No more responding to emails: told therapist I hate her

Yesterday I had my session and for those of you who remember, my therapist had refused to answer one of my emails despite the fact I was struggling.
She ended up saying that a lack a response didn't mean a lack of empathy.

So yesterday I showed up and she immediately brought up this exchange of emails we had had. She said she had thought about it and that she had decided that she would no longer respond to any of my emails because it was creating a dependency and the image of a perfect relationship where all my needs are met. But she said that relationship doesn't exist and I have to realize it and grieve it.
She wants to teach me to still feel the connection even if she doesn't respond to my emails (she'll only answer in session).

I was so stunned and angry, I shut down and didn't say anything for the whole session while she tried to get me to talk.

Sending an email and not receving any response makes me feel more alone when I'm struggling, it's like I'm sending it into the void.

I suppose it's a new boundary she's establishing but after more than a year and a half, it's hard to adjust to this new boundary.

I was so furious that I sent her an email saying I hated her and that I hoped she wouldn't enjoy her holidays. Childish I know but I'm so hurt I couldn't help it.

Any thoughts appreciated.

Consider it a transition. Consider using email if you wish not to get response but as a way to simply vent/share what is on your mind, knowing you will bring those topics up in session to be visited and processed in session (which is probably a better way to process this kind of thing anyway).

Some people here have talked about having an ongoing weekly email that they don't send, or that they send a day or so before session as a way of communicating what they need to work on in session. Others have simply kept a therapy journal where they write down what is on their mind and bring it with them to session as points to work on when they meet with their therapist.

Your therapist is still your therapist, able to work with you and support you in session, but her message is that most things can and need to be discussed in session rather than via email, and she seems to believe you may be relying more on email and a need for quick response (and that relationship ideal that the therapist is there for you all the time rather than in session).

I know the change is difficult to accept, and I am sorry you are hurting.

My heart goes out to you. It seems your t meant to have your best interests at heart, but, I don't think she thought things through thoroughly enough. At best, she should have worked with you to ween you off the emails as opposed to just cutting you off altogether. She also should have discussed this change with you before taking it upon herself to implement it without any warning to you. Her way of handling the situation makes it very unfair.

I actually give you a cheer for sending her the note you sent her. Childish or not, that had to have felt good, right?? Good for you. I hope her holidays suck, too!

Im sorry this is happening.

My first thought is she should realize a change in a boundary surrounding established support and comfort is best done gradually. There needs to be a lot of discussion. The new boundary needs to be fully explained. You need the opportunity to ask questions and explore how you feel about it...vent, if you need to.

I would feel angry and rejected, too, over such an abrupt change without discussing it first.
"That (perfect) relationship doesn't exist and I have to realize it and grieve it." ?
Are you kidding me? How cold!

My second thought is...it sounds like she made this all your fault. She has taken no ownership in it...whether she has created this new boundary because she realized it was too much for her, or whatever. She is the one who created the e-mail boundary in the first place. She has some blame if it has gone awry, doesn't she?

I may be wrong but I find it difficult to believe she changed the boundary only because it was in your best interest.

I'm at a loss for words. I'm sorry this has happened to you. I was warned that if I sent emails and wanted or needed a response I had to explicitly state it.

Unilateral decisions by a therapist don't usually work well. Maybe, you can convince her to renegotiate the terms after the holidays.

Wow, Myrto. So sorry this happened. I know I wouldn't react well if my T suddenly decided not to reply to my emails. I would probably just say 'screw you' and never go back.

What an idiotic thing for her to do. I'm not sure I would want to work with such and incompetent therapist. I never understand why they do things like this.

That would not work for me. I do not always need a reply, but there are times when I do. That would be a deal-breaker for me. I am so sorry.

I'm so sorry this happened to you. It was really poor thinking or NO thinking through on the part of your therapist. It is really frustrating to hear about therapists who encourage/allow email and then when things reach a point where they feel overwhelmed, they blame the client for getting too dependent on needing a response and they cut off the avenue of communication in one fell swoop. What the heck happened to talking things through???? Did your therapist even consider that her comment about you getting "too dependent" on her responding and that you had expectations of a "perfect" relationship was more than a little shaming? How many of us enter therapy having trouble trusting others, find ourselves invited BY THE THERAPIST to lean a bit on them by expressing our needs and letting him/her know "how they can help" and then when we venture to do exactly that, we find the rug pulled out from under us just when we need that "leaning post" the most? I'm sorry, Myrto, I think she handled things very poorly.

I get it that a therapist's boundaries can change. All boundaries in all relationships can change--over time, they can flex or they can tighten, but no matter how they change in a therapeutic relationship it should be done only after both parties talk and discuss why the change needs to happen and how it feels to have the change happen. Therapists are suppose to be teaching us how to establish our own boundaries and how to negotiate other people's boundaries! How can that happen when they jump around and aren't consistent about their own boundaries????

I've heard on this forum how clients are encouraged to email, that the therapist wants them to email and communicate what they're feeling. This usually happens in the beginning of the therapeutic relationship when the therapist is working to draw the client closer, but then when things actually begin to heat up, some of these therapist get panicky and close things down too quickly, claiming that the client is getting too dependent. I get that clients can get overly dependent, but when the charge comes out of left field, with no discussion or attempts to work with the dependency, I say that the therapist is having a knee jerk reaction that has NOTHING to do with what's going on with the client--in other words, it's on the therapist, it's her countertransference and she hasn't worked that through for herself! What the heck is that about? Personally, I'm betting that the therapist isn't admitting that she's overwhelmed with all her clients emailing long emails that require out of session time. How hard is it to admit that? How hard is it to say, "You know what, I can't read all the emails I'm getting and respond to them like I did in the beginning. I over extended my ability to respond to everyone. I'm sorry. I made a mistake. How can you and I solve this situation. What are your suggestions, Myrto? I want to support you, but we need to figure out a way for me not to be overwhelmed and for you to feel supported." Sure you'd still be hurt, but I'd bet after a few sessions talking it through, the two of you would come up with a workable solution that works for the both of you.

From my point of view, it's your dependency on the replies that is the issue. What if she's sick? Dealing with an emergency? And you expect her to reply always? And if not, you're at risk for a crisis?

My T lets me email her as much as I want to. I can ask for a reply in the email, but that doesn't mean she will reply. And her replies tend to be the same: got your email, lets talk about it next session, everything is okay, have a great weekend. Sometimes she replies the same day. Sometimes it's several days. But her lack of response doesn't effect my situation.

Oh, forgot to add, Myrto, I wanted to tell you how much I respected your courage to actually express what you felt in the email to your therapist (Have a lousy holiday, therapist!). I'd have thought that but I wouldn't have had the guts to express it

Sometimes just letting it rip, is a wonderful release!

That's how I took her T's comments also and why I suggested perhaps transitioning to a weekly email or journal to communicate things to discuss in session. It would still give the OP an outlet for those thoughts and feelings to know they will be seen, but also create a more realistic expectation that those things generally need to be discussed in session.

Perhaps talking to the T about that kind of option and working out a plan for those times when there is a real emergency/crisis that really requires immediate intervention and feedback from the T -- how to communicate that kind of emergent situation. It would be a workable middle ground I would think.

Again, so sorry your T handled this change so badly, but it is probably something that can be talked about and worked with. It is a change, but perhaps in the long-run it will be a healthy one.

That may be true. But the T allowed this dependency to happen in the first place. T fed the OP's dependency by choosing to reply to every email.

T has every right to want to end email communication, but, for T to abruptly cut off this email support without as much as giving the OP advanced warning is what is difficult to grasp. I don't think the "quitting cold turkey" approach without a discussion about it ahead of time (at the bare minimum) is conducive to building the therapeutic relationship in the least. In fact, I find it to be more damaging than anything.

Very triggering thread....I'll try to hold back...lol
My T abruptly made big boundary changes in February/March, without ever discussing it with me at all, or even telling me she was doing it. She just let me figure it out on my own. Then it was one thing after another. Supportive touch stopped, extended hugs, disclosure, the use of the word "love" (she would sometimes sign her Emails "Love, T" and even told me she LOVED me a few times), fewer texts returned, and Emails, when responded to, were quite short, even though she kept encouraging me to Email. I was not one who constantly bugged my therapist by phone/email/text, nor was I having any major crisis every other week. After holding me when I cried, telling me she loved me, and being super supportive and present, it all stopped. No warning. No talk. Not until a few weeks later when I really started to notice that things changed and I brought it up, did she ever talk to me about it. For nine months I've been suffering still. I was so fragile, so broken, it has affected my relationships in my life, my depression has drastically increased, and my self worth gone. I had felt quite bonded to this therapist and wanted to try to work it out somehow. I figured with time, I'd feel better. I'd get better. I'd get OVER this. I'm still struggling. My T knows what this has done to me, and is very apologetic now (although at the time, she was only apologetic for how I felt, not what she did or didn't do). I've still been having a hard time with it......and have been struggling very much to try to feel that trust and connection again that I once felt with my therapist (come to find out that's why she did those things, to help me to trust her).

I have an appointment next week with a second therapist. This is a big step for me. I hope you and your therapist can work this out. Unfortunately, as much as I love my T, I'm being held back. Maybe this new T can help me move past it so I can continue working with my T, or maybe I will find this new T will be a good fit for me, and I'll just see her. Who knows. It breaks my heart to think about leaving old T, but she's right. If I can't move past this, therapy with her may not be beneficial to me.

For many people, therapy is a last resort. They are already desperate for validation and support. That needs to be handled with tact and compassion.

Taking something away suddenly because of something you've done is shaming and kind of manipulatively punitive. I know if my therapist allowed emaling and then suddenly took it away, I'd think "she just doesn't feel like answering so she's going to pretend it's therapeutic." For people with big abandonmemt issues or issues from childhood neglect, this is so painful and scary. Changing boundaries don't feel safe at all. This kind of thing sends me into obsessive panic.

I'm so sorry you had to deal with this just before XMas.

hi mytro ,
I think its your therapist way of saying that you need not to be dependent on her so much for when you are in crisis.she give you coping skills to work with in between sessions to distract you when you are in a crisis situation and you have negative thoughts affecting you ? I have coping skills that my therapist taught me when im in a crisis situation or when I have a negative thoughts affecting me . use the STOP technique when you have a impulse or negative thoughts affecting you. it works myrto .I don't call my therapist that much anymore I keep busy with my distractions and diversions.




Diagnosis: Anxiety and depression
meds : Cymbalta 60 mgs at night
Vistrail 2 25 mgs at night for insomnia with additional 25 mgs= 75 mgs at night for insomnia when up past 1:00 in the morning

How could you sit there and not talk? My fear of authority would make me capitulate within two minutes at most.

It felt REALLY good to send that email indeed! I don't regret it one bit
Thanks.

Your answer is the rational one of course and I suppose I will get used to that new boundary but right now it's hard.

I think she may have been tired of responding to me, not that I've expected a long email, a few lines sufficed. Still it was apparently too much for her.
She has said that it was wrong of her to respond at all and that she should have established that boundary from the get-go.
Thanks.

I very much doubt she'll change her mind.

I can't do that. I wish I could leave her sometimes but I can't.

Right? It's hard to not get at least an acknowledgment that she received the email. Thanks.

It is good to hear that she admitted she was at fault. That is a positive sign.

I am very sorry this happened to you. If my T did this I would feel shattered and really upset. It is not right that she changed this boundary and did not even give you the chance to tell her how you feel. She should have at the very least mentioned she wanted to do this and hear your thoughts and feelings and found a middle ground that you both could be happy with. When a therapist does this they often leave the client more damaged and trigger abandonment fears if you did not have them already. I feel for you.

I wasn't planning on commenting on this board but I just had to say that this is horrible and I'm so so sorry. That therapist had horrible boundaries. Some of that stuff could honestly get into ethical violations. Extended physical contact and telling you that she loved you, those things are not part of a therapeutic relationship. She treated you like a friend not a client. The harm it has caused you is evident. I hope that the new therapist is able to form a helping relationship with you that is appropriate and I'm glad you had the strength to find someone new.

Really? Seems to me the message is that the T is incompetent, irrational, punitive, unpredictable, lacking in self awareness, insensitive, negligent.

I am so disgusted with all these stories of T stupidity. It's always the same -- the process and T induce a certain response in the client, the T unilaterally decides that this natural response is unacceptable, then shames and punishes the client. What a biz this is. Drawing in vulnerable people and subjecting them to a pay-by-the-hour abusive relationship.

I don't think you can so easily say what is or isn't part of a therapeutic relationship. Somatic work including what would generally be termed snuggling is an integral part of my therapy ( severe childhood abuse /neglect, body dysmorphia from abuse, severe and chronic eating issues also from abuse). She tells me she loves me every time we talk. I've been with my therapist for 3 1/2 years and we have had issues but she is as honest and ethical as they come.

I dislike blanket statements about what is or isn't "therapy". Just because one therapist screws up doesn't mean every therapist who does something is bad. I agree that it takes a LOT more knowledge and care to manage a therapeutic relationship like ours but that doesn't make it inherently wrong