couple years ago, I thought it was just erotic (he kinda helped convince me it was mostly paternal). And a couple times since then, I've admitted that it's not all paternal/platonic. So this shouldn't be new information for him.
I think part of it was that he also mistakenly thought I was looking for an individual session during the phone call. And he said that if it had been romantic love, it would have been unethical for him to have had an individual session with me. (I then informed him that I was not looking for an individual session anyway!)
I have to wonder if he feels stranger about it now that he's widowed--it just seems he's been different about things with me since then.
I also really wonder if there's a bit of countertransference at play...I suspect some paternal for sure, but maybe something else, too? It's hard to explain, but the times it's just him and me (like H leaves session to go to the bathroom or when I'd run into him in the waiting room while there for ex-T), it's like there's this different energy that noticeably seems to shift when someone else (like H) comes back in the room. It may entirely be in my head, but I don't know...
But, yeah, I get your point that he should be able to handle my having romantic feelings, if that were the case. I think he just wouldn't want to keep that from H, where if it was all paternal, might be more OK to talk about just with him... It's all very confusing. Plus as a T, he should realize how romantic and paternal stuff can overlap, like tied into childhood. Like maybe it's more of an Oedipal/Electra thing than more adult feelings.
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I don't believe in the concept of romantic transference. It seems so silly to me, and I would be put off by a T who uses that or who separates the transference into those categories.
I've read a lot of your posts, and it sounds exactly like an oedipal complex. It's not paternal or erotic. It's both at the same time. Every girl goes through a stage 4 or 5 where she starts straying away from her mother, and her father becomes the center of her world. Think about it, maybe observe a little girl of that age excited while playing with her father. They have behaviors like a person in love and can seem infatuated.
But if the father is rejecting, or not accepting the daughter's love fully (it can be due to the mother's jealousy or many other things), it can linger through adulthood. I have this issue but my T is not warm and 'loving' like MC can be, although he was from time to time in the past... I think MC plays into it a bit--he lets you have that 'special' relationship like father daughter. The act of breaking from the traditional marriage counseling by doing individual counseling with you mirrors that special relationship. That triggers your oedipal feelings. Anything rejecting or close to it, will trigger it too.
I don't mean to project my issues on you and hope it doesn't feel that way. I think it's good to work through this with your new T and suspect that much of it will transfer to new T as long as MC quits playing into it...which will feel very rejecting as his last move (understandably) already has.
