[baseline]

I am not usually socially awkward especially in a professional sense. I am quite confident in communicating effectively in work and have a way of engaging people in conversation. That being said, I recently was at work and I unexpectedly looked up and saw T. Not sure if he saw me but I quickly looked away and sort of hid. I panicked!! Like a teenage school girl!!!Now I will feel awkward at therapy when we talk. His mother is a patient where I work. I was not actually caring for her but he did tell me she was there. I intentionally did not work extra days so I would not run into him. Also, I was trying to respect boundaries. He said he saw me once at work before and did not acknowledge me so I thought that is what he wanted. Why does this make me feel like I did something wrong? He is always professional with me I feel like a fool. He was talking with someone and I was giving report. When I was done he was gone. Should I have gone to the room and say hi. We are not friends although I care for him deeply. I am beating myself up please tell me how I could have handled this better.

Most therapists will not acknowledge a client outside of their office unless the client acknowledges them first, so if you didn't say hello, he was just going off of your clues. You don't have any obligation to talk to him if you run into him, but if you want to that is okay too. Don't beat yourself up about it.

[Restin]

I know what you mean by being confident and comfortable with social situations...until it comes to meeting up with the therapist somewhere outside the appointment. Truly, I think it's how the transference stuff gets tangled up with the "boundary rules". We have the transference feelings which are unusual, awkward, and strong, and then the knowledge of the boundaries we've been taught to know, primarily from everywhere except our own T. So, in the unstructured place outside T's office, it's suddenly an invisible electric fence. I'm so scared my T or my med nurse at the clinic will think I'm trying to get extra attention or being obnoxious, when I'm especially trying to be a good patient. It's just dreadful! Being a bit fat, myself, it's just awful for T to see me standing at the receptionist desk from way down the hall! I repeat and repeat to myself, "I know she doesn't care, I know I'm not doing anything improper" and I feel awful anyway.

[baseline]

Originally Posted by Restin

I know what you mean by being confident and comfortable with social situations...until it comes to meeting up with the therapist somewhere outside the appointment. Truly, I think it's how the transference stuff gets tangled up with the "boundary rules". We have the transference feelings which are unusual, awkward, and strong, and then the knowledge of the boundaries we've been taught to know, primarily from everywhere except our own T. So, in the unstructured place outside T's office, it's suddenly an invisible electric fence. I'm so scared my T or my med nurse at the clinic will think I'm trying to get extra attention or being obnoxious, when I'm especially trying to be a good patient. It's just dreadful! Being a bit fat, myself, it's just awful for T to see me standing at the receptionist desk from way down the hall! I repeat and repeat to myself, "I know she doesn't care, I know I'm not doing anything improper" and I feel awful anyway.

I wish I could communicate this with him as eloquently as you have. I turn into a babbling nervous idiot!

I personally cant say i wouldnt have done the same. I dont care to know my docs outside of a proffesional setting