I canceled a session

Couples therapy last Thursday was brutal. We were scheduled again for Tuesday/tomorrow, and I called today to cancel. Just too soon. The last session left us not even on speaking terms. We are just starting to talk again. Anyone who has ever wondered about couples therapy--for me, it has been brutal at times. After the last session, I felt battered, very wounded, hurt, angry, everything. I have never felt that way in individual therapy; sure, individual has been tough and exhausting and painful before, but has never felt so, well, just plain damaging. (I wonder if it's possible to be traumatized by therapy?) I'm finding in couples, that you just don't get the same support from and connection with the therapist. I miss that level of support. Plus, sometimes T says stuff and I just want to smack him, and I feel like, "you aren't helping things at all, buddy!"

One thing that was very interesting to me in the last session (in an abstract, take one step back way) was that I felt several times like just getting up and leaving. I could visualize myself getting up and leaving the room, walking out the door, leaving my husband and therapist behind. I kept looking over at the door, distracted with my little fantasy. Why did I stay? Well, no way did I stay for my husband. I stayed for my kids and also because of my therapist and our bond. I didn't want to walk out on him, out of respect for him and the process, and also because of how much I trust him. I know I could not have stood this sort of session with just anyone in the counselor role. Without the well-established bond, I would have been gone. So now it is making more sense to me what I have been doing in individual therapy all these months: building a strong relationship with my therapist so I could tolerate couples work. I had no idea.

Ostensibly, in couples therapy, we are working on uncoupling. I hadn't really known what that meant. Now maybe I'm beginning to understand. I think part of it is to lose the emotional attachment to your spouse. Well, I'm feeling now like I never want to see him again. Is that the point? I'm so glad we're not going tomorrow.

((((Sunrise)))))

This is so painful and I am sorry for you.

Do you think this will affect your individual work with T? I hope not, as it seemd you two had a special bond. Will you have an individual session this week where you can discuss what happened and your feelings? I hope so.

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I could visualize myself getting up and leaving the room,

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Sunny, I have not even begun my couples therapy yet but have had this fantasy already! True.....

I hope things settle down a bit for you. I'm glad you canceled the session. You seem confident that you needed to.

Peace.

I did couples therapy when I was married. Although, I think it was probably pointless. I had caught my exhusband in a lie a year and half after we were married, and it was something he lied about a week before the wedding.

I just wanted to end it, but because he threatened to kill himself I went to couples counseling.

The first session, the guy actually said he didn't see an issue. The second session he asked what I thought marriage was - I said trust, sharing, building a life, etc. He asked my ex and he said "everything she said, but I should also be able to do what I want with my half of the marriage without her permission". Well the T saw the issue then!

The third and final I went in for 5 min. to explain to T in front of my ex that I was moving back home and if the ex killed himself that was his issue and not my fault. Then I left the T to deal with him.

It's tough to hear negative things and not be defensive. Sometimes the T is right and it hurts other times they are just off base.

Hope you feel stronger soon.

Tranquility

Sunrise - I'm sorry this is such a difficult time, but from your other posts I know you have a great T so hopefully you can trust him to lead you through it together.

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sunrise said:
(I wonder if it's possible to be traumatized by therapy?)

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I think the answer to this is yes. Something happened in a couples therapy session that was very tramatic for me. Many months later I'm only beginning to talk about it with T in my individual sessions, but she says that I have sort of a version of PTSD from the event.

{{{Sunrise}}}

Don't forget that any single session/action is not the whole of your therapy or relationship with either your husband or therapist. I think in your situation I would have gotten up and left rather than been distracted by staying and having the fantasy. Or, I would have shared my fantasy? If they don't know you got tired/disgusted/angry/hurt with them, how does that help the communications/relationship with your counselor or your husband?

Always being a "good girl" and saying or doing what others want or expect me to instead of exploring what I personally feel about a situation while I am in it doesn't work for me. How is cancelling your session now, with no "discussion" help you? I think walking out and getting accross that you were too tired, too hurt, too fragile, too whatever would at least have "communicated" something of what was going on when it was going on? Then you could have gone back today with a known "mission"/program :-)

((((( sunny ))))

I know nothing of coupling or uncoupling, but I hear your pain. I'm sorry it is so hard. I didn't imagine it would be so hard as you've talked about leading up to the couples therapy.

I hope your individual session goes well and helps with this.

(( hugs ))
just want you to know I care!

ECHOES

Thank you sister, tranquility, lemon, perna, and ECHOES for your comments and support.

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Do you think this will affect your individual work with T? I hope not, as it seemd you two had a special bond.

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Sister, you're right, we do have a very special bond. It is part of what is making the couples therapy possible. I don't know if what is happening will affect our individual work or not, and actually am not too concerned about that right now. Bigger fish to fry...

I do have an individual session scheduled for this week so I'll see how that goes. T and I have a strong bond so I'm not going to get worried about it breaking, I'm just going to trust in it. It's funny how all the angsting I've done in the past about my relationship with my T seems so trivial now. I feel like the bigger problems are now drawing my attention, and well they should. The bond with T will just have to do, be good enough, and I am relying without question on the trust I feel we developed in the past. If the bond breaks, it breaks. I can't stress about that. I'm busy doing the couples work. If anyone needs to worry about our bond, I'll let T have the honor.

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Sometimes the T is right and it hurts other times they are just off base.

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Thanks for that comment, tranquility. I do tend to idealize my T, so it is good to keep in mind that he doesn't always do the perfect thing in session. I'm sorry for your difficult experience in your own couples therapy.

Lemon, interesting what you wrote about trauma and couples therapy. I'm sorry for what you experienced. ((((hugs))) Somehow it strikes my funny bone that maybe in the future I'll have to have counseling to undo the trauma from couples therapy! (Not trying to make light of your past hurt, Lemon.) I guess this is what keeps therapists in business. You have one set of Ts to traumatize clients and then another set of Ts to work with clients on their therapy trauma.

Perna, I did express my anger/hurt in therapy and did communicate my feelings (ha, ha, maybe too vehemently!), so your comments on that did not fit (about being the good girl, etc.). That problem may dog some people--perhaps you've had trouble with that yourself--but it was not a part of our therapy session. We are working toward a specific goal in therapy and with my present state could not work effectively in the next session.

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How is cancelling your session now, with no "discussion" help you?

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Perna, do you mean discussion of cancelation with my husband? Actually, I did share my feelings about this with my husband, and it turned out he too was not ready to go back. (Hey, we were on the same page about something!) The session would have been counter-productive, and we don't want that. So we agreed it was best if I called to cancel. The time between sessions was just too short, only 5 days, and we were just barely starting to talk to each other again. We do have to do some work on our own--can't depend on the sessions for everything. I feel strongly that we will be ready to work again with T next week. We have to. Neither of us wants to bail on the process and stay married. For me, the processing is still going on, and things are making more and more sense with each day. There really is so much value in the time away from therapy and I want to give that time a chance to work. The saying, "most of therapy happens outside of therapy," is so true.

ECHOES, your comments are always so supportive and right on. Thank you.

Sunrise - I wasn't offended about you pointing out the humor in the situation. The primary reason I'm in individual therapy is because of what was going on in couples. Of course once I got into individual therapy I realized there were more things to work on than just what was going on in my marriage, but it is a little funny.

Even though you're going through this hard time, to me it really seems like you are actually in a good place. Very self aware that you needed more time to process the couples session and that you trust your T. Very Impressive!

I'm always disapointed in a way that so much work has to go on outside of the session. Wouldn't it be easier if I could just sit with T all day and have her help me through everything. But, you're right that's not how it works and we have to process and discover on our own so that "most of therapy happens outside of therapy,"

Lemon, thanks. I can tell you understand a lot of what I am going through from your own experience.

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it really seems like you are actually in a good place. Very self aware that you needed more time to process the couples session

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Thanks. (((hugs))) I think I am getting better and better at trusting myself to know what the right thing to do is. I listen better to those voices deep inside of me, the little doubts that I can try to squash (hey, what's going on here, why am I really feeling that way? don't brush it aside). The decision to not to do couples this week was totally the right thing. I'm so glad I listened to myself.

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I'm always disapointed in a way that so much work has to go on outside of the session. Wouldn't it be easier if I could just sit with T all day and have her help me through everything. But, you're right that's not how it works and we have to process and discover on our own so that "most of therapy happens outside of therapy,"

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Lemon, yes, I have felt this too. In my earlier days of ultra-infatuation/attachment to my T, I felt like I couldn't see him enough, wanted to see him more than once a week, obsessed about whether I could ask him for additional sessions, etc. (It's not like I'm not attached to my T anymore, but it is more of a secure, comfortable attachment now.) Anyway, I have come to see why, for me, a week between sessions can be a very good thing. It takes time to process what goes on in therapy, and I can go through a whole range of feelings, thoughts, and conclusions before coming to what seems to be a "mature" place in regard to the last session. It's like a wine must age before it is ready to be drunk. And so my "mindset" after therapy can benefit from aging a week before the next session. And it will influence what actions I take in my relationships with people, which either move me forward or set me back, and this can provide fodder for the next session. And then the cycle begins again.

Couples Therapy is one of the hardest types of therapy there is. Both people feel so unheard and unappreciated. they are hurt and want to be heard and want their point validated.

I believe my ex did get up once...I don't think I did but wanted to...