Noyes for next session

I didn’t learn very much about myself last week, but I did learn quite a lot about you. On that occasion, you were every bit as stubborn and inflexible as I was. You don’t like being criticised any more than I do. And like me, you especially don’t like being put in the wrong.

You were angry because I was trying to keep control. I was trying to keep control because I was threatened by your anger. I don’t think either of us was listening. It became a clash of wills and nothing more.

I believe the therapist should be more mature, more empathic and more flexible than the client. I believe the therapist should lead by example. I believe the therapist has, or should have, the skills to break an unproductive deadlock.

You are a good therapist and we are a good fit. We have come a long way together. But in my opinion, what you did last week was bad therapy.

Will you send this to her Can'texplain? You're braver than me if you do.

Cant - I hope this is something you can work out with your T.

Oops. I meant "Notes" of course.

Worse that that, I'm planning to read it to her.

I've been playing it her way for long enough. This time I'm going to sit down with a script and read the whole thing through.

(Unless I change my mind, of course. I'm allowed to do that!)

I'm impressed you're able to be so open with your T and express opinions that she may not want to hear. Hooray for emotional honesty!! It's taken me over a year to come even close to being emotionally honest with T, and every time I do I feel like I might drive him away or destroy the relationship. He hasn't booted me out yet

Your next session should be interesting. Good luck!

Now that I have a plan for dealing with her, I'm starting to think about what she said.

I always knew I was a powerful debater, but now I'm starting to wonder if I might be a bully. Is that what she was trying to say?

It's not fair to use your superior strength against other people. Does the same apply to superior powers of argument?

Mind if I quote you? Hopefully will never need it, but this would be great to hold onto.
Did you send / give / say this to yr T? how was the response?

Mystery solved!! I thought you and T were going to talk about the poet, Alfred Noyes and thought you must have a really cool kind of therapy lol

yes... and powers of intellect... and any other superior strength...
my $0.02, you certainly don't come across as a bully here, very supportive & helpful.

What response would you like to hear from her regarding this?

I think you might be onto something here. It appears that she was sticking to her guns as much as you were, so I wonder if that was a strategy to see how you would handle the escalation.

How we handle disagreements is very telling in therapy...and becomes very useful information. Ultimately, there is no real right or wrong...it's about what feelings are elicited, negotiating getting our needs met, and understanding our behaviors.

Feel free to copy anything I post.

It was good to write it, and I am going to take it to my session on Monday, but I really don't know what I'll do when I get there.

I might say, "I came prepared to continue our argument from last week, but frankly I'd rather talk about something else."

Some good ideas here. But I need her to guide me through it, and that will take more than just sticking to her guns.

My fantasy is that she will admit she was wrong and will apologise.

However, I think that is extremely unlikely!

Good idea to read it to her. Good for you!

so you want HER to do something else, ie model some different behavior for you, because YOU don't know any other way to behave? Is that what you're saying in your notes? Hasn't she been acting in "other ways" the whole time she's been with you, but you never picked up on them? You only noticed when she stopped accommodating you, and instead she echoed your behavior. Now, like two magnets of the same polarity, you repelled each each other. You want her to go back to acting the "other way". Why don't YOU act the other way - the end result will be the same, you won't repel each other. It would be an interesting experiment. It might give you some sympathy for her side, which I don't see in your notes right now, I just see criticism. If you're gonna criticize somebody, you should be ready and able to do their job better than them, no? That's how it was in my family. I criticized them them for not knowing how to cook a roast, the said fine you do it, so I did, and they shut up. not that they gave me any credit. and not that I paid for the roast. but when you're right, you're right. and when you're wrong, you should listen and stop being a butt.