This is why I think I need an authority figure who won't give me exactly what I'm looking for--why I don't want to just find another version of MC. Part of why I want to try to make it work with this T is that I think he has the potential to really help me by challenging me and pushing me forward. I think I need to struggle to deal with not getting exactly what I want and learn to deal with that.

T also has said that maybe the way to deal with transference isn't so much what MC said in terms of working through it with the object of transference (where MC would say if I could resolve it with him, that would give me a different ending to a story from my childhood). T said maybe it's about going back to the roots of the transference, as in my childhood and my parents, and dealing with those issues. A week ago, he gave me some worksheets to fill out with stuff involving my parents, and we're going to work on exploring that when he gets back. I feel like at this point, may as well try any reasonable approach. It does make sense that someone in the here and now can't fill my childhood needs. And that maybe the first step is figuring out exactly what those needs were and how my parents didn't meet them, then going from there...