Therapist issue

Tomorrow I have to talk to my therapist about something that is so difficult. I saw him today and burst into tears on the way home so I knew it was time to have this talk that has been coming for a while. I just dread it. So instead of waiting 10 days I'm going tomorrow and am very grateful for that time having been open because I think I can last about 24 hours with this before I start crying and don't stop.

I don't really want to try to explain it all. He has always been the perfect therapist for me and now he isn't sometimes and while I know and understand some of it the overall is that it's not working as well as it needs to.

I was all ready to bring this up once before and the day I was prepared things went fine again. And the next week things were good again and after that I went from not great but ok to bad and as far as I know things were fine though that time. Today things were back to not right and I have to say something. By going tomorrow I pretty much have to say something and since I burst into tears driving 70 mph on the way home several times I think I have to say something.

I do not want to change therapists. I don't even want to talk about that; it's not an option right now. I just want things to be like they used to be where I pretty much knew who I was seeing every week instead of lately when I don't know what to expect.

I'm scared I'm going to hurt him. I honestly think he may be depressed himself and not aware of this and in that case rushing in with a lot of potentially harsh comments won't help him at all.

I know he is not doing anything that is upsetting me on purpose. I think he would be very upset if he could watch some of our sessions. But I have to let him know that I need things to work better because keeping me healthy is a team effort and he is a huge part of the team.

I need to start writing. I wish I didn't have to do this. He has gone so far out of his way for me and I hate that this has come up but it has and I guess I have to practice some of those annoying life skills and figure it out. But I'm very afraid.

I first all of commend you for having such a big heart and caring so much. It can be very very very hard to end therapy sessions with someone because it is such a intimate experience from the get go.

However remember this that he is a professional and he has been through this several times before and is equipped to handle this. Just be honest going in why you are wanting to end services. Who knows maybe there is something going on with him and this will allow the opportunity for him to talk.

Once again I admire you for your compassion.

OH no, I didn't mean that. I am NOT wanting to end. Despite a problem I do not want to terminate. It would be easier if I did. No, this is confrontation about how therapy is being done but still staying with him because ultimately time will sort things out and he is the best match there is for me right now.

Ohhhhhh so sorry for the misunderstanding. I still think you could mention your concerns then as I did mention he is a trained professional and can handle the topic. You may try typing out a letter, I have to do that sometimes to keep track of what I want to talk about with my t because I get all like yeah sure everything is great.

Yeah, I'm working on writing. I threw out the perfect draft a couple months ago because of course when I was manic everything was suddenly absolutely perfect and beautiful. Except maybe not so much now that I'm on earth again.

I honestly think he is depressed. But it's not like I can tell him that. My big concern is that my confronting him about this is going to carry a lot of weight. He's treated me longer than anyone in his entire career. So if I have this problem it's pretty likely others do too and unless he is hearing from a lot of people and not changing anything it is likely he's going to hear it from me and from me it carries more weight than someone who has only seen him for a few months. Plus he knows perfectly well that I don't confront people. Ever. We've been sort of working on that for a while now but keep getting interrupted by mania or influenza or his health issues or whatever. My doing this is a big, big thing for me. And nobody will know that as well as him.

So he's a professional and can deal with it but I know from my own life that it still hurts to get criticism (which I'm trying to avoid but this is in fact criticism) and the circumstances are going to make him know this is serious. I hope that means that he is then able to see that something is wrong but I'm not sure.

I guess I'll know tomorrow.

I think what you are doing is courageous. I would have trouble doing this if it needed to be done, even if doing it would make me better.

You deserve the best treatment and he deserves a chance, especially from a long time client with a good relationship. Your confrontation, I can imagine, will be commendable in his eyes. Please let us know how it went.

Thanks Cashart. I wrote it down and managed to keep all of my manic rage tendencies out of it. I pretty much just wrote how much he means to me, that I do NOT want to talk about changing therapists and that is not my desire at all, that I just want to stop a problem before it gets worse and I'm practicing my skills at doing that which we've been working on for so long. And then I just described the issue and then asked him how I should handle it so that I don't just shut down which is what I'm currently doing.

I am afraid that it will be hard for him, even though I was as nice as I could be and a friend read it and said it was fine. I keep thinking about one day that he called me in and said something about being upset because he messed up with his prior client and that he was pretty sure that time slot would be open from then on (I think he was trying to get me off a late slot because he didn't want me driving in the dark on the meds I was on then). But he was having a rough time even just starting writing on my chart and then excused himself and came back and had obviously been crying. I have no idea what happened in that session but he blamed himself and whatever it was it really upset him a lot. I think we even cut the session really short and they gave me my money back. I don't want to make him cry....it shouldn't but if I'm right and he is depressed it's hard to know how he'll really react.

One of the hard things is that after 9 years you get close enough that I almost want to say "I think ...." but it isn't something I really can do. The walls get weird sometimes.

Oh well, it will be over in another 13.5 hours....

I survived and so did he. I had to give him some really specific examples and then he suddenly seemed to realize what he had been doing and was kind of shocked by it. He had explanations for some of it but mostly just was surprised at what I was saying and promised to change some things. And we have a sort of code word that I can use if it happens again and that is less awkward for me. I feel like we are back to a place where things are much better than they have been in a while and since I said over and over that I knew it was mostly because he wasn't feeling good I think he doesn't feel as attacked as he might have. It did seem to hit him partway through that he's probably doing this with other people too and so I'm hoping that this will help him maybe realize that maybe the answer is not the other stuff but depression. I really think that's the big problem but I don't think that needs to come from me.

It was a better session, as hard as that was. I think things will be better now, or I hope they will. I am very bad at finding therapists I work well with so I really need him to stay in position in my life as long as possible. I have had a couple of very good therapists (him and one other) and the rest have not been so great. Usually I quit really fast; the one before him I lasted nearly 4 years and it was just chatting, not ever working on helping me learn to cope better. I have no interest in entering that mess again unless there is no other option. Which is still far away today.

I'm so glad that is over with. That was HARD and even harder because I'm still feeling very fragile and somewhat manic but I can easily be tipped into being depressed and a whole new set of problems can come up. Not my favorite time to take a big emotional risk but I survived and so did he and hopefully now things will be better again.

I am glad that you were able to talk to him about everything! You showed a lot of strength by standing up and talking to him.