Talked more about attachment/boundaries with T and things somehow got even worse

I think I can prepare a sheet for her about the most important stuff...I'm just worried it will be like going up against that wall again and just a waste of my session going in circles and not getting anywhere. Also, I don't want her to feel like I'm not respecting her boundaries...I know her feelings aren't my concern or my problem, but I feel like it's not productive for either of us if that happens.

You ARE respecting her boundaries. And if she can't deal with this stuff then you're going to have to face the prospect that she's taken you as far as she can and maybe you do need to look elsewhere.

Also, I know I probably didn't do anything wrong, but part of me still feels super guilty and like this is my fault and I'm ashamed to even bring it up with her in case she (inadvertently) reinforces that. It's just scary to be that vulnerable when I don't know what kind of response I'll be met with. Especially since when I brought this up in the first place, which was really vulnerable for me, it did not feel nice at all.

I know it's not nice and you've been brave already. But i really think this is important stuff and the guilt and shame you're feeling is the strong conditioning you've had growing up and not because what you're doing is wrong.

I know it's important. Just scary. Because I feel SO guilty, even if there maybe isn't much reason for that - I mean, I was doing my best to respect her boundaries and communicate appropriately with her. But still she got upset(ish - perhaps I'm overstating this) at me, and I just want to make it better. Transference? Most definitely. Which sucks, because usually our relationship is completely transference-free. We talk about transference a lot, actually, and have concluded that there wasn't a lot of it, if any, up until now...

The just you wanting to make it better part is a hangover from childhood, it sounds like you were the pacifier. THe boundaries thing seem super important to you, can you explore why? It seems to go deeper than just wanting to be respectful.

More transference - not wanting to upset or hurt the other person by trying to get closer than they're comfortable with. (I did not do so well with that in the past, and it feels like I'm failing all over again. Transference. Sigh.)

Dude, you were a kid! Cut yourself some slack, you're barely into adulthood as it is. And needing someone is so normal, just spend time on these boards, you'll lose count the amount of people who depend on their therapist or see them as parental figures. There is nothing wrong with any of that. We often regress in the therapy room.
As long as you're turning up and making an effort to some degree, you're not failing.

Well, the situations I'm referring to aren't situations with parents but with other adults; teachers are a big one, social workers, other Ts...people who I couldn't REALLY be close to but who I wanted to parent me anyway. I thought I was past all this...I don't usually have that kind of maternal transference with this T (never had it in the seven months we've been working together, actually). So it feels like I was handling myself really well for awhile and then suddenly went back to being a five-year-old who needs her mom to tell her, "Yes, baby, I love you too."

I don't think that's actually the situation here with T; I think there might be actual valid reasons that I want her to care about me that have nothing to do with maternal transference...but I can't help but be reminded of that situation.

When kids don't get their needs met by their care-givers, they go looking for it else where, i did it all my life. And there's loads of people on this board who do it. That type of maternal neglect is so very damaging and it's a loss you'll be navigating for a long time to come most likely.

I feel like maybe you are repressing these unmet needs because they've been dealt with wrongly by other women in your life. You've been made to feel ashamed and you're now pushing away that need, numbing it out. The thing is, until it is addressed in therapy it will keep rearing its head in many different ways. THat need feels shameful, but it isn't it makes perfect sense and it's sad and that part needs to be healed. The people who shame you about it aren't the people to help you with it. It's not going to go away just because they've made you feel bad, that's not how it works.

Maybe you don't have maternal transference with this T, but that doesn't mean that need isn't in there. And all of that apart, even people without transference towards their T still very much want to be accepted, liked and cared for by their therapist.

But I guess that's the thing for me, because if it is such a normal, valid, appropriate need to have, then why can't T fill it? (I know, the answer is that she has her own boundaries for her own well-being and she has the right to that...but the incongruence is troubling...but I guess it's just something that I either have to deal with or decide this T isn't for me.)

I think it can depend on a therapists psychotherapy approach- is she CBT, psychodynamic, eclectic, person-centred etc? It could be the way she was taught, it could be her own boundaries. There are therapists out there willing to fill that need, they recognise it and have no problems with it and are quite comfortable with it. Mine for example. So i know for a fact it exists out there.
And you are right, you will need to decide how important it is to you and if your therapist just now can provide it. I hope she can.

She mostly works from an attachment framework. She does CBT with other clients sometimes but not with me.

if she's working from an attachment framework then her respond to you the other day is even more baffling.

That's why it was so confusing/upsetting to me. Which is why I thought maybe I misinterpreted it or was maybe acting angrily or critically towards her even though I didn't think I was...

i don't think you were either judging by what you've said.

These needs that weren't met at the appropriate time, in childhood, even tho they're valid .... they left a hole that can never be filled. That train has left the station, as my T puts it, rather coldly, I think.

Your T can never fill that void, or anyone else. Because it's too late. Our only hope is to recognize what's going on, and be able to accept the love that IS available to us, rather than discarding what we actually have because it's not enough. IT WILL NEVER BE ENOUGH. We need to let go of that unfufillable need and accept what we can get in the here and now.

Sorry if I sound so opinionated. I'm dealing with this in my therapy right now and this is what I'm working on, and my T agrees. And it's damn tough. I'm not at all happy about it, but it feels right. Just wanted to share in case any of this makes sense to you.

I know a T (or another person in general) can never care about you like a parent. We're working on that. But I'm not 100% sure that my need to have T care about me has anything to do with lack of care experienced elsewhere; I think maybe it's just human nature to want the person who you tell super traumatic things to to be even a little bit invested in you personally. No?

Read what you wrote here. The gift is in her listening. I think we take our ts for granted. I valued the regularity of the bus that took me to t, and he's like, hello? She IS doing it - it sounds like you want to be in control of it somehow. Youre saying its not exactly right, its not enough - what is this other thing youre searching for? This could be a big breakthru, but its elusive. And its not your ts thing. You keep circling around it, logically. Time to feel.

Yearning,

I just want you to know that I've read every word of this thread. Iit so very accurately describes my own struggle with my t. I really understand how you're feeling, and why. I have felt these same emotions and the same confusion regarding: Is it my t who is being insensitive? or Is what I want/need wrong? And the whole switcheroo between feeling angry at t versus feeling guilt and shame myself for having what feels like excessive needs.

I SO appreciate all of the responses to the thread too. They are helping me evaluate the very similar (and repetitive) conflict that my t and I have.

Hugs and hope to you,

Peaches

exactly! Feelings are rarely rational, and i sense that part is being repressed due to yearnings feelings of shame over having needs.

But i don't think it's unreasonable to feel like the T is invested in you personally and not as some faceless collective. The T may be listening and caring for yearning in the usual therapisty way, and she may even deep down really care about yearning but if the client isn't "feeling" that care then it doesn't matter what the therapist thinks or feels she's doing right. She needs to find a way to connect in a way that is meaningful to Yearning.

I'm not sure what you mean with this - can you say more? Or anyone else, who kind of gets what this means?

I mean, to me it sounds pretty horrifying that any of us with attachment wounds will never get anything that is enough - and that all we can do is accept it that way?? What does acceptance in this case even mean?

Can we not fill the void and meet the needs ourselves, learning with help from a handpicked selection of trusted others, and therefore truly heal the wound?

Yeah - this thread was speaking to me and i couldnt exactly say why, except that i could put myself in the OP's shoes of wanting more from the t.

Anyway what connected for me today in session is that i feel like i live my life as a string of lost opportunities. I just read in the nytimes yesterday that a certain neighborhood in Brooklyn is turning into a sort of French Quarter. I lived in that exact neighborhood, totally by chance, in the late 80's. Im kicking myself now for leaving. Thats just one of a million examples. But this connects to, my mother saying something to me, me following up on it, and then her never noticing that i did. The specific example that comes to mind is, i remember her complaining i used too much toilet tissue. So i stopped using it for number one. I also stopped changing panties daily to give her less to wash. I thought i was doing what she wanted. But she never acknowledged these things, never loved me more because of them. But i thought they were the golden ticket (pardon the pun). So now do i think anytime i pass up an opportunity to take better care of myself, maybe she will love me more?

I dont know how this relates to the OP, except that we are both looking for acknowledgement. Its kind of vague to me, i must admit.

I think to a certain extent that need for a parent will always be there, but you can fill it in different ways so that need doesn't take precedence over all the other needs in your life. I feel like for me at certain stages in my life, that need was front and center and pretty much everything I did was so I could get an adult to notice me and pay me a certain kind of attention. And although I sometimes find myself acting in those same old ways, it's a lot less now, and I don't get as triggered and the sadness isn't as deep when I see a little kid holding her mom's hand for example. So yes, there's still part of me that needs a mom, but that part is a lot smaller and a lot less salient, and I expect it to get even smaller and less salient as I continue to work through stuff. Well, I hope so anyway.

I'm not sure but I'm thinking the mismatch between Yearning's legitimate needs and her therapist's inability to meet them has to do with a really deep difference in personalities. It kind of seems, to me, like something is wrong with a therapist who can't express a basic caring for a client- like the therapist has problems with being emotionally connected. But, maybe the therapist's more detached personality and Yearning's more caring, emotional personality and needs are just different. I think the therapist is in the minority. But there are people who live their whole lives being pretty detached and, if they seem reasonably functional and report being content, it doesn't mean much to say there is something wrong with them. Those of us who are more emotional know there is something they are missing, but if they don't reach a sense of wanting it, there's nothing wrong with them. I wouldn't want a therapist who is detached like that, but maybe a client who is more detached might find a detached therapist to be uniquely understanding. I was thinking how strongly Stopdog would disagree with Asia's quote I put in bold

For what it's worth, I agree with what I think others are saying, that since Yearning is more aware than her therapist is of emotions and of needing a therapist to care, it may be better to find a therapist who would not reinforce her mother's detachment; to find a therapist who is more caring. Staying with a detached therapist for too long might end up re-inforcing the problems her mother's emotional detachment caused.