Because I am weak and stupid and a waste of skin

I am so angry at myself right now for being in this much pain. I still can't stop crying. My health has taken a nose dive and I've been at hospital this afternoon to ensure nothing more serious is going on than a boring old chest infection (I'm immuno suppressed, so have to check stuff out).

How can I feel so much pain for somebody who thinks I'm nothing? I am so embarrassed to be me right now. I can't tell anyone how horrific I am feeling because it means admitting to what happened and knowing there's a secret badness in me that makes people go away if I relax and they see it. So I have to keep it under wraps and make sure no more people ever ****ing see this, or I'll become even more isolated.

I can't do this, I really can't. The last time somebody I really loved left me it took a year and a half to get over it. I only recovered fully earlier this year. I'm exhausted, I can't do another year and a half of intense pain.

I feel crazy because I'm not suicidal but I feel like I should be. Not because of one experience with a therapist, but because it's the latest in a long, long string of experiences. Like the world is trying to say, get with the programme and do it already! You're never going to be loved or have your love truly welcomed - that's not for the likes of you! So **** off and die, instead of foolishly trying again and again.

But I don't want to die. **** that.

I am honestly sorry for venting here but I can't go anywhere else. I can't let any of my friends see me like this or they will probably just move away from me too.

It would be a grief to leave a therapist you once thought was good. Perhaps just grieving without being angry at yourself for such could relieve some of the stress around it and help it lessen quicker.

That's true, Stopdog. But I was duped again. It is pathetic.

You weren't duped. You were manipulated. Over and over. That isn't your fault.

Have you been able to contact other T's? It's important that you start seeing someone to help you through this. There's nothing inherently wrong about you. Your T had terrible boundaries and was unethical with them.

(((((IndestructibleGirl)))))

I have an initial appointment with a new therapist on Thursday. She sounded very nice on the phone. But I am so wary.

I'm at an absolute loss to know how to proceed. With the last T, I said from the start - I don't want to take too much off you, and kept asking was I, and she kept saying no, but it still happened. What more can I do than ask to stop it happening with the new one? Unless I try to water down my feelings when I talk about them to the therapist so I'm not so intense? But that seems a bit pointless? I don't know. I think that is what last T expected me to do, she said yesterday 'you kept pushing and pushing and pushing' regarding how I would always tell her I felt I was expecting too much from her and she got fed up reassuring me.

(((((((((Huge hugs)))))))))
You are NOT a waste of skin, or anything like that!

You are grieving and it's an incredibly painful process which isn't clear cut.

That's her problem, not yours. You gave her plenty of opportunities to back down. And anyone could be manipulated. I understand your confusion. I think it would be best if you explained to the new T you see on Thursday all of this, what happened, and how confused you are as to how to proceed. If they are unable or unwilling to help, they can pass you to someone else who would be better suited. Just don't feel like you have to hide yourself or what you have been through. It's not your fault.

I have explained a bit - well, I have quizzed her on boundaries and said I've had my fingers burnt, so she knows this is a key thing for me.

That's a really good start.

Indestructiblegirl, I'm a bit confused about the status of you and your t, maybe I've missed some postings. Did she tell you you were too much for her, have you both terminated therapy? What's been happening?

Re being too much for her and boundaries; it doesn't matter how much you say or do, you cannot know someone's limits or protect their boundaries for them. Only each individual can look after their own boundaries. If she got burnt out or things became too intense then that is not your fault. That is a sign that she didn't hold her own boundaries and that she took on too much. Only she can fix it. She has made the mistake, not you.

Is it possible that with you feeling so poorly that you're less able to cope with things right now and that is aggravating these feelings of rejection and abandonment? I know when I'm really sick my mental health also takes a tumble.

Asiablue, I terminated yesterday after my session. I had a panic attack/ sobbing outburst in the street on the way home, going to therapy with her was doing me no good.

Yes, she told me yesterday I had pushed her too much needing reassurance, ie I would keep saying, is it really ok for me to be in contact this much, etc. In her notes that I offered her an exit from me every week, so she got sick of it and that's why she pulled back. She did apologize for being brutal about it.

I know being sick isn't helping, everything seems ten times worse when you're ill. I ****ed up big style last night and left a voicemail when I was desperately unhappy and burning up and just thought ah **** it. Which of course, she didn't respond to. So - clever woman I am - I left another today. Which in a way it's good she hasn't responded to, because I'm starting to feel a bit of dislike for her now. It's further proof of how she was bullsh#tting me all about how it was always going to be okay to call at any time when in desperate pain, and she'd call me back when possible. I need to grow this dislike of her. Deleted the number but it's on the internet, so I'm worried if I get weak in my resolve again I'll call again.

Utterly flabbergasted it has gone like this. I know I'm repeating old patterns, even with calling hoping for something comforting and for things to actually not be as bad as they are - but I couldn't seem to stop it.

Ugh venting my spleen again, sorry folks.

When I get so desperately down on myself, I try to remember that the other person always does things/lives their life their way, not necessarily the way I do mine. As HazelGirl says, a lot is about your therapist, not you; she did not move away from you because of you but because of herself. You don't ever get the credit for what other people do

Do you remember when you first realized that other people's families and parents and households weren't like yours? It is kind of like that and I try to remember that when I wondered how I could be friends with this girl when her whole upbringing was so different from mine, etc. :-) Remembering that sense of wonder at how different we actually were, sometimes I rethink my T in that light (she was from another country all together, 10+ years older than I was and could not possibly have had a childhood like mine) and, as painful as it is, it is also calming a bit to realize that there's a larger world out there besides the misbegotten one I am constructing in my own head.

I'm so sorry you are sick, too, I have asthma and got bronchitis on top of that a couple winters ago and never ever want that again!

She never abandoned you, she just reestablished boundaries to make the relationship more long-term stable, and its hurt you so much to know that that you're leaving. I understand you don't trust her because she offered more for a while than she could give permanently, but she didn't terminate you Indestructible Girl, and she was still committed to you.

Of course you feeling ill will make it harder, I hope you feel much better soon.

I'm sure your next therapist will not allow so much, so there won't be such a drastic change: along with your current therapists' illness, which also impacted what you were receiving from her, I'm sure her unavailability due to that and the management's issue with Saturday sessions really exacerbated the change.

IndestructibleGirl I am soooo sorry you had such a horrible experience with this T. I hope this new T will be much better for you.

Take care of yourself. By the way be as cautious as you need to be at first with new T. She should understand. There's nothing wrong with slowly busing trust. Especially after recent circumstances. Again take care of yourself. Hope thing turn around for you.

Thanks, Leah. Although, I must pick up on some points. I really like you and respect you and always value your insights, but I think you are wrong when you say she was still committed to me.

There was no substance in any of her words at all, ultimately. It was all false. I have been thinking, and it's not that she said 'I love you' and it's wrong because she was a therapist - it was wrong because she didn't mean it. She said it for, I guess, an experiment and she was winging it and hoped it would all be grand. I was an amusing project until she got bored.

I think being committed to a client means doing what is in their best interest, and thinking before you speak.

In therapy the currency we use is words. Therefore, careless words have no place in that room.

Being committed is not doing weird and wonderful freestyling where you park your near 20 years experience and comprehensive training at the door, and just roll with whatever feels good at the time instead.

I understand your anger. My experience from reading the past few months of your posts, is that she offered more for a period than she could provide indefinitely, and that's hard to stomach. She overextended herself, which wasn't good for you. But you're also highly emotionally reactive now, understandably, and sound overwhlemed, and seem to be reading much more into her actions than is there, based on what you've been writing. Of course, I do not know more than what you've written on the forum. The thing is, some of your actions are contributing to the pattern you have been sure would repeat itself, a pattern you've anticipated for months, like a self-fulfilling prophecy almost. However, I understand you've already gotten your take on the situation and made your decision, and so that's that.

As for her commitment, she saw you for free to the tune of $15,000 in therapy, correct? And she was ready to see you again next week, and indefinitely, correct? And she helped you through what you previously described as an intensely healing period, so... I'm not buying that she isn't committed to you. More that in overextending herself, and then returning to a more normal relationship frame, it was too much for you. I get that. Too much is too much and it's been a lot, between her overextension, her illness, even the irritating office policy change. I hear how it's all added up toooooo far for you to see any hope for the future with her.

I hope the next therapist is "just right" ala Goldilocks and the Three Bears. This one sounds too soft. I hope you'll try and take excellent care of yourself while you wait to see the next one.

P.S. Did she say she did not mean the "I love you?" That would indeed be awful, a betrayal.

P.P.S. I understand you reaching out to her, one alternative idea to get that therapeutic support in the interim is one of the free online or phone crisis lines, they're not bad, can give you some space to say what you have to without more entanglement with her.

[quote=Leah123;3784054]


Thank you. I'm still not convinced of her commitment.

I am frightened of all the healing I had done unravelling. How can it not? I feel she was absolutely dishonest. She is trained in these things, how could she not know what she was doing in being free and easy and thoughtless with her boundaries and I love you and texting and calling flat out and making me feel welcomed? Actively encouraging it, just to drop me like a hot brick. Why would you do that to somebody who comes to you in tons of pain in the first place?

It had no basis in truth, just in cheap and trite platitudes. She was talking through her arse, I believed her, well I don't now. How can I believe anything we talked about???

No she didn't say she didn't mean it when she said I love you but she hasn't said it for months now. And she doesn't behave it anymore anyway. She did not want to engage with me anymore.

And no, there was no room in her schedule for me after next Saturday anyway. She just said she hoped we could work together but she didn't know what we could do about it. There was nothing sure or secure anywhere between us anymore.

Also if somebody could explain the self-fulfilling prophecy I would be genuinely so grateful. This is what she said too. I have no idea what it means. What I thought I was doing in all of my interactions with her was being my most honest self, as much as I possibly could. Clearly I made a mistake somewhere - should I have known not to admit all of the wretched abandonment fears when they kept filling my head? Is this what people mean by a self-fulfilling prophecy? If I tell them about my fear of being left all the time when it crops up, then eventually it will happen? I cannot get my head round this.

What would have been the point in therapy in lying through my teeth and telling her everything was peachy and that my attachment was secure when it wasn't?!

Yeah, I'm sure she did get sick of hearing it, but as an experienced therapist why they **** did she enable me to sicken her?

I don't understand at all. Why play cat and mouse with somebody so obviously hurt who is trying their hardest to trust you and taking you at face value?

You're cutting her off, and have been cutting her off rather than doing the work to mend the rupture, and interpreting her actions in a pessimistic light for a long time. I've read it in many posts, and I think that's what I mean by self-fulfilling prophecy.

I understand, not saying she behaved perfectly, she didn't, but that the motives you're ascribing don't make sense to me, based on everything you've shared, and I think that you're acting in large part out of fear, creating this self-fulfilling prophecy. It's not one bit about suggesting you don't be honest, but rather I wonder about your cutting and running rather than investing some time and money in seeing whether you could forgive and get to the better relationship you want as she seems clearly committed to you, though not perfect. The timing of you leaving once you got a job has to be considered too, sort of a ... 'you pull back, well now that I have money, I'll pull back.' I know it's not at all that simple, but I would say it is one of a few factors.

But I understand if the work that needed doing was too much. If you feel your limit and are at it... then you try another avenue, and it sounds like you aren't willing to return or seeing the benefit in repair, in breaking the cycle, so hopefully it can somehow turn into a transformative learning experience with a new therapist.

One thing I'm confused about, that you just posted was that she did not have any available appointment slots for you? Is that correct? She couldn't schedule you for any appointments at any time in the future? Is that what she said, or was this related to her illness, the office policy, etc. and just a matter of working out logistics? Either way, I hear how that is tough.

In my opinion you did nothing wrong. I think she is trying to remove the blame from herself by claiming you did this to yourself with this self fulfilling prophecy statement. I rarely post but I've been reading her for a long time now, and from all I've read about your experience it is my opinion that she was careless and reckless with you. I think she liked you, liked you enough to feel a friendly love and concern for you, and then realized she couldn't and wasn't supposed to have this kind of relationship with you. She goofed up. It seems like she so enjoyed your company that she wasn't responsible about boundaries and allowed things to get out of control and then realized she was the professional here, her license could be in jeopardy, and so she suddenly decided to act as she should have from the start, and pulled back and slammed on the brakes.

And you, sweet Indestructible Girl, went through the windshield. And she's blaming you for it, which is of course not at all fair.

1. Wasnt she in the hospital last week? Why is there no consideration for this?

2. Re self-fulfilling prophecy: even the title of this thread is a little dramatic, no? A little self-indulgent? Its like youre insisting on driving, then complaining on where you end up. You dont get to complain if you insist on driving. Thems the rules. No, we cant do it your way. We have to do it the ts way. THEN we can complain. But until then, we are SOL. Most ts will wait for as long as it takes. Yours was in the hospital last week - its like youre hitting her when shes down - what is up with that? Did you have a caretaker who was unavailable due to illness when you were young?

Actually, I've seen IG state that the therapist did indeed apologize (take responsibility) for how she pulled back and has been working to retighten the frame. I haven't read anywhere that the therapist has blamed the client, which isn't to say I didn't miss that, but I have not seen it. Rather that the therapist got overwhelmed (her own error) and course corrected. And no, I don't think she did it in a very graceful fashion.

This is not your fault. This is her fault. She is the professional who was supposed to guide you and keep boundaries clear. How can a client expect to figure all this out and make things right? Aren't we in therapy because we don't know how to do what they do?

But how have I been cutting her off? There have been times I've asked for sessions and she's said no because she has no time. The amount of times she's cancelled or reschedueld on me in the last few months is substantial. So how could I do the work when she's not there?

In the last ten weeks, she has cancelled sessions or missed arranged calls eight times, I guess about one a week apart from the last month where she was AWOL. Because she was sick, yes, but also because her dog was sick, because her osteo appointment ran over, because she got the time wrong in the diary. Sometimes reshuffled to another day, mostly not.

How is that my fault?

I am really not trying to be tedious, but please tell me (if you can think of any examples from my posts) where I'm projecting and such? I appreciate that when in the cycle of our own behaviour it's hard to see it from the outside, so I am fully aware I might be being awfully unreasonable here. But I can't see it. I can't see what I have done wrong?