Sorry to drag this out of the past....

He's been practising for 8 years now. I don't have qualms with his competency. He makes what I would consider to be the occasional slip up, but I think he's very good at his job, generally speaking.

A month ago I sent him an email after a session where I was struggling to put my thoughts together, mostly around how I feel robotic and how I feel that everyone, including him, is inauthentic. I told him he didn't need to respond. He wrote me back, but then said that, in the spirit of authenticity, he wanted to let me know he doesn't interact with clients outside sessions. I told him he's always been vague about what's OK and what isn't, and he needs to be direct. He said let's discuss it next session.

We did. He couldn't say it straight, but I put it in to words which he then agreed to. No hugs allowed. No texts allowed. No emails allowed.

I feel cut off at the knees. I had somewhat begun to trust him but now I am very guarded in sessions -- can you really trust someone who says no to a hug with someone who's opened themselves up so fully for five months? I've tried to tell myself therapy is a professional relationship, there shouldn't be hugs...but I can't do that anymore. Therapy is personal, and I feel connected and calmer to a person when there's touch. I don't want to sleep with him. I just want to feel human.

And I feel just plain annoyed about his response to texting and emailing -- I contacted him maybe once every other week, and nothing would take him more than two minutes to reply to. And some of it has been useful to me -- it's how I came up with a list of goals for goodness sakes!

He told me to <i>imagine</i> I was writing to him, but not send it. Just makes me feel even more disconnected and bad at the whole human interaction thing.

Any advice? Your responses were very helpful last time I was here...