I just emailed T for the 3rd time since Wednesday!

Do you think I'm testing her? I know that one email is all right, but this time I responded back to her email, and she then wrote back. Today my "excuse" was that she had asked me to email her the name of a documentary I saw (nothing really to do with my therapy) so I did that, but of course wrote more. I'm panicking that it's too much. I could have put the name of the film in the first email. Instead, I wrote about my parts fighting the feelings for her, and not sure if I should have emailed her again. I said I wanted the "container connection" at the session; that's why I'm so upset.

She trusts me too much, just ignores the fact that I get triggered by the connection. She has good boundaries, but is very casual, like asking me to email the name of the film. My former T would never have asked me something like that! It may be that she wants me to see her as a "normal" person, doesn't want me to fantasize about our relationship. Something like that--I'm just guessing.

I feel like this therapy is going to cure me or kill me. That's what I said about the last one, though. I have to get this "wanting" T out of my system by letting those parts attach to her and see what happens. I'm just so scared right now.

Rainbow, if your T allows e-mails - you can use that. Allow T to set the bounbary.
But be respectful of the time and issues. My T lets me write him for my therapy stuff - a TON of venting that I do and processing through my thoughts. I do send him links he asks me for in session, but he never replies to those emails. In fact, he rarely replies at all - so I go through phases thinking I am abusing the ability to email. We have talked about it several times and he tells me to trust HIM to set the boundary and that HE will let me know if I am crossing them. He is very honest with me about everything.

So go with your heart but don't get trapped in the same bind I can get into with being upset when he doesn't reply. I sent him 12 emails yesterday because I was not well at all. He answered the first one in the AM and assured me that he was there for me and sending me positive thoughts and love - then there was silence.
But then this AM I sent him that dream I had last night and he wrote back and said only a few words - that I could trust him and that he did NOT forget me :-)

Hope this helps!!

My T has very wide boundaries also. She actually has very firm boundaries, but you know that she's certainly tolerant, and permit(ted) a lot of behaviors that most T's would have squelched.

But it helped me, it really did, I guess it was just stuff that I needed to work through in my own way.

She told me once that she would never be able to give me what I wanted, but that after a while, it wouldn't matter so much. And she was right about that. It doesn't. That neediness is mostly gone.

So, I pass that on to you. (Your T sounds really good to me, BTW. For whatever that's worth.)

Take care,
-Far

WePow, yes it helps a lot, what you said. At my session, T told me that she would tell me when the emails would be too much for her, but at the time I told her I only need to send one after my session! I'm just extra needy right now, or like I said, trying to "get it out of my system" though I don't know if that's possible. Maybe I want to see how far she'll let me go, or how far I will go, in order to see if I "jump off a cliff", will she be there to catch me?

I've always stopped myself in therapy. Stopped the feelings. I desperately don't want to do that, and she's the first T who has welcomed email to express my feelings.

Far, how did the neediness disappear for you? Why doesn't it matter that she can't give you what you want? What did you want? How do you get it now? Do you mean love, like I want? And, yes it means something to me that you think my T is good. I always got negative feedback about my former T so I don't trust myself completely any more. thank you!

Rainbow, your behavior is "learned" it has served you in the past to get you what you wanted/thought you wanted and there's no way to change that behavior but by working on it through practice and experiences. Maybe you do email too much now but look how you're really thinking about it and trying to understand another's boundaries (and, by default, learn where you want yours). Your T doesn't trust you "too much", that's like saying a parent trusts a toddler too much when it's learning to walk and falls down; the parent doesn't stop the toddler from trying again!

You have to learn to deal with your own triggers which is what you are doing; you have to decide what is a good idea for you to do, how to behave, your T can't do that for you.

Perna: What you said is interesting to me though I don't think I totally understand what you're saying. Do you mean my T may be "allowing" me the emails because she realizes that I'm "learning to walk"? My former T let me call her, but I nevere grew out of it. So far, in this therapy, I've felt a need for the emails after my sessions, just like I felt a need for the phone calls after sessions with Bt. I wonder if I'll ever learn to "walk."

I agree with what you say, wepow, but the problem I personally have with that is that I'm afraid of how I'll react/feel when or if my T did have to reassert the boundaries. I just know I would experience it as rejection and that is so hugely painful and triggering to me.

So, yes, I agree that we should let the T set the boundaries, but I am always so scared and careful to not push those boundaries for fear of it causing me more pain.

anyway, that's me, hopefully you don't have those same rejection/abandonment issues, Rainbow

Zoo, I'd feel rejected also if my T decided she wouldn't respond to my emails. I don't trust her completely because our original agreement was that I could email, but she wouldn't respond unless I specifically asked her to. I make sure to ask her now, just in case, so I won't be rejected.

Oh I do feel rejected for sure when T doesn't reply to some emails I send :-) It is not fun one bit either. And it makes me seriously doubt myself for trusting T.

But the thing I am learning is that the relationship I have with T is not about each day and the issues that come up... it is not about the single emails I send when things are bad or my vents... it is not even about his good responses when they come or his lack of responses. There is a much bigger picture that T can see because he has 1) been through his own trauma healing and knows what it is like to be "me" and to be a client. 2) has 20+ yrs of being a T and had had many other people he helped through trauma healing. What I have to trust is 1) my own ability to know whether or not my T is actually helping me to heal and become healthier and 2) that my T can get me to where I need to go in the long run and will try his very best to not allow me to come to harm along the way.

It is so wonderful because I am finally picking up things he says in session that tell me he is feeling that protective nature towards me. And I have NEVER EVER in my life FELT like someone was actually trying to protect ME!!!! Every single person I knew who was in a role of authority was first protecting themselves. I get that. But when you are a child, you need to be protected. I didn't get that.

I finally can trust that my T can do both - protect himself and teach me how to protect myself. This is so HUGE that I can't even describe it.

If you can trust yourself enough to know if the therapy you are in feels like you are gaining from it - then you can start trusting your T's process. My recomendations is to be totally honest with your T the whole time. If you feel rejected because you don't get a response and you feel you needed one, let T know. Talk it out. Give T the chance to show you the reasons they have behind their actions. They are not out to trick us. It is very scary to ask these questions - oh how I know!!! YIKES!!!
But it is only when we ask those questions that we allow T to see our response.

Keep in mind that the relationship we have with our Ts is about transference - and that is for a reason. So all those pangs we have when we are on edge waiting for responses or when we are confused about things said or whatever, all of that can be used within the context of the theraputic relationship to bring light to our triggers and issues we need to address.

For example, when T was silent and did not respond to some of my first trauma context emails, I would spend hours in agony. I had to work very hard to allow myself to feel that pain and then dig into it to see why I felt the way I did and what it reminded me of. In my case, whenever I told my parents or teachers about abuse, the common response was silence and dismissal. The other response was for them to call me a liar or tell me I "have such an active imagination!" ..... urrrrrr!! So when I hit that silence, my defense system automatically said "T is not responding because he does not believe me or because he thinks it is OK that things happened to me. He does not want to help me so he is silent. He enjoys listening to me suffer while he takes no action to help. I am invisible to him. He is too busy for me."

NONE of those things were true at all. But T could not just tell me that those things were not true. T had to show me that he did care and that I did matter. That is where his training and experience as a T and as a survivor came into play. He did not change the way he responded to me or my emails. He just did his T thing and I am finally being able to actually rest inside my skin a bit and feel that he really is there and that he does care deeply for me... and that he is kinda like a good dad who is teaching me how to ride a bike (how to process trauma responses and PTSD stuff on my own in a healthy way). On days like yesterday, I may feel that the hand is not behind me ready to catch me if I fall... but I actually felt that safety net all day yesterday. He knew what to say and when to say it. He was paying attention to make sure I didn't fall. But he allowed me the space to do the work.

So again... allow your T to be the T. And us clients and survivors can do our job to work as hard as we can at just trying to heal up. But always try extra hard to be honest with T.

Hugs!!!!!

Beautifully said, WePow.

Thank you, WePow. Your post was eloquent and helpful. I need to focus on why I crave the email contact with T right now, and how it makes me feel when she answers me. She did answer my third one, thanking me for the link to the film, but saying we would talk about my "parts" in the session on Tuesday. I expected that. From the start, she told me she did not want to do therapy via email, but she's been doing a little of that with me anyway. I know she cares very much about me and doesn't want me to feel like she's not "there" for me when I need her.

Hi Rainbow. (I've been away -- no internet.)

Yes, it's about love, like you want. Yes, I want it too. And can't get it.

Sometimes I still feel needy for that special kind of (maternal) love. But I think what my T did was allow me to accept and enjoy the other kinds of love, the other kinds of joy in the world.

So, it's not so much that the neediness is gone, but that it's smaller. It doesn't matter so much because -- I guess I was sort of keeping myself empty because of wanting that particular kind of love. But now I don't do that so much. I let myself be filled up and nourished by other things, other kinds of connections. That's why it doesn't matter so much any more that she can't love me like my mother should have done.

It's like, I was completely fixated on wanting a macintosh apple. And she couldn't give me that, and it was horrible. What she could give me was a macoun apple, but at first I completely rejected that, I hated the idea of it. But now, I have finally tried the macoun. And it's very good. Not a macintosh. But still very good. And because I have the macoun, I don't need the macintosh. (Still long for it sometimes. But not nearly as much as before.)

OK, I don't know if that makes any sense. But I think that's kind of what I mean.

Take care,
-Far

Far, thank you! Yes, what you wrote makes sense. My Ts have all told me something similar. "You can't have the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but you can have the goodies along the way." Or "I can't give you what you want, but it can be good enough." Or "we can feel connected and you can feel good even though I'm not holding you or rocking you".

But the macontash tastes so good, and I don't like macouns. (By the way, what kind of apple is that?! I never heard of it! )