Therapist Doesn't Want me as a Client

I finally got enough money to see my old therapist and I was told that they had assigned me to someone else. I wonder if she doesn't want to see me anymore because my emotional ups and downs are too much? It kills me that I have even made a therapist not want to be around me any more. My therapist did say that she felt like she would be really affected by me if I killed myself--could she be protecting herself and that's why she won't be my therapist? Do therapists think that way?

There are a number of reasons this could have happened, and some of them don't have anything to do with your therapist's preferences. If you are working with an agency or some kind of group system, it's possible that some kind of administrative issue is the reason why you would be sent to someone else.

If it was because of your therapist's issues, then it's still not your fault. One of the great big rules that therapists must follow is that if they cannot keep themselves in an appropriate emotional space with a client, then they need to refer the client elsewhere. It is unethical and inappropriate for a therapist to try to do therapy with someone when it they (the therapists) are unbalanced by the client.

That does NOT make you bad or too sick to help or anything like that. It just means that your therapist has limits, in stuff like emotional availability and in professional skills, that make it no longer a good fit from the therapist's side.

She could have a full caseload. I know it's hard but try to see that it's not a snub.

"My therapist did say that she felt like she would be really affected by me if I killed myself--could she be protecting herself and that's why she won't be my therapist? Do therapists think that way?"

There is your answer. I am a retired therapist and yes we do think like that. Her not wanting to see you is more about her than it is about you. She may have had a client suicide recently and doesn't feel she isready to talk to someone with SI. Another possibility, she may have things going on in her RL and she may feel she doesn't have the emotional energy.
She is taking care of herself. She is modeling good boundaries. Again this is more about her than you.

Hoping your new therapist works out well,

Sabra

Shouldn't it be more about him than the therapist? Aren't therapists supposed to help people instead of telling them to **** off?

I agree with the OP's, that it's more than likely not you personally.

Well, nothing in the OP said anything about being told to f*** off. Therapists are only human --and they have to take care of themselves too. They are not superhuman, demi-gods without limitations. And like one of the posters said that it might just be an administrative case, and have nothing to do with the the therapist.

I agree that therapist have GOT to protect themselves too. They are human, and it's only normal that at times they may find themselves too "attached" to a certain patient -- anyone could feel like that. Perhaps something in the patient's history reminds the therapist of herself -- and she can relate too closely. Perhaps she feels a warmth towards the patient that she doesn't feel towards other patients because she DOES relate. That's ONLY human, and you can't blame the therapist.

So she has to protect herself. I don't blame her one bit and it has NOTHING to do with the patient. She didn't tell her to F##$$$ off. She is just having someone else take her case. Nothing wrong with that.

Thanks for the input. I saw my new therapist who works with my old therapist (same office) and asked him what was going on. He said she had a full caseload................but I really don't believe him (I think he's just trying to be nice and not telling me my therapist had to quit seeing me cause I was too draining). God, it's going to be so hard to trust someone new and reexplain everything that is going on....and it's a male therapist (I prefer to deal with females)..............anyway, I'll see how it goes, I can always leave if it doesn't work.

And change is hard anyway; I know it is for me.

The therapist MUST be in an appropriate mental/emotional space in order to be fully present and able to engage with the client. If anything in her life is interfering with that ability, it is her ethical obligation to NOT see that client.

Let me use a really dumb/obvious example: Let's say you are an actively using cocaine addict and you are engaging in every coke addict thing in the book to avoid the issue. Now let's say your therapist lost her child to cocaine overdose a few months back and she is in total internal uproar.

Should that therapist be working with you? Absolutely not. It would be unethical and quite possibly harmful. It's not about you, though. It's about her.

That's the way the rules of the profession work.

I hope that helps it make a little more sense.

prob more about your therapist not feeling as though he can handle your case, not so much about you! But I know you must feel a loss here; however, you're much better off working w T who is able to work with you, that's for sure!

I honestly think that you should believe that your old therapist had a full caseload. The first thing I thought when I read the first sentence of your post, was that there was probably scheduling issues or space issues. You should try to take this entire thing less personally. It most definitely was not your fault, and you can't change it, so you should make the best of the situation. You're going into therapy to get better, not to worry and feel hurt that you don't have the same therapist as you did before. I genuinely believe that it was not by the decision of your old therapist. You should give yourself a break, you didn't do anything wrong.
Good luck with your new therapist!