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ArtieTheSequal
Writing my way through...
 
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Location: In the desert of my soul
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Default Jun 29, 2024 at 05:04 PM
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by East17 View Post
I think there can be a 'good goodbye', it all depends on what is important to the client.

For me it's 'How' it ends, and 'Who' ends the therapy relationship that feels important.

If a client makes the decision / has a choice to end therapy on their terms, that's one thing. But if an ending is forced upon them for whatever reason, especially if there isn't sufficient closure as far as the client is concerned, that can be really difficult to deal with, because you never feel as though everything was resolved. Bad endings can haunt a person.

I'd say it was only natural to have occasional pangs (nostalgia?) and miss your former therapist, particularly if you chose to just go to a session one day and say "that's it, after today I'm not coming back." Even if it was your choice to finish, there's bound to be residual complicated feelings attached to it, particularly as you had a long term therapy relationship with L. Ending the way you did though, must have felt like the right thing to do at the time. So perhaps ask yourself if you could do it over, what a good ending would look like to you, would there be anything you would like to do differently.

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Thanks East. It did feel like what I needed to do at the time. I suppose the only thing I'd like to have done differently is to go in, instead of canceling on the phone, and ending in person. I suppose the reason I didn't, was really only because at the time I wasn't 100% that I was ending. I called it a "break". I realized later it was over. I dunno. I just need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable and let time heal this.
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