[growlycat]

Does your T understand what therapy is like on your side of the couch?
Do they have an inkling of the impact it has on you, for better or worse?

Whether you want them to understand you or not, do they really have an accurate take on what you experience in therapy?

You know, I really think she does.

I don't think anyone can completely understand what another person is experiencing internally. Our experiences are our own, skewed by our own histories, beliefs, emotions, etc. All I ask from my therapist is to hear me and help me come to an understanding and acceptance of my own experience and to support me through that process of self-awareness. I really can't expect much more than that.

[growlycat]

CBT T today was so hard to get through to. The concept that I'd leave therapy and be upset for days was worrisome for him. He just couldn't grasp why therapy would be so jarring for me, why it would dredge up needy feelings. That I'd sometimes feel nauseous or even get sick before or after session. To lose sleep over it. It was just not on his radar and I think his own therapy experience was way more cerebral while mine is more emotional.

I feel like I've been hitting my head against a wall this morning.

Does your T understand what therapy is like on your side of the couch?

Yes, she has been in her own therapy. I plan to ask her if the modality she experienced was schema therapy, which she is using on me.

I know she had experienced transference for her therapist.

She is often able to articulate how I am feeling "in the moment" even when I struggle to find words and even when I've mixed feelings.


Do they have an inkling of the impact it has on you, for better or worse?

Yes, she knows things like how I feel she shows me more care as a paid professional, than my family.

She articulated that my needy, obsessive feelings (which are feelings I hide from her, but she can tell) and my counterdependent reactions to them are natural due to me having strong unmet emotional needs due to neglect and abuse.



Whether you want them to understand you or not, do they really have an accurate take on what you experience in therapy?

I think she has a relatively accurate take on my experience in therapy.

I am very cerebral, T works on getting me to experience emotion.

Growlycat, I'm saddened that your CBT T doesn't seem to understand your feelings.

[Leah123]

Well, my T has been in therapy a total of 15 years, long term with two therapists, 5 years and 10 years...

so..... she knows something of my experience and she's done her own version of depth psychotherapy and I know that it wasn't only because she was a practicing therapist, she told me some of her struggles, so I know she's had them and worked through them.

She even told me how her therapist sort of mothered her too in a way.

But it doesn't translate into perfect understanding, though I bet things could be a lot worse. I don't think she... gets my volatile feelings all the way, all the time. I know she says her issues were not as tough as mine, for example, in terms of trauma. And she never (as far as I know) attempted therapy as intense as mine, doing this multiple sessions per week version, which has some differences.

But I'm very glad she's been through therapy, it clearly makes a significant difference. I'm sorry your T seemed dense when you discussed it with him! He may have done therapy light if he didn't have major issues to work through nor attachment ones.

[growlycat]

Originally Posted by QuietMind

She articulated that my needy, obsessive feelings (which are feelings I hide from her, but she can tell) and my counterdependent reactions to them are natural due to me having strong unmet emotional needs due to neglect and abuse.

Growlycat, I'm saddened that your CBT T doesn't seem to understand your feelings.[/color]

Thank you for thinking of me. I am baffled as to how one can be a therapist and not seem to understand what you said above. It should be a basic understanding of human nature.

I'm hoping this is all a misunderstanding and that he really just doesn't suck at this. Fingers crossed.

I'm thinking that perhaps he had a very secure attachment plus his therapy perhaps was more "solution focused brief therapy" (I got the impression his therapy was cerebral problem solving) than anything close to evoking emotion.

I really hope he's just misunderstanding you because even in a super basic course for counseling, I'm being educated on transference and how clients can develop strong feelings.

[growlycat]

Originally Posted by QuietMind

I'm thinking that perhaps he had a very secure attachment plus his therapy perhaps was more "solution focused brief therapy" (I got the impression his therapy was cerebral problem solving) than anything close to evoking emotion.

I really hope he's just misunderstanding you because even in a super basic course for counseling, I'm being educated on transference and how clients can develop strong feelings.

Yes. You've stated it more eloquently than I could! Thank you-totally agree!

[atisketatasket]

It seems like she does get it, as much as anyone can get what another person is going through. She has been through her own therapy - I don't know for what, or how long.

In my professional field, also a service occupation, you would be very surprised at what some of my colleagues don't yet understand about their profession and the people they serve despite years of experience. It is just possible your therapist has just never recognized this situation before.

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[scorpiosis37]

While my T has been in extensive therapy herself, she seems surprisingly unaware of how I feel in therapy at times. For instance, she thought it would be nice for me to meet her daughter, by having her daughter walk in on a session we were having about how I felt as though she didn't have enough time/energy available for me (not ok!). After her daughter left and I explained how I felt, she was like "oh, I guess I do remember it bothering me when I heard my own therapist's daughter leave a voice recording during one of my sessions. That was during the days of land line answering machines and I still remember that." I wanted to say: DUH!

She just has done a lot of things recently that are kind of insensitive and poke at my trigger points, and she doesn't seem to have any clue that it feels like she is taking a knife to my feelings. Like, after my sexual assault 3 weeks ago, she said she would give me the information on a group I might want to join for queer women who have had that experience. I REALLY want that number. It's been 3 weeks and she still hasn't given me that number and she cancelled our session today. She doesn't get that it really hurts when she forgets stuff like that is important to me and that it makes me feel like I don't matter-- especially after I told her in our last session: "it feels like I don't matter."

[growlycat]

Originally Posted by scorpiosis37

While my T has been in extensive therapy herself, she seems surprisingly unaware of how I feel in therapy at times. For instance, she thought it would be nice for me to meet her daughter, by having her daughter walk in on a session we were having about how I felt as though she didn't have enough time/energy available for me (not ok!). After her daughter left and I explained how I felt, she was like "oh, I guess I do remember it bothering me when I heard my own therapist's daughter leave a voice recording during one of my sessions. That was during the days of land line answering machines and I still remember that." I wanted to say: DUH!

She just has done a lot of things recently that are kind of insensitive and poke at my trigger points, and she doesn't seem to have any clue that it feels like she is taking a knife to my feelings. Like, after my sexual assault 3 weeks ago, she said she would give me the information on a group I might want to join for queer women who have had that experience. I REALLY want that number. It's been 3 weeks and she still hasn't given me that number and she cancelled our session today. She doesn't get that it really hurts when she forgets stuff like that is important to me and that it makes me feel like I don't matter-- especially after I told her in our last session: "it feels like I don't matter."

I recently told T that I was jealous of his daughter when he described doing fun activities with her. He seemed more than a little surprised. Which surprises me.

You would think a T would be more aware than most people of these sore spots!!

[LonesomeTonight]

I said that T has a realistic grasp of how therapy affects me, but I guess I was answering for my marriage counselor rather than my T, since I just got off the phone with him. He's talked some about his own therapy, and I know he's had some personal issues he's dealt with in the past. And I think he at least to some extent gets how therapy affects me. I'm just not sure he completely understands how *he* affects me and why I want to talk to him so much and am so intensely emotional where things involving him are concerned.

With T, I think to some extent she gets it. But then sometimes, I don't know, like the other day when she asked me why saying good-bye to people was so hard for me. Shouldn't she know the answer to that? I know she was trying to get me to talk, but I thought that most people had trouble saying good-bye... I also get the sense she's someone who never faced a whole lot of difficulties in life, including emotionally, but she might just do a good job of hiding it (she's much more closed about herself than MC).

I'm quite shocked how insensitive yours (growly) and yours (scorpiosis) therapists are...

A counseling lecturer once told us that we shouldn't even put personal photos (eg of family) up in one's office because it could cause hurt to clients...I can't imagine having T's daughter walk in, describing fun activities with family...

[Cinnamon_Stick]

Yes my T does get how therapy is for me. During my session last Thursday she started tearing up and I asked her if she teared up and she said yes. She said she was imagining how it would feel to be in the amount of pain I am in. She said its a gift that we both shared the same emotion at the same time.

[stopdog]

Although she has gone through therapy herself, she really is clueless about me altogether. I gather from what she has said that I do not do it like she did.
This week was not bad as I was talking about new puppy and she does like dogs.

[stopchewinggum]

I haven't really had that discussion with t. I don't know think she gets a lot of issues though. She's "good" at getting things right, but she's not so good on dealing with them. I think she thinks I have very little emotion and takes advantage.