[scorpiosis37]

I was going to post this in “Dear T: I Need to Tell You Something” but then I decided that I want responses. This is what I want to say to my T—but my question is what SHOULD I say to my T? Should I tell her that I don’t want to e-mail anymore? Should I tell her that she’s hurt my feelings around the lack of responses and forgetting the picture? Or should I just give her a break because she’s been busy and she’s usually more consistent. I don’t’ really want to have a rupture a few weeks before our 5 year “anniversary.” She’s done a lot for me over the years, and I don’t want to appear ungrateful. There’s just something about the anniversary—and the perceived change in her consistency—that is triggering me right now. I even kind of brought up that I was feeling some distance from her last session, but she brushed it off and said she didn’t feel that way. So, any advice?

T,
I feel a bit of distance between us right now. I feel like you aren’t as consistent or plugged in as you usually are. Rationally, I know that you just got back from vacation and you’re busy. But it still feels personal. You always used to write back when I e-mailed you. I don’t email often and your replies are brief—but they let me know that you read it and things are still “okay.” The fact that you haven’t written back the last few times hurts my feelings. It feels like you’re sending me the message that I should stop emailing—even though you say you like receiving them. You also forgot twice in a row to bring in the picture you told me about. It feels like now that I’m an “old” client you aren’t as tuned in to me anymore. You’re more lax. Like, it’s okay to be less consistent now because you know me better. That hurts. It’s triggering my fear of rejection and abandonment. As you know, I have a history of every “adult” in my life leaving. Next month is our 5 year “therapy-a-versary.” I know that you aren’t leaving any time soon—but I still have the same fear. I think, unconsciously, I’m looking for any sign that you might leave or that you don’t care anymore. While you were on vacation, I wrote you a “therapy-a-versary” letter and started hand-making a decorative envelope to put it in. I was fine while you were gone because I knew you needed the vacation and I was busy. But, when I had my first session back with you on Tuesday, the first thing that happened was you forgot the picture. Then, we talked about something that was difficult for me, and it felt like you just weren’t totally plugged in. Your body language also seemed far away. I left therapy and ended up writing you a short e-mail that afternoon to tell you some things that had come up for me afterwards. You didn’t respond. Now, looking at the “therapy-a-versary” card on my desk—things just don’t feel right. I don’t feel like doing something nice for you right now. I feel like I want to pull away from you. What I need is to know that you aren’t every other person in my life who has slowly withdrawn, and then left. Because, right now, it feels like you’re withdrawing. My reaction when people withdraw is often to cling tighter out of fear—and that usually just pushes them away faster. So, I’m tempted to do the opposite right now. To let you withdraw, and to withdraw myself. I feel like telling you that I don’t want to e-mail anymore. What I really want is for you to do what you said you would always do—which is write me back a brief response just acknowledging what I’ve said and affirming that we’ll talk about it next session. But if I can’t count on you to do that, then I’d rather have no e-mail contact at all. I don’t like feeling rejected, which is how I feel when you don’t respond. The issue we talked about last session involved touch, and you said that you actually enjoy coming to sit next to me on the couch or putting a hand on my knee. But I don’t really feel that from you. In fact, right now, I’m feeling like I don’t want to hug you at the end of session next week. I don’t really want to be physically near you at all. I know that I’m experiencing a hurt reaction right now—and I’ll probably feel differently later. But this is just where I’m at tonight.

[SoupDragon]

I think it is really relevant to let your T know how you feel. As you said your T has been away and it may take time for you both to settle down again, but there's nothing wrong in checking these things out with your T.

Soup

[musinglizzy]

I feel your pain. When it seemed to me my T was backing off I asked her about it and I was right. She was. New boundaries, you know. I hope that's not the same for you...but you gotta talk to your T or this will just eat you up inside I'm sure! She may be going through a rough time in her personal life, and it's reflecting in her work. Even some of the best T's can't hide it ALL the time...

To me this letter expresses your feelings really eloquently, I think it is a good letter.

After the breaks I had with my T I generally felt some very difficult emotions, it seemed incomprehensible to me that it was because of the break, it always seemed to be because of other things. I can't help help thinking that about your feelings right now - that they may be in some way intensified by the break. Is it just a coincidence that you are feeling like she is withdrawing and abandoning you after the break? Like you I was always fine during the break, and then after woods something she did triggered me.

[Coco3]

In my opinion it's always better if you let your T know how you feel. Especially if it triggers something. You're not being ungrateful. I think you've expressed yourself very well in your letter and that it's okay to give it to her.

((((Scorpiosis)))))

[Rive.]

I would bring up how you feel hurt in session. I would also not be too accusatory. Granted, I don’t know your T and the type of relationship you have but some of the things you wrote could be perceived as finger-pointing - which i think is not necessary. Why ‘invite’ a rupture when you are not exactly sure what is happening on her side. I would cut her some slack until you know for sure. After all, you have a 5 year relationship with her & say she’s been consistent and helpful up to now.

PS: I would also not ‘threaten’ to stop email - as again, you’re not really sure what is happening and although all your fears are triggered, you are assuming how she feels etc.

Reading your post, my first reaction was that maybe something is up with T (personal or whatnot) which might account for her being distracted, detached or not so much on the ball. So, although you feel the impact (e.g. feeling rejected or insecure etc.), it might not have anything to do with you.

She might simply have a lot on her plate and genuinely forgot the picture. You won’t know until you have a(n) (amicable) heart to heart. Tell her how you feel and perceive things and ask her if there is any validity to these (i.e. reassurance that you still have a strong relationship with her).

[MoxieDoxie]

I agree with Rive. You can state how you perceive her actions in your mind but own them instead of making it feel like a scolding. You can start the letter out with things she has done for you that have been helpful in reaching your goals, or in your recovery and you can state how the time with her has helped you grow. Build her ego up first then state how you are recieving some of her actions.

[stopdog]

I do not believe a client needs to build up a therapists's ego before pointing out how that therapist is failing. Or actually ever at all. It is not, in my opinion, something a client ever need do.
I am not sure that a client not sending email to the therapist is going to be a big deal to a therapist, but telling the therapist you don't feel like doing it anymore is not a bad thing for a client to do.

[MoxieDoxie]

Believe this: Therapist are just like us, they judge even if you think they are trained not to, they have feelings, even if they are trained to supress them, they have egos even if you think it should not enter the therapy room. Remember you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar. I tried to write emails to my therapist from an adult place instead of a child place and have found 100% of the time that my PRECIEVED feelings are wrong because they are coming from a child part still feeling the hurt from a past trauma or conditioning growing up.

[stopdog]

I did not say theose people don't have them. I said I don't believe a client needs to build up the therapist. If you want to do so fine with me. The therapist's feelings and ego is not the focus of what a client is supposed to worry about. A client pays them to keep those things out of the client's way.
I don't see the OPs letter as particularly hostile or childish or attacking. I would not think it wrong if it was, just that it is not from how I read it.

[MoxieDoxie]

Now you are just being argumentative. I do not "Believe" a client needs to but it is a technique that can be beneficial.

[stopdog]

We all have our different approaches.

OP- do you mind if I ask what it is about the email part that is making it a focus for you now to think about taking it away from the therapist? Has the feeling of disconnect been for more than the first appointment or two after the therapist's vacation? Were you expecting more from the post vacation appointment than you got?

I think the letter is great.

One part of therapy that is really hard is acknowledging that our T's are people, with problems of their own. Though they are trained, they aren't always going to be perfectly attuned or present. I think of raising my kids, and most of the time I feel like I do a good job as a mom. Then there are the days the dishwasher breaks, I burn the breakfast, I realize there are no clean clothes in my kids drawers, I've forgotten to make cupcakes for Halloween, and my boss calls with a work emergency. One or both kids will ask me for something and I respond in an angry and stressed out way. Their faces drop, and I know I've disappointed and hurt them. Denying anything is wrong on my end means THEY'VE done something wrong in their minds, so I'm always up front if I'm having a bad day or upset. Anything other than that is crazy making.

I prefer not to email my T. Old T was really inconsistent in replying, and I spent all week fretting about how what I wrote was being perceived and why I wasn't getting a timely response back. It felt really good when T would send something caring and helpful back, but the heartache of no reply or a cold brief response was too much to deal with. The hard truth is, T's get busy and reading about our emotional turmoil doesn't always make the top of their list. And sometimes, they need to disengage for their own mental health. One of my hard therapy goals was to not rely so much on my T's support, and happily I haven't needed to email T in months. I do keep journals and read them in session.

Let us know what your therapist says. I'm guessing she has her own "stuff" that's getting in the way of being there for you like she used to.

I forgot to mention - maybe this is a convo better had in person than through email or a letter? I'd start the convo out with.... "Are you really okay? Because I am picking up on...." and go from there. It's definitely worth bringing up, grist for the mill they say. From your posts, it sounds like you have a really solid relationship with your therapist, and addressing face to face where there is no ambiguity with intent or emotion might go over better.

[ragsnfeathers]

The thing about changing an email based on someone else's advice: The email may or may not be appropriate in social situations - and I'm not critiquing this email in particular, this is a general statement, but it's eliminating a potentially valuable source of "therapy fodder". Like, what are the projections embedded in the email, what are the feelings, etc. Writing on the assumption that the therapist needs building up or is prone to judge or get hurt by criticism, whether fair or unfair, is putting someone else's therapy fodder in the email. Not useful to the OP's therapy.

It's like... about 10 years ago when I was a volunteer English tutor an ESL learner improved so much between the initial in-class evaluation and the first home assignment that I took the samples to her professor and asked how this could be and did she still need me? He glanced at the second sample and said she had help doing it. Great for her initiative but I needed to know what help she needed.

Seemed kind of similar to this.

[scorpiosis37]

I don't intend to give T the letter-- it's something that I wrote just for myself. Whenever I want to talk to T about our relationship, I do it face to face (and politely). I'm just using this thread to think through what I'll say.

I don't view my desire to stop e-mailing as a "threat." I don't think she cares whether or I e-mail or not. I just think it may be healthier for ME if I make the decision to stop. I don't do it often, anyway. I just e-mail on occassion so that I can get something out, and feel "heard." But if I can't rely on her to acknowledge the e-mail, then it doesn't serve the purpose of making me feel heard. Instead, it creates a new worry on my part. That isn't good for me. That's why I think it may be better for me to stop. I'm not in control of whether she responds; I'm only in control of my own actions. So that's why I'm proposing a change in my own behavior. I'm not going to ask her to do anything differently or accuse her of anything. I'm just going to let her know that my feelings were a bit hurt, and I think it is better for me if I no longer e-mail her.

Stopdog, to answer your question about why specifically I felt hurt by the e-mail-- it was because the e-mail was about our relationship. We had talked about our relationship for part of the session, and I left feeling unsatisfied. So, after session, I tried to explore what I could do differently, or how I could re-frame things to feel better. So, I wrote up a short e-mail offering some insights about myself, and why I might be feeling the way I do, and thanking her for being the kind of T that I could talk to openly about this stuff. During the session she also told me that her daughter has become interested in the subject that I teach/research and is reading about a topic that I wrote my dissertation on-- so I also added a "PS, your daughter might like X book." It's really hard for me when her attention, during my session, is on the vacation she just took with her children. But I really tried to allow for there to be room for both, and to appreciate her attempt to make a connection by telling me that her daughter enjoys my subject. So I tried to respond from a place of generosity (offering a book suggestion), and I didn't let myself really go to the place of being hurt. I actually felt good after writing the e-mail. But after 2 days, I started to feel hurt by the lack of response. In fact, I told her a month or two ago that I was hurt when she didn't respond that time, and she said that now that she knew that, she would respond next time. But this was "next time" and she didn't respond. So I'm hurt that she didn't respond after she assured me that she would-- and I'm hurt that she didn't respond to an e-mail which specifically addressed our relationship.

To answer your other question, Stopdog, T started to become inconsistent before the break, so it isn't something that just occurred afterwards. I don't feel that it's the break that is causing me to feel this way, although I do think it contributed to her inconsistency because she was away from work and now has to play catch-up. I do think her mind has been on preparing for her trip, going on her trip, and then catching up with work after returning home-- so I do think she's been distracted by things that are separate from me. However, I don't think anything "big" is going on in her life right now. She's pretty open with me and she's told me when "big" things have happened (she got divorced 2 years ago, there was a time when her daughter was sick, etc). She seemed really happy last session when she talked about her trip, so I think that's where her mind was. It just wasn't on me. I don't blame her for that, I'm just acknowledging that my feelings were hurt. (I feel no need to share this part with her though).

Originally Posted by ragsnfeathers

The thing about changing an email based on someone else's advice: The email may or may not be appropriate in social situations - and I'm not critiquing this email in particular, this is a general statement, but it's eliminating a potentially valuable source of "therapy fodder". Like, what are the projections embedded in the email, what are the feelings, etc. Writing on the assumption that the therapist needs building up or is prone to judge or get hurt by criticism, whether fair or unfair, is putting someone else's therapy fodder in the email. Not useful to the OP's therapy.

It's like... about 10 years ago when I was a volunteer English tutor an ESL learner improved so much between the initial in-class evaluation and the first home assignment that I took the samples to her professor and asked how this could be and did she still need me? He glanced at the second sample and said she had help doing it. Great for her initiative but I needed to know what help she needed.

Seemed kind of similar to this.

I'm with you on this! Though I think a lot depends on the T. On this forum, we've gotten many many many accounts of people confronting T's, or confessing feelings to T's, that end up blowing up in those people's faces. Commonly damaging therapeutic relationships, and less commonly ending in terminations. It all comes down to how well individual T's handle criticism or anger.

In general, erring on the courteous side typically has less fallout. Not that there's anything discourteous about the OP's email.

Originally Posted by scorpiosis37

I don't intend to give T the letter-- it's something that I wrote just for myself. Whenever I want to talk to T about our relationship, I do it face to face (and politely). I'm just using this thread to think through what I'll say.

I don't view my desire to stop e-mailing as a "threat." I don't think she cares whether or I e-mail or not. I just think it may be healthier for ME if I make the decision to stop. I don't do it often, anyway. I just e-mail on occassion so that I can get something out, and feel "heard." But if I can't rely on her to acknowledge the e-mail, then it doesn't serve the purpose of making me feel heard. Instead, it creates a new worry on my part. That isn't good for me. That's why I think it may be better for me to stop. I'm not in control of whether she responds; I'm only in control of my own actions. So that's why I'm proposing a change in my own behavior. I'm not going to ask her to do anything differently or accuse her of anything. I'm just going to let her know that my feelings were a bit hurt, and I think it is better for me if I no longer e-mail her.

Stopdog, to answer your question about why specifically I felt hurt by the e-mail-- it was because the e-mail was about our relationship. We had talked about our relationship for part of the session, and I left feeling unsatisfied. So, after session, I tried to explore what I could do differently, or how I could re-frame things to feel better. So, I wrote up a short e-mail offering some insights about myself, and why I might be feeling the way I do, and thanking her for being the kind of T that I could talk to openly about this stuff. During the session she also told me that her daughter has become interested in the subject that I teach/research and is reading about a topic that I wrote my dissertation on-- so I also added a "PS, your daughter might like X book." It's really hard for me when her attention, during my session, is on the vacation she just took with her children. But I really tried to allow for there to be room for both, and to appreciate her attempt to make a connection by telling me that her daughter enjoys my subject. So I tried to respond from a place of generosity (offering a book suggestion), and I didn't let myself really go to the place of being hurt. I actually felt good after writing the e-mail. But after 2 days, I started to feel hurt by the lack of response. In fact, I told her a month or two ago that I was hurt when she didn't respond that time, and she said that now that she knew that, she would respond next time. But this was "next time" and she didn't respond. So I'm hurt that she didn't respond after she assured me that she would-- and I'm hurt that she didn't respond to an e-mail which specifically addressed our relationship.

To answer your other question, Stopdog, T started to become inconsistent before the break, so it isn't something that just occurred afterwards. I don't feel that it's the break that is causing me to feel this way, although I do think it contributed to her inconsistency because she was away from work and now has to play catch-up. I do think her mind has been on preparing for her trip, going on her trip, and then catching up with work after returning home-- so I do think she's been distracted by things that are separate from me. However, I don't think anything "big" is going on in her life right now. She's pretty open with me and she's told me when "big" things have happened (she got divorced 2 years ago, there was a time when her daughter was sick, etc). She seemed really happy last session when she talked about her trip, so I think that's where her mind was. It just wasn't on me. I don't blame her for that, I'm just acknowledging that my feelings were hurt. (I feel no need to share this part with her though).

Vacation is funny like that. I get the feeling my own T tries to pull back a few weeks before her break. Maybe to get me ready for a few weeks without therapy? Or possibly to get herself less engaged so she can enjoy her break without having to think about heavy topics? I do it consciously and unconsciously myself. Then of course easing back in after break. It could be technique.

Also, my T is always really busy before vacation and right when she gets back. She hasn't said it, but people tend to have crises around that time and need extra appointments.

[BlessedRhiannon]

I don't have time for a more detailed reply right now, since I'm heading out to my own T appointment. I just wanted to say that recently, I felt very distant from my T and I sent her an email very similar to your letter. She didn't see if before session, so she read it during my session. My T told me that she was so glad I'd sent her the email, apologized for not reading it prior to the appointment, and then we talked some about the distance I was feeling. My T owned her part in the distance and agreed that she'd been a bit "off" the last few session. It was very good for me to tell T exactly what I was feeling without trying to couch it in "friendly" terms.

So, I think what you SHOULD do is whatever feels right to you, even if that means sending her a rather blunt email or being very straightforward about how you're feeling in session.

[scorpiosis37]

My T actually e-mailed me today. It was a delayed response to the e-mail I sent her at the beginning of the week (I haven't contacted her since then). She said that she was busy unpacking and getting back into her routine, so she didn't have time to e-mail me until now. I feel better now that she responded, but all her response said was "We'll talk about it next session" and then she asked if I had any articles or lectures I might be willing to send her daughter on X topic. So, I sent her an article that I wrote and 2 powerpoints I created and use with my own students. I still feel some distance with her-- and it feels a little strange to send her my own work to give to her daughter-- but I feel better than I did when I started this thread. I don't think I'm going to bring up the fact that her lack of responsiveness hurt my feelings... because, now, she has responded. I think I'll just know for the future that, if I e-mail her, I'm making the decision to open up a can of worms. Hopefully, I'll decide not to do so in the future. I can, however, talk about feeling a little bit of distance and work through that with her.

I don't know that I want to say anything to her about feeling "weird" around the daughter stuff. I mean, I have no problem sharing my work. I think it's great that her daughter is interested in my field, and might benefit from reading what I sent. I feel positively towards T's children. Obviously, I haven't met them-- but, because they're my T's kids, and I like T, I have a general positive feeling towards them. But that doesn't mean that I don't still feel a little triggered by the fact that they have T as a mom and have this great relationship-- and I wish I had that. I'm not directly jealous of them, but I am sort of abstractly jealous of kids who have a good mom. And I won't deny that there are moments when I wish T could be mom-- or that she would hold me like she holds her kids-- but I'm enough of an adult to be able to separate that kind of "fantasy" from "reality." I don't normally feel that way-- but having her talk about her daughter SO MUCH does kind of bring the topic to the surface.

[musinglizzy]

I honestly think it was inappropriate for her to ask you for the articles. She could be Googling? I don't think I'd be ok with that.

I understand your feelings otherwise, because I feel very similar.