ive been having a hard time. and yesterday my t on the way out turned to me and said i care about you. but the wierd thing is that she was so close, i was like confused. like are you going to hug me, am I supposed to, of course i want to, but i've been in therapy for 2 years and shes never hugged me, so i dont know if its off limits. it was so wierd. I really needed a hug but i dunno. i dont hug people often unless they initiate. would you guys initiate? should you wait to see if its okay?

I've just point blank asked if it's ok to hug. Since then, we've hugged every session. She usually comes to hug me first since we know it's ok between both of us. She may not want to initiate if she doesn't know you're reaction.

[MissCharlotte]

I can't imagine hugging my T, but he's a guy and it would be awkward and I'm not yet at that point with him.

Hmmmm, maybe eventually though. I think you should ask next time.

[sidony]

I would never initiate. But if my therapist suddenly wanted to hug me, I'd sure want to. I love him, he's awesome. Once he said to me something like "I feel like I want to hug you right now," but I was never sure if it was an invitation or not, so naturally I just talked (asked him why he suddenly felt that way, etc.)

Sidony

[DePressMe]

I have had the same feeling—been close to hugging, but never done it with my new therapist. I have with my old therapists. I think I am still getting to know my new therapist and it may happen in time. I see myself eventually asking for a hug on my way out the door and being happy when I leave the office. It’s a tough thing to judge…and I agree, just asking may be a good idea.

[LittleMouse]

I would just ask my therapist if a hug would be appropriate. I would say the I would like a hug somtimes and do you feel comfortable with that. I hug my therapist everytime we end a session. He is male and I am female but we both feel comfortable with it and have discussed it and feel its OK. It's a nice way to end our sessions together and a great way to say good buy until the next time.

[asylumgardens]

The first time I ever saw a therapist.. I went in on a crisis, and he hugged me in the end. I guess that skews my views because I don't see anything wrong with hugging at all.

[WinterRose]

a hug would be nice sometimes - I don't think I could be brave enough to initiate, maybe not even brave enough to ask - but if they initiated or mentioned something then I might ask

[Grace03]

Hi Esthervirtue!

Re: Hugging

My GP has been my lifeboat for 3 1/2 years. He keeps me on track..and is just an amazing, caring person.

When I reached Bipolar2 stability (abt a month ago now) as I was leaving his office I asked him "May I hug you?" He opened up his arms to me & said "Yes...it's allowed" Well I felt so incredibly good during & afterwards because I believe it was genuine caring on both our parts. As I hugged him I said "Thank you". I have wanted to hug him for so long-but I knew he would never initiate.
It was a good day!

[Hopefull]

My T has offered a hug twice. The second time was similar to your situation. I was leaving and she just stopped me and offered a hug. I wasn't real comfortable with it and I hugged her with one arm. She realized that she had made me uncomfortable and mentioned it in the next session. My guess is you can either initiate by asking or hint that you feel like you need a hug. T would probably offer one then. However, I think the initiation is better because it might give you a chance to practice assertiveness. I have major trouble asking for anything from T. So, I keep thinking about asking for something just to test the new behavior of asking for what I need from T. If you look at it that way, even a "no" response can be okey. But, I suspect your T will go for it if you express your desire for a hug.

[Perna]

When we terminated the first time after 9 years my T, as I was leaving the last session, put her hand on my shoulder and squeezed. I didn't wash that shoulder for years LOL :-) But we never hugged and I guess I would have found it awkward as she was so much "smaller" than I am. I think in our cases it is just as hard for the T to initiate the hug since we probably give off "unsure" vibes :-) and they don't want to be rejected either or make things worse by "misreading" us.

If my T got that close, I would probably die.

No... not a good idea.

I wouldn't ask for a hug. I don't think I would ever want to hug him.

Maybe your T was trying to make that type of intimate contact that T's so often do, without touching?

Like how one time my T leaned real forward in his chair, and made intense eye contact and told me something that of course I forgot because I was so intent on him leaning forward.

Good thing he didn't fall off the chair.

How do you feel about your T standing so close? I know you said confused... of course.... I'd feel confused in the moment, too... but now how do you feel, since you've had a bit of time to process it?

[sunrise]

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esthersvirtue said:
i dont hug people often unless they initiate. would you guys initiate?

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EV, no, I would not initiate. But it sounds to me like maybe you want to? I'm kinda shy that way, plus I like my T too much to just hug him outright, if that makes sense. He has reached out to put his arm around my shoulder a couple of times and given me a kind of sideways squeeze as I walk out the door. Usually this is after a particularly rough session, and he usually accompanies it with "good job today" or something like that. This little gesture gives me extra support. I really appreciate it. Like pink's T, mine does this move in his chair where he gets really close to me and stares right at me, inches away. I like that too.

Sometimes recently, I pause near the door on my way out and he is standing next to his desk and we are kind of close, like closer than normal. I am invading his personal space a bit, if you know what I mean. I like to do that to compare the discrepancy in our heights. He is a lot taller than I am and I like to stand close to him with him towering above me (his tallness is not apparent like this when we are sitting down). I know the reason I like to do this and it is because my husband is not tall. He is only about 2-3 inches taller than I am and I like the contrast of T being really tall. I don't get that much and it's a nice feeling.

[lauren_helene]

I also would never initiate a hug with my therapist. I would be fine with it.

I'm Italian all we do is hug. Actually, it feels weird not to for me. We've been together over a year and I have shared some unbelievable stuff.

So why not...