SA and therapist touch

Right. It's the changing the policy on touch that it is hurtful. Maybe something that was said during the session made the T think that she needed to stop touching.

I made some comment about people in my family constantly touching me and how bothered I was, and my my T, luckily, stopped me and asked me if him touching me on the back when I was leaving bothered me. I said it didn't, and we went on.

I agree. It's very confusing and hurtful. I mean, look at me, I'm generally all purposely ambivalent towards my T, I would never admit to attachment blah blah..... and yet I am now ragingly angry thinking about how he used to pat my back and now he's (maybe) stopped. I can only imagine how this affects people whose first reaction isn't anger. It has got to hurt like hell, because I'm pretty sure that I AM hurt now.

I think I need to add this to my list of things to talk about on Monday. I am finding it impossible to let this go. I am also super-pissed at Nellie's T too. I am an angrybutton this morning.

But for T to decide it's not comfortable based on something that someone else did to you? That sounds really painful and almost like punishing you for someone else's wrongdoing.

Can you let T know how you feel about this? Maybe by email if you can't speak to her? Or you could give her this thread?

I'm not sure what the chances are, but I'd definitely say even if you COULD do it, it's not the answer.

I was at a 12 step meeting last night. A woman there LOST it. She started sharing, and got more and more upset, and by the end, was sobbing and yelling. I mean, big, big, big, big feelings. She's been sober for 5 years, so it wasn't someone walking into the room with no tools, no experience working through things, etc. Her feelings were just. that. big.

By the end of the meeting, she was smiling. Through tears, but smiling. She left the meeting visibly different than when she came in. Tender, maybe, but lighter.

It really struck me, and I'm still thinking about it this morning. I tend to want to stuff my feelings, hope they'll go away, imagine that I can just not deal with them and things will somehow magically change.

But I *watched* this woman go from desperately, unbearably upset to relieved. She may feel lost again this morning, but for a while, she had that relief.

I really hope you will bring it up with T. We can't wish our feelings away (or believe, me, I SO would). So the only other option that makes sense is expressing them, asking for help, feeling them, learning from them. It hurts, and it's healing, and I don't know what else we can do.

In the meantime, I wonder if it would help at all to find a way to be in your normal routine a little. I had a week from hell but was kind of forced to maintain my normal routine and it occurred to me at one point why everyone tells us to keep routines going for our toddlers during stressful times. It kind of contained all of the emotions and confusion. I had to get up, get dressed, drive the kids around, make dinners. It was hard, and I kind of hated it. AND in the end, I think it helped me move through it.

I know it hurts, and I KNOW how spirally I would feel, nannypat. Be gentle with you.

The hard thing about all of of this is that therapist are concerned and worried about triggering clients. That means that if a client reveals that he/she has been sexually abused, the therapist immediately begins to worry about how their actions will be interpreted. I truly do understand that an individual wants to protect the client and him/herself. It does distress me, however, that the immediate feeling for some therapists is that the client will morph the personal touch into something wrong or manipulative. I GET it that a therapist needs to be cautious and aware of what might be happening, but what I have a hard time with is the belief that EVERYONE who has been abused should be treated the same way. I think a GOOD solid therapist will investigate and talk about what touch means to the client . .. sadly though, here in the US, touch is usually seen as regressive or wrong. I know that's my own biasis, but I just wante to speak what I think about this issue.