I feel like sometimes the boundaries have never been made positievely clear with my therapist and I.

Once I came clean about my transference, (when I told him I had romantic feelings for him) all he basically said was, "That's never going to happen."

But otherwise he was completely open to exploring why I felt that way, and that he wasn't going to refer me to someone else.

Since that session we haven't really brought up my transference since.

I've still sent him text messages here and there wanting to dialgoue with him. He's said before in one of our last sessions that my texting or me, "could never bother him." He said it in a very sweet and reassuring way.

But it makes me wonder. Should I just be using common sense here? How much can I get away with? I want to talk to him all the time. Sometimes he chooses to respond and sometimes he doesn't.

He has never told me before what I can and can't do/say to him. It seems like a lot of people's therapists here set clear boundaries from the start, where mine basically never has.

It's like...when is he finally gonna tell me to stop? Stop bothering him? Stop texting him when it is not during standard working hours? etc? Maybe he thinks it's self-explanatory. He responds when he wants to. I dunno. He's never told me to stop.

Do you think he's just trying to be careful to spare my feelings?

[sailorboy]

I think those are all good things to talk about with him!

[Elektra_]

hi. i think that specially when u acknowledge u have romantic feelings for him he should have set some strict boundaries. talk to him about it. tc

I agree with sailorboy but also wanted to add to be careful here, there is a great potential of you getting hurt. He is the one holding all the power and because he has not set clear boundaries with you the lines can be blurred and crossed too easily.
It's too easy for you to get hurt here and for your own sake I would ask him what his boundaries are around texts and why sometimes he responds and not others
It sounds as though he is sending mixed signals but of course from the little information you provided I can't jump to that conclusion

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[Leah123]

Many therapists allow some contact between sessions. It is his responsibility to set boundaries for himself. If he is open to discussing anything you need to and also does not mind occasional contact, I would call both of those healthy signs.

I would definitely also suggest discussing your worries with him directly.

Therapy is conducted along a wide spectrum: while some therapists refuse 100% of all contact between sessions, others encourage heavy contact, and many, many are somewhere in the middle, realizing they have chosen a vocation that doesn't fit as well into rigid 1 hour blocks as dentist appointments might.

I believe he's just engaged in a normal therapeutic relationship with you, and that it is easy for you to be concerned, since you probably depend on him to an extent to support you, so you feel vulnerable, very common.

I would just talk to him about it and rest assured that if what you are doing works for both of you and you find it helpful, keep it up!

[Petra5ed]

Well I think any way he responds is probably part of his therapeutic plan to be honest. By saying you'd never bother him, and also responding to several of your texts, that's encouraging in a way isn't it? It seems like he is giving you the green light.

I'm in a very similar situation. I think it's interesting because many therapists would tell you 'don't contact me between sessions.' Yet, he isn't and neither is mine. When he said it would never bother him, maybe you should take his word on it? You said he sometimes responds and sometimes doesn't, my T is the same way... maybe his plan is to just respond if he has time and feels like it and otherwise not to worry about it.

My gut says you should contact him as much as you want, and if it bothers him he will tell you. In your shoes though I'm also cautious and super careful about not being too imposing. I try to never contact more than twice a week out of session, and I rarely say everything I want to... haha, but I think that's a failure on my part in a way.

As for the transference discussion, my guess is he doesn't want to kick off that talk. I bet in his mind he doesn't want to assume you still feel that way, and/or isn't sure you're ready to keep talking about it, and/or otherwise just waiting for you to lead the way. More than likely I bet part of it is he's feeling awkward about it too, but my guess is he would be feeling far far far less awkward than you or I. LOL!

These are all just my wild-*** guesses of course.

[HazelGirl]

He sounds like he's responding in a normal way. My T has said very similar things, and I also have never had her spell out specific rules. I asked her once if there was anything I could do to make her hate me or leave me, and she said no, so that's a pretty big leash.