Help: Is this my stuff or a legitimate gripe?

She wanted you to have the freedom to leave. My T once told me that I could cancel my appointment with her for another appointment with another doctor. It had nothing to do with disliking me. It had everything to do with giving me the freedom to choose what to do with my time. Because of the transference and fear you feel, she probably wanted to give you the message that you do choose to be there in the end, and it's your choice to leave if you wanted to. You have to choose to be in therapy and get better.

Update:

I'd sent her an email on all this and she claimed to not have received it. I believe her about 70% of the way. Meaning, I think there's a 30% chance she really did get the email and just wanted me to talk it out. But then again, my email had so many curses in it that I wouldn't be surprise if it tripped her spam filter.

So then we had to talk it out. When I reminded her that she referred to another client as selfish for wanting a meeting, she began to laugh hysterically. I mean seriously, she was laughing SO hard.

"I said that?" she says. "Oh, that's just an inside joke here around the clinic. Like, if someone takes a parking space, you say, oh that person was so selfish for parking there. Because of course people really aren't selfish. They do what they need to do."

I was stunned and sat there flabbergasted until I laughed too. Laughter was not what I was expecting.

Then I explained the scheduling issue and how I feared that she was going to think that I'm selfish, and she said, "Well I really stepped in it this time."

And then she said it was good that I'm so perceptive.

So I guess that's over.

I had cried over this in private, but I didn't get all weepy with her. I was more annoyed and angry. Until she started laughing. And then I laughed too.

Was the laughter okay? Or was that bothersome to you?

It was surprising to me, but I am not hurt by it.

Her laughter was genuine. As in, "I can't believe I really said that."

On a meta-level, I think she knows that was not OK to say that. And I like stepping back for a second and looking at it that way. As in, "Ok dude, you just offhandedly told Client B that Client A was selfish in wanting an appointment."

Like, yeah, that's a screw up on her part, but it is kind of funny. It diffuses the situation for me, too.

Because before I was getting paranoid about it and now I'm thinking that I don't feel that badly anymore!

Good! Yeah, it was sort of a mess-up on her part. But therapists are people, too, and they do make mistakes. I am glad this was worked out.

Everyone makes mistakes. What matters is how they react when you call them out.