Therapist has given me an ultimatum

Probably during the two months before the job fiasco. When we were doing six to eight hours of sessions a week, lots of texting and there were very few boundaries. Yes all wrong, I know.

Had already started to retract all vulnerability when she offered me the job, because it was two days after the rupture where she also had a go at me for not taking her up on the offer to ebay her clothes and split the money.

I know it's all fairly mad.

Don't want to try another T right now, I'd rather have a break for a while if I'm terminating with current one.

Let me tell you, my T would be PISSED at how your T has treated you. She would be absolutely FURIOUS.

I know you are right that it isn't solely my fault. I know at least some of this is her crap, that too much of her personal stuff comes into therapy with me.

Well, I don't seem to be terminated

Have had another text to say we can't do the proposed arrangement of week 1 x 1 hour, week 2 x 2 hours, alternating going forward, as the clinic won't allow it, and can I pick one or two hours a week.

I'm glad she didn't terminate you, but....

I hope all this gives you pause. Maybe it would be a good idea to write down a list of everything she's done helpful and everything she's done harmful?

I'm sure it's a big relief, but I don't fancy this whiplash you keep going through.

On top of everything, I know therapy's very pricey with her, would it be too expensive to do two hours per week? Ugh.

And what happened to her 7 week waiting list that she has a second slot available for you? I guess she's..... got discretion because you're an existing client?? Then why did she cut back so much before? Clearly the more time was what you wanted, right, all along?

It is all SO MUDDLED I AM GOING CRAZY!

I feel like there is something not quite right in all this bluster about what the clinic wants and what they're dictating and the waiting list and all the rest. But not sure what it is.

It's not that there's a second slot, it was that we agreed we'd do 2 hours next week (like 1pm - 3pm) then just one hour the week after, then the 2 hour session, then one hour, and onwards like that alternating each week. This is because one hour a week felt like not enough, she said she felt the same, but I cannot afford $200 every week for 2 hours. So as a compromise it was the 1 hour/ 2 hour alternating thing..

Now if we can't do that, I dunno. I texted back and said would it be possible to do a 2 hour session each fortnight. NO REPLY. Is this just her subtley getting rid of me in another way?

I have this awful Orwellian doublethink in my head about her I want to tell her this is all too chaotic and not therapeutic and I am pissed at how much time I'm wasting worrying about her and her agenda. But then I think my tainted view of the world could be urging me to cut off my nose to spite my face, and yes she is flawed but she is also great, and if I can just get my sh#t together and make myself embrace vulnerability instead of backing off...well then we might get some great work done.

Ok. I'm so sorry. I think I understand the feelings you may have been experiencing during this time. But I don't think those are the same as the feelings of vulnerability and validation, support and "holding" that come in response to competent therapy. Those feelings are more like the limerence of romantic love. They are very volatile--and the sort of boundary crossings and loose frame that your T allowed would only feed those feelings and the instability that comes with them.

I don't think you've experienced therapeutic vulnerability and validation.

Aha no she cut back before because I wasn't paying back then. And there's still no way I could pay $600 on the sliding scale every week for 6 hours of therapy as I was doing.

Therapy elsewhere would be so much simpler, straightforward, safe.

Would it be as intoxicating, as compelling, maybe not. But have those things really been helping you?

What if you just saw someone that grew to care about you and really really wanted to help you in a reassuring, boundaried way? I know she loves you, but.... therapy is a lot more than that, and her lack of clarity is really screwing up your life at this point, isn't it?

I have had chaotic experiences w/my T too, as you know, and we've also done many many hours of sessions during certain weeks. So...I appreciate the power of such a close connection, sigh. I do...

My worry here is just that your therapist couldn't maintain it- she overcommited, which is a very bad sign to me, she couldn't keep track of her boundaries. The key is not maybe how much they offer, but how much they keep the implicit and sometimes explicit promise not to change the offer. My therapist has been consistent in her offers and never crossed lines as far as weird job offers, inappropriate emails, changes in availability, and never those severe arbitrary cutbacks.

Would you really have the balls to ask a new t for two hours every other week? This t gave you two choices - why couldnt you pick one of them? Did she say, "or come back with a better idea?" No, she didnt. How is she supposed to fill the alternating two hours every other week? Therapy is one session at a time, one or more times a week, every week. Youre making me crazy!!! I know, i am VERY structured. I am just speechless that you would ask for something she didnt offer. I would be pooping my pants with fear.

Eta - make that, i almost am!!

Okay, got it, thanks for clarifying. When reading my prior replies, take into consideration that we didn't know it was because of finances that the schedule changed. (I'm thinking about the agency putting her in check, must've been regarding another incident.) It is a drastic change though... why would she think you could just drop from 7 hours a week to 1... I mean, you weren't paying for 7 hours a week at any point, right? And then... did she taper or give you some support structure for that transition?

Therapy is meant to be one session at a time, one or more times a week, every week? I did not know this.

My current therapist does not like working in one hour sessions. She usually works in two hour blocks. She also always said some people see her once every two weeks, or once a month or once every six months, or whatever. So no, I didn't see it as a big deal to ask! I'm sorry, I just don't believe I'm being terribly brazen for asking for this.

When I did ask for my alternating thing, she said yes. Now she has said no.

That's the thing - it wasn't said that it was the finances. It was just when we had the rupture, at the time I wasn't paying, and she said 'we're going to do one two hour session once a week'. Instead of three or four two hour sessions a week.

We didn't taper or have a support structure. Then I got a job and it was still shaky with her, so as I posted here I thought about finding a new T. Stayed with her and started paying as I now had an income. As we had been doing two hours, I was paying for two, $200 a week (less than half her full whack fee) but it wasn't sustainable, so I asked to drop to one hour which is financially comfortable. One hour simply isn't enough, so asked for my arrangement of three hours a fortnight (which I now know is shocking to have asked for) which would have been just about affordable by skin of my teeth. But now she can't do it. She has also said there is no way I can come ad hoc when she has a cancellation anymore, which is new.

IG, that's ********.

There's no other way I can put it, because I've put it in other ways over the course of probably 10 threads and 50 posts, lol and she keeps screwing up and so I've run out of semi-polite ways to label it.

She is yanking your chain. That's not the technical term, but seeing as she's not being professional, I'm not going to bother either.

(Hugs)

I had a standing appointment once a week for 1 hr, but he would also schedule me for extra sessions as needed. The last couple of years I saw him for 1 hr every two weeks. He didn't generally do longer appointments for therapy (he did for testing and couples work) because he said he found them exhausting for both client and T. Fine with me--I was wiped out usually after 1 hr!

ETA: so asked for my arrangement of three hours a fortnight (which I now know is shocking to have asked for) which would have been just about affordable by skin of my teeth. But now she can't do it. She has also said there is no way I can come ad hoc when she has a cancellation anymore, which is new.

There's nothing shocking about asking. She probably wants to limit the extra sessions as a way of holding to a boundary. Probably too little too late.

You can ask for whatever you want, that's not brazen at all. She is free to say no, but you are most certainly welcome to ask for anything and everything!

I didnt mean it as a criticism of you. I was just - i thought "everybody knew". I am shocked that people here (other than you) go for longer than one hour, or that there are even insurance codes to accommodate it. That was new to me. Hey, my parents told me stuff was impossible, i believed them. When i found out stuff WAS possible, my whole life fell apart. I had no reason to do anything.

So i think she is just trying to give you a structure, or the clinic is for whatever reason. Not sure why the clinic is involved. But you still chose something outside her options - that seems controlling to me. You want to control when you will meet with her. So i would agree with her - for some reason, you are trying to make her redundant to the process. Your one vote will now outweigh hers plus the clinics vote. That concerns me, that it is set up like that. Eta - that she feels a need for the clinic to back her up.

So, what is the bottom line? Did you decide by last night to continue with this therapist or not?

I think the changing of length of time, hours a week, etc. might be distracting? If she only does 2 hours at a time, I would decide to try that once a week for six months, keep notes for myself of the experience and then readjust then after a good discussion of how it "went". But then, that's what I did for 9 years (no wonder I liked it).

But she can't afford 2 hours a week she's saying. Only 6 hours a month, at the very most. The therapist does one hour sessions also.

Controlling to try to match my financial resources to the best amount of therapy possible?? Really?

My reasoning went:

- I go to therapy one hour a week and it's not enough.
- Can I afford two hours? No I cannot.
- Can I afford an in between, ie get a longer session every two weeks, with a shorter 'touch base' one on in between weeks?
- Yes, I can. Therefore, I will ask my therapist about this.
- Therapist appears unfazed and agrees.
- Therapist says nothing about control at this juncture.

So, I though it was all okay. Evidently not!

Perna I would fecking love to do two hours a week. But I can't afford the $200 that would entail.

No, you haven't misrepresented her at all.

Listen:

I think you're having an urge I know, which is when you feel your therapist is being attacked, you backpedal and defend her. I totally get that, if that's what's happening. I think you're having this.... instinct to vilify yourself, to label your confusion as your own fault. your own issues.

So, for the record, and with only the best intentions, let me say: I don't think your mental health is perfect. (And you're in good company!) I see that you have issues, certainly. I see that you struggle. I see that you've done and said things that are unhelpful and even manipulative in your therapeutic relationship. And I see that you're a little invested in this self-fulfilling prophecy of being too much, too messed up to be handled.

And I'm saying that with very gentle intentions. All I really mean is... we're not polarizing you two, don't feel that by criticizing her, we're exalting you or ignoring that your issues complicate the relationship.

My point is-

that's what therapy is: we bring our issues in and work on them.

So.... no one's pretending you've always been perfectly anything in therapy with her, perfectly correct, perfectly reasonable, perfectly open, perfectly clear.....

But that's not your job. Your job is to be kinda messy.

Hers is to be clean. To keep clear of entanglement.

You can get drama for free, sigh, as I'm sure you know. I really don't think you should be paying for it.

I feel she's yanking it too

I don't know what to do. I keep going to make the decision 'no more' and then this stupid awful panic lifts up in my throat at never seeing her again.

I'm in a sticky wicket with this one. I need to have somebody who at least sometimes lets me feel like what it is to be loved, and there's only her. If I cut her off there is nobody

I know how weak and wrong that is.