Limited Reparenting

I have the same worries, like what if get so far in and for some reason therapy stops, even thorough my t is trained in this area, she is good at it. Another big issue for me is if it doesn't work, I am going to be left in a bigger mess with no way of getting anything sorted.

Exactly. It is a huge risk. I wonder if we can just take things slowly and not just go in trusting heart and soul and blindly expecting it will all be ok. Maybe it will be a slow process of trusting a little but not giving our whole selves over to a stranger?

Because I am in the UK having therapy on the NHS, I only get 25 sessions of this type of work, it's this that is worrying me, as 25 sessions is nothing really in therapy terms, think I need to think all this through and discuss it at my next session before we start..

25 session is no way enough for limited reparenting. But for other aspects of schema therapy it might be so i suppose it depends what you are there to work on. Definitely discuss with your therapist about expectations and whether you can extend therapy over the 25 sessions if you need it.

I totally get this. In my own experience, I had a mentor figure in my life (not a T) who supported and encouraged me for two years, then abruptly turned around and rejected me with not much provocation. Then I had a T who encouraged me to attach to her but then referred me elsewhere (she didn't force me to leave, but strongly pushed for it) when I acted needy and anxious. Fortunately her referral was spot on and I have done wonderful work with my current T for the past year and a half.

To succeed in reparenting-type work in therapy, especially where there is a trauma history, I think there needs to be some ground work in place, and it needs to be a cooperative effort between the T and client. In terms of ground work, I mean that the client needs to have some skills for handling distress during times when ruptures occur in the relationship (and ruptures WILL happen, and they will definitely be distressing). Otherwise, the client is likely to act out in ways that will worsen the rupture (skipping session, pushing boundaries, demanding more contact, threats of self harm, screaming at the T, etc.) This is why a lot of T's will refer certain clients to DBT or something similar before engaging in more in-depth work with them.

In terms of it being cooperative, both sides need to be committed and trying their best. The T needs to show flexibility and hold boundaries while not being needlessly rigid in their approach. They need to be prepared to get extreme reactions and times and not to take them personally. They need to show a willingness to admit their own errors. In return the client needs to make an effort to use their own skills and keep coming back even when it feels almost impossible to do so, and needs to make an effort to forgive the T's imperfections and missteps.

If you want to find out what it would be like to do this kind of work with a particular T, I would ask specific questions about it. "Are there any reasons you would terminate a client?" "What would you do if a client did X?" "Do you do email? Do you return phone calls?" "Have you worked with people with similar issues to me before?" Whatever occurs to you. Finally, carefully observe the T's emotional maturity and stability. Are they consistent and present or do they appear scatterbrained and all over the place? Do they respond defensively to complaints and feedback? Are they comfortable with intimacy and dependency? Can they talk comfortably about attachment and trauma and what they mean? Have they done their own therapy?

Hope that helps some...

awesome post boredporcupine, some great ideas of things to ask, i'll take these ideas to my next session i think.