Quote:
Originally Posted by Brown Owl 2
I wonder if anyone can identify with this? I tried so hard to tell her, but she didn’t agree with me. I think she thought it was great, safe therapy, but the reality for me was that over a number of sessions feelings of trauma were triggered and I became unable to sleep and was only just managing to get through my working week. This happened several times during the therapy, but I recovered each time, and put what had happened behind me, because I believed her story that it was good therapy, until the end when I couldn’t. She is very experienced and well respected therapist and supervisor. I really liked her.
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Hi Brown Owl 2,
I am sorry that you have had this experience. Your story fell short towards the end - and I was curious, how did your therapeutic alliance with this therapist resolve in the end? Did you have to shut the door? Did you walk away and call her out on what she did to hurt you?
In short, yes I relate, and so will many others. You deserved better - and you know it - so count yourself lucky to have identified an issue with your therapist before it go too out of control. Unfortunately, some client's find themselves in situations like yourself, only to be groomed into a trauma bond with a Covert abuser.
It can be very damaging to first connect with a therapist, and only after things go south - to have them suddenly become distant and unwilling to acknowledge a rupture, or a breakdown in the therapeutic alliance. It effectively acts as gaslighting - a form of insidious emotional abuse often utilized for malicious purposes. As painful as it is to experience, you know your story well and you know you are not crazy. Rest in knowing this.
Good therapy looks different for everyone - and in some cases - the only way to get better - is first - to get worse... This often means that through exposure therapy and painful therapeutic interventions, and thus, change, (which naturally causes turmoil in clients), resulting emotional turmoil can appear to have the opposite impact that someone who enters therapy wants in the first place. But this can also be a natural by product of change. On the flip-side - it can also be a sign that someone is being abused covertly, and is in need of help...
What a perfect environment for abuse!
Thanks,
HD7970ghz