[fieldofdreams]

My T told me yesterday that I've learned a lot in therapy but I have a difficult time transferring it to other relationships because I'm very reluctant to allow other people to really know me. Well... that's probably true, partly because much of what I now know about myself isn't anything I'd really care to share with other people, and partly because the therapy relationship is so unique, so unlike an actual friendship that I really don't see much that's transferable. I guess in many ways I see the therapy relationship as being equivalent to the "special tool" that's needed to fix certain mechanical problems. The tool is absolutely necessary to repair that particular piece of equipment, but beyond that its function is extremely limited because it doesn't fit anything else.
Certainly there are some things that I can transfer to other relationships, such as my increased ability to see gray areas rather than everything being either black or white, and I am much less reactive and impulsive when someone triggers me in some way because now I know that something from my past is being triggered and I can take that step back and think before reacting.
But in other ways, therapy has made me feel even more "different" and unable to fit in than I felt before. The more I know about myself, the more alien and uncomfortable I feel in the company of other people... so in that sense, what I've learned has made me even less likely to pursue new relationships.
I really don't see much about the relationship itself that's transferable to other relationships. He thinks I should try reaching out to others more, to transfer some of the vulnerability and trust to other people so that I don't feel so alone when he's not available or when he's on vacation, but I've done that and it hasn't helped because I can't talk about what it is that I'm really feeling. I mean really, how do you tell anyone who hasn't been in therapy that you miss your T and you have separation anxiety when he's away? Most people just don't get it -- so how much is really transferable anyway?

[skeksi]

I am having similar struggles. T has been gently nudging me to share my mental health difficulties with my friends, but I am so so so resistant to that. They know my main problem, and why I have it, but the idea of giving details makes me so scared. For example, how do I bring up the fact that I spent the last week terrified that something bad was going to happen to me because someone reminded me of my abuser?

I value T's perspective so much, but I can't even wrap my brain around doing the things he suggests sometimes. Sigh.

[pachyderm]

Don't you learn from looking at yourself more about what makes other people tick? And this ought eventually to make relationships more meaningful, shouldn't it?

[fieldofdreams]

Yeah Skeksi, I totally get it. I value my T's perspective very much too, but I often feel as though he and I live in 2 different worlds. I think that of course it's easy for him to share his feelings with his friends or family -- he has "normal" emotions that most people understand. He doesn't get sent into a tailspin when he sees someone who reminds him of an abuser. He doesn't have intense childlike feelings that sometimes make it difficult for him to function as an adult. Sure, I can tell my friends when I'm upset or angry or sad about certain issues, but details about what I'm dealing with in therapy? No, I don't think so. I don't know what world my T lives in, but it's definitely not mine.

Because my t keeps the focus on the here and now, just about everything I learn in therapy is transferable to my current relationships. That's what I find so helpful about my therapy. That doesn't mean I always put into practice what he teaches me, but I try, and I'm getting better about it.

[Melbadaze]

I find that I no longer see relationships through the template of my adoptive mother and begin to see people through the template of T and because of that am not hyperviglant to being abused or let down because of the positive experience of the theraputic relationship because I have a secure base to work from this is what I transfer into my other relationships. I can almost react like a "normal" person now to other peoples "maddness" if I come upon it, if that makes sense.

[fieldofdreams]

That's true, Pachyderm, I do learn more about what makes other people tick. I guess that should make relationships more meaningful but so far it hasn't worked that way for me. Sometimes I think that therapy has made me so painfully aware of unmet childhood needs that instead of feeling more connected to people, I feel more alienated because of the intensity of those needs. It's like there's this huge gulf between my experiences and the experiences of "normal" people and I don't feel like I fit in anywhere except with other people who have very similar issues.

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by fieldofdreams

It's like there's this huge gulf between my experiences and the experiences of "normal" people and I don't feel like I fit in anywhere except with other people who have very similar issues.

True, but maybe people with similar issues are "better" than normal?

And maybe some of the "normals" have just pulled the covers over their problems?

[fieldofdreams]

That makes a lot of sense, Farmergirl. I've learned a lot by exploring my past because it's helped me understand my behavior in relationships, but it's the day-to-day aspects of relationships that I find difficult to navigate, and we don't talk much about that in therapy because of the intense focus on my childhood and other previous relationships. Maybe a little more balance between the past and the present would help.
That's cool, Melba. It sounds like you're really able to use that secure base as a "transfer point" that helps you feel safer in other relationships. The only way that I've been able to do that so far is by using that secure base as something I hold on to when other relationships feel unpredictable and overwhelming. The problem is that I won't always have that secure base to hold on to, but the reason I feel secure in my relationship with my T is because I expect him to provide that security and predictability due to the nature of the relationship, whereas I don't expect that kind of security in any other relationship because no other relationship is intentionally designed to be about my needs. So again, it becomes very hard to transfer the therapy relationship to other relationships because the therapy relationship is so unique. And I don't really get to test my perceptions of him to see how accurate I am in those perceptions because he rarely answers those kinds of questions, and he almost never confirms or denies my perceptions of him, so I really can't use our relationship as something to gauge the accuracy of my impressions of others. In that sense, I'm still clueless because therapy hasn't helped me at all in that area.
Pachyderm, I actually think that's part of the problem for me -- I am often surrounded by "normal" people who shove things under the rug and sometimes their issues are glaringly obvious to everyone but them!

[kitten16]

Field, I agree so much with this. (That's why I have no friends and everyone thinks I'm a Debbie Downer. I'm only half joking!)

It's weird. I think I would feel bad anyway, because I'm depressive, but I like self-awareness and insight. I enjoy knowing why I feel bad. It's better now than when I was a kid, when I felt bad all the time -- but I was confused by my feelings. All of the trauma was so buried. It was like being thrown in a bag blindfolded and beaten with a stick. So now I can see the stick. It still hurts, but...I'd rather not be in denial. That's what the benefit of therapy for me is -- it's the process of getting to know myself better internally. That inner landscape is a little more moonlit, a little less frightening, because I've spent so much time in there. It kinda feels good. Not great, but better than total darkness.

It's such a good question, though -- what really is the point of therapy? My parents thought therapy should fix me. Their expectation was that therapy would normalize me, cause me to fit into acceptable modes of behavior that would make me more tractable, more charming, more ornamental, more biddable, etc.

I always thought therapy should be about me, and later on it was. I don't know if I even want to fit in with others at this point. I'm a deep person -- I can't deal with the shallowness of our have-a-nice-day culture sometimes. It's too frickin' exhausting. So I spend a lot of time alone.

Anyway, just free-associating, I guess, as a result of your topic, which I think is a great one

Originally Posted by fieldofdreams

That's true, Pachyderm, I do learn more about what makes other people tick. I guess that should make relationships more meaningful but so far it hasn't worked that way for me. Sometimes I think that therapy has made me so painfully aware of unmet childhood needs that instead of feeling more connected to people, I feel more alienated because of the intensity of those needs. It's like there's this huge gulf between my experiences and the experiences of "normal" people and I don't feel like I fit in anywhere except with other people who have very similar issues.

[Sannah]

Hi Field, relationships is definitily something that I have had to work on. What I have always done was put myself into these friendship situations and then worked on whatever the results were. This way I worked through the issue. Actually, all of the issues that I worked on came up in my relationships with other people - self worth, boundaries, feelings.......... You can't just sit on the sidelines and move forward. You have to get out and play.