I agree that people can be manipulative. I also am the type to own up to my own manipulation. I've actually learned to call myself out on it. Even my last email to L I admitted that I wanted to create drama in order to keep up the higher intensity of both the relationship and of the support. But I didn't act on it.

I still don't see how having thoughts and expressing thoughts in emails equals manipulative. I do it all the time. Was LT's email manipulative? I'm not going to judge that. But expressing her thoughts and feelings in an email context, even in an email that might be manipulative, does not mean that that part was manipulative. And Dr. T couldn't see that. Instead he generalized the whole email, got defensive, and instead of helping LT, sort of offended her by labeling the behaviour in a negative way. Why couldn't Dr. T, in return, talk about what LT is experiencing. Why did it have to be about him. A good T will not put themselves into the mix. They should know what their own issues are and keep that out of the relationship. And when it does enter the relationship, he should have owned up to it and not gotten defensive.