bored therapist?

as i was talking today, i looked over at my therapist and saw her looking/picking at her nails. it was very disheartening. i felt embarrassed for some reason, and like i was interrupting her or something. she looked up as i was looking at her, almost as if i had "caught" her. she turned her attention back to me, and made sure to say something validating about what i was talking about like, "yes, i can understand why that would be difficult for you.."

so i got back into the therapy groove and some time later - she did it again! clearly, something was wrong with one of her nails and it's like it caught her by surprise when she first saw it. and she has long nails that are perfectly (french) manicured, so perhaps this is something that would bother her more than most people. i don't know. but i just felt stupid for talking, as if she was totally bored with what i was saying. i mean, what does it say about my "problems" that a chipped nail is more interesting?

also, i gave her a framed poem (not by me) a few years ago. it's one of the only things i've ever given her, and she really liked it a lot. she ended up putting it in the client bathroom. i really came to love seeing it there, and felt good like i took up some "space" in her home (office).

today, i saw that it was gone. there's another poem there, one that she's had for forever that used to be in the waiting area. so i looked around the waiting area to see if she had just switched the two, but it wasn't there either. when i got into session, i looked (as best/subtly as i could) to see if it was anywhere around, but didn't see it. and i didn't have the courage to ask. i'm sure it'll come up eventually; i foresee myself saying something like, "so now that i'm on sliding scale, you get rid of my poem?"

oh that would make me feel horrible also.i hope you ask her what is going on .maybe there is a simple reason the poem is removed .maybe the frame was busted or something

Ouch! Ouch! This could have just happened, your T was preoccupied due to a reason that had nothing to do with you. However, it was YOUR therapy session and I can understand how you felt.

Maybe it would help if you were straightforward, tell her how you feel, and ask her what was going on with her. Maybe tell her that you feel that she wasn't present that session? I hope she has a good reason for taking your poem down, because I imagine is very hurtful to you. I am sorry

I am interested in hearing how this goes for you. From what I have read, you are making progress I am interested in hearing what happens.

I'd love to know what the outcome is too. Nothing like being ignored , invalidated by your t.

You appear to be handling the situation much better than I would have. I'd be devastated!! My T always gives me her full attention so I would think something was wrong. In your case, maybe it's an obsession with her nails that she didn't know she was doing?

As far as taking down your poem without telling you, I think that was inconsiderate. If my T took down the collage I gave her, I'd expect an explanation!

I don't think she was bored; I think her nails preoccupied her for the moments! But she should tell you why she took down your poem. A T wouldn't think a client wouldn't notice that, would they?

I hope you don't wait too long to ask her about the picture. I'm SURE it has nothing to do with your sliding scale, but I think you need to hear that from your T for your own peace of mind.

Oh dear that is awful, firstly the nail thing would have frustrated me. I would not have been able to say to her but would love to say "Oh sorry, I didn't realise I was boring you!"
Taking down your poem and replacing it is downright rude while you are still her client anyway. I know she has a right to change things in her office and isn't obiliged to dislplay something just because ot was a gift. But, aren't T s supposed to be considerate towards their clients? This could be a massive trigger for someone with abanment issues or any issues really. I am sorry for the way your T behaved

I can understand how that would feel. You could always get her a new poem to display, see what happens Tell her you miss seeing something of yours that you left behind with her...

The fingernail issue is kind of annoying, particularly since she seemed to notice your discomfort about it earlier. I think sometimes it is easy to fidget a bit like that in an absent minded way, even when you are listening closely. Though I do understand that it was like she wasn't completely there with you.

They are the types of things that feel like they should be molehills and not mountains (at least I feel that way encountering things in my own therapy)...but often being brave and bringing them up and talking about them really helps the therapy relationship. I think it's helped me a lot to bring up all those things that did actually make me feel sad, undervalued and forgotten.

How vexing! As far as I know, nothing in my T's office has any direct connection with her clients. When I give her flowers, she always takes them into the house, not the office.

My T is a model of discipline and integrity, which I find very comforting.

i finally worked up the nerve today to ask about the missing poem.. turns out the frame broke . she said she had been meaning to say something to me, but that lately we just jump right into things and she was sorry she hadn't yet. she also said quite a few people had been asking, "where's that great poem that was in the bathroom?" that was nice. she said she put it in a safe place and has been meaning to get a frame, but just hasn't. so.. there's that.

That is a very good explanation. 78 why not bring her a new frame ?

My therapist is generally very attentive. This past summer, however, I'd been doing pretty good for several months, and it started feeling to me like she was somewhat distant. Like she was only half there. Your therapist being distracted by her nails would feel that same way to me. (Yet, on second thought, someone can pick at their nails while their mind and emotions are totally absorbed in the interaction - but it's not gonna send that message). Anyway, over a period of months, I felt more and more distance. Since it coincided with me holding my own and being consistently steady, I interpreted it to mean that she was withdrawing because she thought I was doing "fine." Like I lost her without my having given her permission to "go."

By the time I started trying to say something about it, I was so afraid of finding out that what I came up with was true, that my voice was almost imperceptible. Before it was over with, a huge rupture had taken place (at least from my perspective) and I nearly crashed and burned. I started canceling sessions with little notice, and when she texted me to ask "Are you ok?" I gave her almost no response. I think that was what told her I was in big trouble.

Anyway, it took her a couple of weeks, but she finally coaxed me back into her office. The best I could manage was to tell her it felt like she was real far away. She apologized and blamed herself for the rupture that she hadn't even realized took place. Turns out, over that summer, a close family member harmed herself, and another close family member lost their baby because the husband (a physician) had gone to work (in the summer) and forgot he was supposed to drop the baby off at the babysitter, and the baby died in the hot car. So there was plenty going on to preoccupy her. She told me that there were indeed a good number of times that she came to work hoping to goodness that her clients were in good shape, because she wasn't.

My point is, that if your therapist is normally more attentive, there could be something going on in her life that has her understandably preoccupied that does not mean that you are boring.

I think you might just hold off on letting yourself seeing it as meaning anything about you, and wait till next session. If she does something that indicates she's preoccupied, bring it up right then and there. Maybe say "Am I boring?"

One thing my therapist and I agreed on during our "repair the rupture" phase was that especially when I'm doing well, it's important to not neglect checking on our relationship, making sure the connection feels secure. She sees herself as being primarily responsible for that, but she told me that it's really important that I feel comfortable calling her attention to it right away if she seems distant.

Gah! This sort of thing makes me hopping mad.

T is supposed to be a trained empath and a close observer. How can she not know there's a rupture going on?

Ouch ouch ouch ouch ouch!

How could he ever forgive himself for that? I hope he got therapy.

I get how she might have been greatly distracted. What I don't get is why she didn't take some time off.

Because she's human.. and I wasn't making it obvious. And because she was distracted by two huge tragedies in her personal life.

I don't know... by the time I found out about it a couple of months had passed. She may very well have taken some time off when it happened and just didn't burden me with it. I know at least once in the summer my apts were spaced a couple weeks apart

If your therapist is bored then its their issue (counter transference) not yours. You should bring it up next session to bring it to the surface and work on it.

I usually assume the therapist is bored. My issues are not that interesting and I am not all that unique. She has been in practice a long time so the chances of her having heard the same sort of thing from the other clients who were like me before are very high. But I am not there to entertain the woman and I rarely look at her, so I don't see that her boredom is all that big of a deal to me.

I would totally disagree with this statement.

Brian: Please, please, please listen! I've got one or two things to say.
The Crowd: Tell us! Tell us both of them!
Brian: Look, you've got it all wrong! You don't NEED to follow ME, You don't NEED to follow ANYBODY! You've got to think for your selves! You're ALL individuals!
The Crowd: Yes! We're all individuals!
Brian: You're all different!
The Crowd: Yes, we ARE all different!
Man in crowd: I'm not...
The Crowd: Sch!
(monty python Life of Brian)

The correct number of Stopdogs in an ideal universe is exactly one.