T on Monday, crisis today

ok, today is the last day i see him before he has a mini-vacation due to the long weekend. He does pain management work at a clinic and he is there two days a week...meaning next week there is only one day that he is in the office and he is booked with his regular thursday people. Phooey. i accused him of not thinking i was important enough to have booked me. i am so mature right?

i am going to tackle the connection again with him today. But i just can't talk in person about certain things yet so i am going to write him a short letter today before i go, and ask him to read it after. i want him to leave me a voicemail telling me what he thinks so that i don't spend a week and a half climbing the walls waiting.

this is going to be hard. i NEED tenderness from him...openly. How do i say that? i cannot say those exact words... i can't... if i could i'd be further along than i am... but i have that need now.

My life situation is about to change drastically - again... so more crisis management work. Yay. i can't do anything about the constant upheaval in my life. Wish i could, but that is one reason i am in therapy at all... because i can't seem to do the things i need to smooth out my path.

i have realistic expectations i think... i mean, i don't expect him to rock me to sleep or anything, and i don't want to crawl in his lap. i just want him to lean forward and talk gently to me when i relate something casually that should be painful... i want him to react to bland recitation of painful events the same way he would if i told him those things through a stream of tears. i do things the way i do b/c of a lack of tenderness and care for my feelings over the years... how can i change if the environment still reflects what i already know? I mean, isn't the point of therapy to have a place where the environment is NOT what you have experienced or am i wrong?

> i am going to write him a short letter today before i go, and ask him to read it after.

great idea :-)

> this is going to be hard. i NEED tenderness from him...openly. How do i say that? i cannot say those exact words... i can't... if i could i'd be further along than i am... but i have that need now.

yes. i understand. i've seen many therapists where precisely that came up as an issue. i... couldn't ask for it. i just couldn't :-(

> i just want him to lean forward and talk gently to me when i relate something casually that should be painful... i want him to react to bland recitation of painful events the same way he would if i told him those things through a stream of tears. i do things the way i do b/c of a lack of tenderness and care for my feelings over the years... how can i change if the environment still reflects what i already know? I mean, isn't the point of therapy to have a place where the environment is NOT what you have experienced or am i wrong?

no, you are right.

i found an article on how what helps one move through trauma... is experiencing those feelings that hurt so much in the past (and repeatedly plague one) AT THE VERY SAME TIME as getting different inputs now. in particular... that t is there and that t cares and t's empathy and warmth etc etc. you might be able to find the article if you google "trauma pages". i can't remember which article it was though... try van der kolk (or similar).

you could ask him if he has heard of the notion of a 'holding environment'. or... empathetic attunement. or... mirroring self-object function.

i'm just thinking of ways that he might be able to relate. after i did DBT i was all 'acceptance acceptance acceptance' but this other stuff seems remarkably similar to me...

(okay getting back to work now)

;-)

thanks alex. It's reaffirming. i will look up those ideas and i will ask. When i began therapy with him.. or rather while i was shopping for a new T, i asked him some things i felt difficult. i asked directly if he was willing to be flexible with his approach and if he was willing to deal with past issues. i asked directly about whether it would be we or just he who would determine the length and speed. i wrote him several letters early on in which i did my best to give him as much information as possible about my pitfalls and defenses... and about how obstinate i would prove to be. i told him i needed to be allowed to need him.

i'm not sure how to word this letter for today, thankfully i have all afternoon. On one hand i am angry and frustrated that he hasn't yet given me what i need despite my efforts, on the other i am wanting to express a need in a positive way... an emotional plea.

it is tremendously helpful to use this place as a practice environment.

it went better than i could have hoped. It was an extremely difficult session, i was exhausted by the end. He was very receptive although he intially thought i wanted to stop therapy altogether. i think this is going to work out really well.