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Here are a good answers to this question from Quora. I wish my T would read it.
In my view this is not psychotherapy at all, as psychotherapy deals with deep feelings. In psychotherapy, it is understood that transferential feelings ALWAYS exist, and it is more about how and when we choose to identify and work with them, you cannot prevent a client from experiencing the full range of transferential feelings. That is the whole purpose of therapy, to work through unresolved feelings and unfinished issues, the ones that won’t go away and mess up your life, and the way this is done is through what emerges in the therapeutic relationship.
It seems bonkers to me that a therapist would terminate a client just when the real work begins to emerge. I would suggest this is probably because these therapists feel out of their depth with deep feelings, for example if the client is angry with them, as they have not been trained in how to work with these very real situations that will always arise when you have two people in close relationship. So if you want to work with your feelings and you want to feel free to feel whatever you happen to feel in therapy, choose an experienced, mature psychotherapist who will be rock steady while you go into your more vulnerable material. Do not go to a therapist who does not work within the transference. This means being informed about who you choose to work with, what modality they practice, and what they regard as therapeutic.
This does NOT mean trying to seduce your therapist, or acting out in other ways that are disruptive to the therapy. You have to keep to the therapeutic boundaries just the same as the therapist does. You are free to feel and explore what comes up for you, just not to act it out with this person. This is the essential distinction. Transferential feelings arise when you experience the person of the therapist “as if” they are someone else in your life. They stand in for this person so that you can take the opportunity to heal old wounds that keep repeating. It is essential that this is handled appropriately by the therapist, and that you also stay in your lane as client.
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When a child’s emotional needs are not met and a child is repeatedly hurt and abused, this deeply and profoundly affects the child’s development. Wanting those unmet childhood needs in adulthood. Looking for safety, protection, being cherished and loved can often be normal unmet needs in childhood, and the survivor searches for these in other adults. This can be where survivors search for mother and father figures. Transference issues in counseling can occur and this is normal for childhood abuse survivors.
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