|
Hiya,
I think the important question is: is your therapist a friend or is she a therapist? I don't think it is really possible for her to be both, professionally. Therapists are not professionally allowed to maintain dual relationships with their clients i.e. to be friends outside of therapy, to meet for coffee... Are you just talking about hobbies and mutual interests during the therapy time or are you talking about deeper things? If you are just sticking to the former, does your therapist ask you why you are avoiding deeper topics?
The fact that your therapist cannot be your friend doesn't mean your therapist doesn't like you, feel friendly towards you - it's a complex thing. I don't think you should be scared by the way you feel toward her - a lot of people in therapy become strongly attached to their therapists and even imagine what they would say to their Ts when they're not there - therapists call these feelings 'transference' - some people fall in love with their therapists - therapy is an intense situation where feelings can become very strong. I think a good attachment is essential for the therapeutic work to happen - you need to feel a great deal of trust toward that person to share what you need to share. Often there is a conflict between opening up and the fear of them judging you, but the whole point is that they won't judge us - that's why you need to be able to trust her. Why don't you start by talking to her about why you find it so hard to talk about your issues... why you feel the resistance... your fear she won't like you anymore... your desire to maintain a friendship outside of therapy. It's fine to have this desire, but if your therapist is doing her job, she should explain to you that you won't be able to act out that desire.
I think that you should stay with your therapist - don't be scared away by your feelings toward her. Therapists are trained to work with these feelings - many consider such an attachment as essential to the therapeutic work. If your T doesn't seem to be able to deal with it, then that's more of a problem - likewise, if you only seem to be talking about recipes and other trivial things, then you're not really doing 'therapy'. Remember that you are paying this lady to help you work on your emotional problems, rather than for friendship (you don't pay for friendship). Of course, one of her roles may be to support you, encourage you - and in this way, sharing things in common can be nurturing and healing.
I hope this helps and that you can work through this. I've been in therapy for over a year and a half and many times I've felt scared to go deeper, through fear that my T won't like me anymore, that he'll be freaked out and won't see me any longer. Each time, he's had to show me that he won't do this and I've had to trust him... that's really a big part of the process. Likewise, in the first months, we built up a good relationship - shared a lot of things - like our interest for art and traveling - he lent me books even, I would do the same. This was a great way to build trust in the first place. I can mail him between sessions or phone him - I have his home number. He is the one person who probably knows me the best - even better than my fiancee. That said, I know that I will never be a friend of his, per se - will never come to dinner or share any other social activity with him, and of course I pay for the time I spend with him.
Greetings,
Onzichtbaar
|