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Originally Posted by possum220
Thank you for all the responses. I do not have BPD but when I talk to him about anything remotely emotional a switch goes off and I dissociate. I have vocal changes or neck spasms. I don't think I have full blown DID but have landed somewhere on the spectrum.
When he listens he actually hears me. He doesn't tell me that nothing is wrong. He doesn't tell me that other people are so much worse off than me or dismiss what I say. There are times I talk about stuff he will have tears in his eyes and I do not understand that. He obviously cares but my capacity to tap into the fact that he cares is missing.
What happened back then is a huge key to a few things that are part of my life. I was just so embarrassed of my raw emotion that I had to kill it. I was successful. Maybe too successful. The very thought of talking to him now about that makes my neck and cheeks burn red hot.
When people try to tell me that they care it's feels like water going off a ducks back. I want to connect with others but my inability to understand it emotionally makes me think that I am a trying to find a unicorn.
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Hi, possum, I think I get it. I was diagnosed 8 years ago not with full-blown DID but with DDNOS. This after many years of therapy and trying to "get in touch" with my emotions.
I think transference, and whatever it is that can lead to that, is very complicated and not well-understood. This applies also to countertransference, which is where things can get very messy. Also, in my view, sometimes re-traumatizing and damaging. So your caution seems well-advised to me.
Therapy has been a pretty long, crappy experience for me. The newer therapies weren't around when I started and I never tried them. Now, most of my feeling of having been traumatized is related to bad therapy, so I don't think any other T is likely to understand that.
Nevertheless, have you tried any of them -- EMDR, brain-spotting, schema therapy? It has sounded to me like they can get to the "touchy" points without some of the risks of regular interpersonal therapy. If you like your current T OK otherwise, have you considered doing EMDR along with continuing with him?
How one finds a unicorn -- maybe a unique, individual experience?