Sharing dread of people needing/wanting stuff from you

I tried to share with my T the dread I feel about my family (h and kids) wanting/needing stuff from me. I told her that sometimes I sit in my car in the driveway for 15 minutes after getting home from work trying to convince myself to go in house. That sometimes I actually wave away (like shoo shoo) my h because he wants to give me a hug or a kiss when I get home. I just feel so smothered. She didn't really comment. At the end of the session she suggested that my h and I try to go for walks every night. WTf?

These aren't new feelings...I remember going to my 6week checkup after the birth of my son (16years ago) and when the dr was asking if I was enjoying motherhood...he knew it took 4 years to get pregnant and lots of shots to keep pregnancy and all I could say was how I didn't realize how hard and suffocating it would feel to have someone constantly need something from you.

I must be a freak or something....my t had nothing to say about it???

Does anyone else experience other people's emotional needs as exhausting or smothering.? Or am I alone in this?

ETA: lts not physical demands like drive me here...I need my uniform washed stuff ...it's emotional..they are just trying to be nice sometimes...ugh

I can relate to the feeling you are talking about.

Is this the first time you brought it up in therapy? Maybe your T didn't fully understand what you meant. I'd suggest you bring it back up!

Omg I feel constantly smothered by my h and mil it's like they are so needy I want to run away everyday and they don't get it they are so dependant on me everything is give me get me I sometimes hate them

You are not alone. I think mine comes from having to worry so much about my parents.

I am a great helper, but I tend to be very resentful about it.

Sometimes my H reaches out to touch me nicely and I want to slap him. It makes me feel like the evil one.

Yes, I have a similar freakishness. But to you I would say it is normal for a wife and mother. Are you good about taking time and space for you? I regularly take time to myself and I have my own office that I routinely kick people out of. it helps to dampen the desire from a roar to a buzz.

But I think your T could stand to hear a little criticism of her . . . er . . . suggestion. I might ask, I said these things, and you responded "go for a walk with H every night." I don't understand what you meant or why you thought that might help.

I will say that my T doesn't make me feel like a freak when I say these things. He says, in short, that his wife is the same way. He may have said something about introversion/extroversion, with the idea being that introverts are drained by interaction with others and need to recharge by being alone (vice versa for extraverts).

My suggestion would be to tell your family that you love them, but you need a half hour (or however long you think would be good) when you first get home from work to unwind and that after that half hour, you will be available to them. "Mom's half hour" or whatever you want to call it. It's a way of setting a boundary for yourself and it's what you want and need. Your family can wait and all will be well. And, in fact, you will be more receptive and more responsive to them when you are feeling more relaxed after having your time and space.

Would that sound like something you would enjoy going home to?

RTS
I often feel burdened by other people's emotional needs.
I am not one to share much but apparently others think I am a good listener and feel its okay to share with me. Sometimes I can handle it, but when I am in my own bad emotional state, I just want to run away screaming.

Oh, RTS, you are so not alone in this! I find myself dreading it as well, at times. When my emotional resources are depleted or I'm not in a place to be supportive of others, I want nothing more than to be left alone.

T encourages me to find ways to recharge my battery - by doing things for ME. Then, I can be better prepared and more willing to give of myself to others or be receptive to the emotional needs of others.

i find that i dread and resent the expectations that my family has of me. as simple as they might be. like remembering mothers day. it isn't a day of fun or anything it is a day of expectation and i hate it . or my husband has expectations that i am happy and doing ok .i hate it.

I feel the same way

I think I get this. While I do get tired of handling the physical stuff sometimes, I think that's just par for the course, especially when you're a parent.

And for me it's not really all of the emotional stuff. Like if my daughter's scared or something, I'm happy to comfort her. (The whining is another story!) But there are definitely things that feel smothering, though that mostly happens with my partner.

For a long time I've complained that I feel like she doesn't want to be as close to me as I to her. (In retrospect, I think that's not at all true...it's just that my expectations for how that gets expressed are different than hers.) Oddly, though, I feel completely panicked and smothered whenever she does try to be close/intimate. Even though it's mostly about her expressing her feelings/love/whatever, I get freaked out that she's making some sort of demand on me that I can't escape.

I've talked to T about this a few times recently. T's thought, given my history, is that it has to do with my mother. (Ugh...what doesn't?!) Growing up she wanted almost no connection with me. Her own needs always came first, and the only thing I could do that would sort of please her (pleasing her being as close as I was going to get to any sort of "love" from her) was to be exactly who she wanted me to be and to otherwise disappear/annihilate myself.

Bottom line: I'm still looking--from my partner--for the love I never got from my mom. But when my partner tries to be close and connected, I panic because I think it'll mean something horrible, like annihilation.

Anyway, blahblahblah...I've gone on too long. But I do hope something here resonates/is helpful, R2S.