sunny, waaaay back you mentioned the book "In Session". I bought it soon after and read some and really liked it. But often I read books a bit at a time and not necessarily from front to back, I read what looks interesting at the moment....so recently I read some more.

I've posted about my craving for "mothering" before, particularly when I first came here. The craving is so deep, has been unrelenting and so frustrating, embarassing, shameful, and depressing. It's been a focus among other things in therapy; we've talked and talked about it. We've also talked about child development and anxious attachment as the consequence of early child development issues. So interesting, this analysis.

So I recently read the section of the book "Dreams of the Perfect Mother" and "Mothers Lost and Found." It has been so helpful to me. Why I waited so long to read that is beyond me--I can't imagine how or why I didn't turn to those chapters immediately the first time I opened it! These chapters I read talk about someone just like me, with the same cravings for "mothering". I read about different therapeutic approaches to this not-so-uncommon issue, and Kohut's ideas. One is that the importance of these cravings therapeutically is that it shows the therapist at what point child development needs were not met and so it shows where on the developmental continuum I got 'stuck'. There is no going back, but going forward where "the client and therapist together can complete a growth process that is analagous to the thwarted process of development."

This felt so good to read and it has allowed me to make sense of it, to not feel so ashamed, and to be able to let go of it some. It's been relieving. T and I talked about how it helped me just to read that. She said it's 'amazing' I can take that in and apply it to myself. I couldn't have without the year of therapy prior to my reading these parts of the book.

Thank you, sunny, for suggesting this book in your post. It has opened up therapy for me in new ways; it has changed my life.