Dreaming about your therapist.

Do you bring it up next session?

I never have. I had two in one night last night. I feel like I should, but I'm embarrassed. I don't know if I'm ready to face what they mean. One of them was kind of romantic. I really don't want to go there!

Gah.

I occasionally had a few (but not many) dreams about my prior Therapist (including one where she kissed me) but they didn't have much effect on me so I didn't bother saying anything. Although I am sure that there are many people who do tell there Therapists because they feel they need to so it is up to you.

Why do you feel like you should bring it up? Not to say that you shouldn't - just wondering about whether it feels like it would be a natural extension of the work you do with your T or if there's an expectation to bring those kinds of things up, or...

You actually sound kind of ambivalent about wanting to bring it up. It might be helpful to start with talking about the conflicted feelings around it.

Yeah I have. I had several that I've talked about, but sadly none were romantic. If one was I might not have talked about it. I'm oblivious to whatever they mean. I'm sure I should feel embarrassed, but for me talking about a dream is easier than talking about what I think when I'm awake.

I only bring them up if they relate to something I'm working on in therapy. I've had some very strange dreams with my therapist in them and those I usually don't mention. Sometimes, I don't tell my T that it was her in the dream...I'll just say "someone."

I had a nightmare about my T a few weeks ago and it has stayed with me ever since, it was totally terrifying and I woke up freaking out with heart pounding!!! I didn;t know if I could tell my T because i was embarrassed to be dreaming about him.

Anyway, I did tell him and he was fine....he was interested, curious asked questions and wanted to know if I was more upset by the images(which were horrid) or with the way he had treated me in the dream. I dreamt we were in a session, he started to change appearance in front of me, said some awful things, then told me it was time to leave, as I exited his door he was laughing at me with scorn and when i looked I wasn't in his hallway...I was in a psych hospital but one from the worst possible horror film. I begged him to not put me there, to help me and he just kept laughing at me. Then what happened in there.............. UGH!!!! (sorry if that is too much info, but it felt good to write it out)

He has suggested that we do some work around the dream....we'll discuss next session. So, depending on the dream, I would say it could be really useful to talk it over with your T, although I would be reluctant if there were ever any romantic involvement in the dream!

It feels like it would fit my type of therapy. I have a lot of difficulty opening up and sometimes dreams feel like a wormhole to my feelings.

I imagine that it would be like, extra helpful, if it were a dream about the therapist, opening up an opportunity to work through transference. Which as useful as it is, I find really painful and uncomfortable.

Yes i talk about it with t;she thinks its funny. In my dreams t is usually a teacher.

I mentioned two dreams about her in passing, though I kind of quickly charged through it in the conversation when I really wanted to analyze them. My T didn't ask any questions about it. I see what you're saying about dreams opening up a window to talk about transference. Sometimes they show our feelings visually in a way that is difficult to describe otherwise.

Update: I couldn't do it. I think I know what they were about so I tried skipping to the underlying message. I don't really feel like its off my chest though.

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Dream work was a big part of my therapy, so ex-T heard ALL of my dreams even the ones about her. There weren't that many actually, but I shared them with her anyway. One particular one I remember: I dreamed that a sand castle rose up out of the ground and surrounded her. After I told her about it she said that she had been dreaming about castles herself; and that it didn't really surprise her the similarity of the dreams because "it's not uncommon when two people are working as closely together as we are". I cherish that memory still and probably always will. I think of it now with a smile and a warm heart; evidence to me that I'm really truly getting over her and therapy. I don't mean that to sound bad. It's just, since my final appointment 6 weeks ago, I keep wondering how much longer I'm going to keep thinking about her/therapy!! It's all good though. Sorry to get off topic. Oopsie!!

My therapist really enjoys dream work, and sometimes I enjoy sharing them, the complex ones or the troubling ones, though sometimes I feel extra-vulnerable giving her symbolic material about which I'm not completely clear. I have dreampt about her a couple times, in one I visited her office, which I don't in real life as it's long-distance therapy. In another, she was sitting across the couch from me. Both were just comforting, a way to feel protected and closer to her. I really liked them and told her about both. I didn't feel they needed much in the way of interpretation, just simple dreams really in those cases, and luckily no embarassing erotic content! I'm very happy this therapy relationship doesn't have that component. Been there, done that, hated it.

Yeah I told my T I was having terrible nightmares about her dying. Like her car flipping and all in gruesome detail. She asked why I was so worried about her and I didn't know, I just cared about her and wanted her to be okay.

My T loves dreams - he thinks they're important in our lives whether we're in therapy or not. So we've done a lot of dream work, and I find it really fascinating. I dream about T all the time, which makes sense, because my social life is really limited right now and I'm spending a lot of time working through therapy things.

I've told him about 95% of the dreams that he is in. Yeah, it's embarrassing, especially when I dream about his family too and I don't even know them! But I think it's been valuable, because the dreams show that I want to get close to him (like joining his family) but realize I don't belong there. It shows I want more intimate r/s in my life but I've got a real problem actually doing that. So the dreams definitely tie in with therapy, just like most of the other ones.

Dreams are just another tool that can be used in therapy, not a requirement. I'm just having my say here to show that at least in some cases dreams about T can be useful and help move you forward.