I have mixed feelings.

I think it’s totally normal to feel jealous of people in our therapist’s lives. If it’s not jealousy of children, I think it can come out as jealousy towards spouses, friends or other relationships. In many ways, the setup of therapy can be withholding and rejecting in that way. There is always a knowledge that 45 minutes a week is all we get and a relationship outside of the room will never happen. It’s hard to accept that other people have 24/7 access to our idealize support figure, while we are sectioned off in a really secretive way.

Rationally, I understand why therapy is structured this way, but often I question if it’s healthy for ALL of us, and if there is really such a thing as working through the feelings. It seems that habituating to it is best case - though wouldn’t doubt somone who said it was talked, felt or rationalized out for them.

I didn’t struggle so much with intense jealousy of my therapists kids - though it cropped up in spots - but that therapy followed a pattern of strong intimacy and then abandon (and I wish that it hadn’t)... week after week. It didn’t seem fair. For me, it took a heavy toll and opened the door to a whole lot of emotional turmoil and therapy melodrama. I can’t say that this is the case for you, but felt healthier in relationships that followed a more normal relationship pattern. As a ‘worried well’ (and now victim of therapy trauma) I am furtunate enough to be able to go without therapy. For those that have to deal with these dynamics long term, it is certainly motivation to get well and get moving.