Wondering how this will go down...

I plan to ask my T this Wednesday:

Do your clients ever affect you? Do you think about us outside of work? Do you rejoice over our successes and mourn over our failures? Do you get emotionally attached despite efforts not to? Do any of us manage to really get into your heart?

I'm going to explain why I'm asking afterward:

After what happened between *Client 1* and me on Friday (PTSD touch-resistant young girl hugged me and told me she loved me...big for her), I just wanted to scoop her up and take her home. Made it even harder when I did my on-call house checks Sunday and she asked me if she could come home with me. I love each and every one of my clients, but I am emotionally attached to three of mine; *Client 1*, *Client 2*, and *Client 3*. *Client 2* and I have had a special bond since the day I started working at the group home; he and his mom came to my wedding. He comes into my office to just stand behind me in my chair and put his hands on my shoulders. *Client 2* and *Client 3* are non-verbal and I think I relate to them because I feel like I never had a voice growing up. *Client 1* reminds me of myself because she has a hard time attaching to people due to what happened to her in life.

What do y'all think?

Really interesting questions to ask a T - would like to know the answers. I guess it would be a very hard insincere person who didn't experience some emotional attachment to us, but at the same time, I can imagine unless a T manages it well, it can become overwhelming for them.

As a teacher, I am very attached to my students. I teach some with special needs and special circumstances, and I find myself very concerned with their progress. I don't know if I am triggered because of my own past; however, I am greatly involved with a child who was has suffered abuse from her birth mother as well as her adopted brother. Also, if a child is bullied in any way, I find myself feeling very maternal.
bluemountains

Do your clients ever affect you? Do you think about us outside of work? Do you rejoice over our successes and mourn over our failures? Do you get emotionally attached despite efforts not to? Do any of us manage to really get into your heart?

I am a retired caseworker so I can definately answer for me:

My clients always affected me, some more then others. Some I just loved, some I was glad when they left my office

Every nite I thought about someone or something after work....even now I think of some of the clients from years ago. There was this one guy who wote me poetry. He was an alcoholic...a sweetie....he was in an auto accident and went to the emergency room with a headache. The discharged him. He died the next day. Yes, it was 1969 and he is still in my thoughts!!!!

I rejoice over successes but tried not to mourn over failures becaue they might be one step closer to getting better with my help

I have definately gotten emotionally attached many times. You can't help but do it, but it can rip you open!!! Thats why so many in the social service field burn out!!!!

Many, many stay in my heart...like my friend Willie who died. He will be in my heart till I die!

I am a retired caseworker so I can definately answer for me:

My clients always affected me, some more then others. Some I just loved, some I was glad when they left my office

Every nite I thought about someone or something after work....even now I think of some of the clients from years ago. There was this one guy who wote me poetry. He was an alcoholic...a sweetie....he was in an auto accident and went to the emergency room with a headache. The discharged him. He died the next day. Yes, it was 1969 and he is still in my thoughts!!!!

I rejoice over successes but tried not to mourn over failures becaue they might be one step closer to getting better with my help

I have definately gotten emotionally attached many times. You can't help but do it, but it can rip you open!!! Thats why so many in the social service field burn out!!!!

Many, many stay in my heart...like my friend Willie who died. He will be in my heart till I die![/QUOTE]

Thanks for everyone's answers so far. I know the answer for myself; I gave the example of the clients I work with as a program director in a group home for MR/DD adults. I just want to hear what my own T has to say about it...I like to disarm her sometimes. One thing I promise her is that my sessions will never be boring!

One of the great things about talking to my T from college many years later was him telling me the ways in which I affected his life and his career. It was amazing and touching.

Awe I like the question if any of us really get into their hearts! You will have to let us know what she says!!

Well, now, I dont know what's going on with me but I think you ought to skip the personal questions to him and simply cut to the chase:

"After what happened between *Client 1* and me on Friday ...."

It sounds as if you want to know what you mean to him, etc, & are bringing along this fairly complicated story as a cover--although you'd like to discuss that with him too. Why not just ask straight out about the kids & your job? Why the appearance of asking your T personal questions that might make him think you're asking for different reasons?

I am attempting to blend personal and professional insight with these questions. I want to ask her the personal question to see if she reacts similarly (personally) to her clients as I do my own. It is more rooted in the personal because I am having a personal reaction to my own client. If she doesn't want to answer the question, I would be disappointed, but that is her right. I believe she will answer the question from all angles because she tends to share both her personal and professional views freely. I will tell her up front that I also want to know how she feels about me. She will probably say that I should know how she feels because she has expressed that she loves me both verbally and through actions she has taken. She has called us "colleagues" several times because our careers parallel each other's and I wanted to blend the personal and professional aspects of what is going on. We talk shop on occasion and do like to "disarm" her at times. In nine months, she has never refused to answer any question I have asked her.

I think it would make a great session.

Can't wait to hear about it

My T, and even my old T, have both told me about how I have affected their lives (sometimes not in a good way, LOL). My new T even has dreams about me (I DONT want to know about them!!)
As a teacher I love most of my students very much. They just get into my heart very deeply, working with them on hard things, working with them for a long time.

Hmm - I'm not buying any of this. I think you already know the answers to the questions you say you want to ask. This is so confusing to me. But you have not been to official shrink school, right, so you don't know the secret question and answer yet. Why do we want them to be in love with us, even though we really don't?

No official shrink school (B.A. in Psychology) here. Of course I know the answer...but I still want to ask. I just want to see what she has to say. I don't really want my T to BE in love with me; but I do want her to love me, which she says she does. She's a mother figure to me.

I'm actually considering going to shrink school once I'm done with my own therapy work. T said she'd help me in any way she could, but to pray and think hard about it. She's still paying off student loans five years later, she has to buy her own insurance, and she only makes about $2K a year more than me at the B.A. level. My schooling's paid for, my company provides my insurance, and as I gain skills and my company grows, my salary could rival or surpass hers. She said she feels one has to be "called" to do the work. She thinks I can do it, but she knows I am good at what I do now also.

I've only been here for a couple of months, yet I've already seen people grow up before my eyes.

Can you imagine how their Ts must feel? I know how I would feel. I'd be so proud I'd be insufferable!

Okay, Chopin99. I didn't understand from your post that you wanted to make this an opportunity for her to explain her feelings about you. In that case your plan looks fine. I misunderstood & thought you mainly wanted her take on how you dealt with your job. I see now that I was wrong.

RR...you have nothing to be about. That's one thing I love about this forum...everybody's opinions! I was a bit vague in my first post anyway. I already emailed her about what happened with my client. I wanted it to be a short discussion along the lines of, "This happened to me. Do you ever get this way about some of your clients? Am I one of them?" I'm going to ask it the way I wrote it in the original post, but that is the crux of it. Once I get there, I might change my mind entirely...who knows?

I promised her I would never be boring...and I intend to keep that promise!!

You really remind me of my husband sometimes. He rides that fine line between good self-esteem and arrogance. He would be SO insufferable if people grew under his tutelage!!

i was a caseworker who worked with abused and neglected children and their families and/or caregivers. there were some kids who really touched my heart, even if I was with them only for a few days. a couple of the ones who made an impression on me are ones you'd least expect, like ones who cursed me out or gave me the hardest time. i still think of them from time to time and wonder how they are doing, wish them well, and become a little sad that i'll likely never know. i could have done without the adults

Before I had kids, I worked in the mental health field. And, all of these years later, there are still a few clients that pop into my head sometimes. I haven't worked with them for 15 years, I live across the country, and yet, there are still here with me in some ways. I liked all of my clients, but there were a few that really affected me.

I did tell that to my T and I started to ask him if I was one of those clients, and before I could get the question out, he said "yes".

T has probably seen me more than any other client ever, in terms of hours together (this is his second career). I know that I've been seeing him longer than any of his other clients, and for most of the time I've been seeing him, it's been twice weekly. So it makes sense that I would be one of "those" clients.

Still, it was nice to ask and to hear him say it

It's amazing how many of us work in the human services/mental health field! My best friend does what you did and she becomes attached to those kids really quickly. I work with adults, but being DD, they're much like children in adult bodies. I love them all; some of them I've known over 12 years.

Ouch! So true. But that's better than purely arrogant, right? So I'm less insufferable than I was.

I worked with adults, but being computer programmers, they too were much like children in adult bodies!

Well, I do say sometimes that I work with crazy people...then there are my clients...