feeling weird and disconnected

i am not a morning person. i'm a aim to arrive at work in time for morning tea (10.30) and miss it almost every time (11.00) kinda person. my peak working hours are between 6pm and 2am - though if i pull one of those i'm likely to get up around 12 i'm also a 10 hour sleeper for preference.

i see my therapist at 8am on fridays. that involves my getting up around 5.30-6am. i'm often unable to get to sleep until 12 or 2am the night before. the session goes okay (i feel awake). after the session... I feel so tired... so tired... i think a couple hours sleep will help me out so i go back to bed (around 10.30 or 11. sleep and sleep... sometimes i drag myself out of bed for drinks after work (around 5). sometimes... i feel too tired for that and i sleep the day and the night.

i kinda did that yesterday. briefly cleared out my old room and went to visit friend at hospital (so got up for a couple hours). then back to sleep. slept today too. it is 5pm and i've only just made some food and turned on the tv. haven't even had a shower yet. need to pull some work tonight...

i feel weird. haven't felt this way for a long time. i do some sleeping to be sure. i also do a lot of... being caught. traumatic feelings. feeling them... feeling them... trying to imagine t lying next to me. holding me. trying to imagine me figuring out how to entwine myself around him so he can hold me because this damned body is too big.

what does this mean?

is it good because it means stuff is coming up? does that mean i'm taking risks with him and doing the work etc. does it mean that i'm pushing too hard? maybe i should not allow myself to sleep. i don't think it really is about my needing sleep... its about me needing time to feel the trauma feelings...

i don't know...

i said a couple things that made him startle slightly last time. one of them was about my feeling anger. i said i'd never really felt anger at my dad. that i guess i couldn't feel anger at him 'cause then he would reject me for sure. he said 'how do you know this? do you feel it now?' and i was like... 'no, but it makes sense'. the other was... i said that the only time i ever got to spend alone with my dad was when i went outside with him so he could have a cigarette. i said that is probably why i smoke.

i didn't really feel anything... just... well... i felt pain. i felt pain when i was saying how my father chooses my stepmother over me. that he has made his choice and there is nothing i can do about it. i felt pain. aside from that just a whole heap of numbness.

see him on friday...

then don't see him the following week 'cause i have conference.
then don't see him the week after that 'cause he is taking a week off again.

i feel so disconnected. so abandoned. so alone. i need to see him more. i need more of him. he isn't enough. he isn't enough.

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alexandra_k said:
i feel so disconnected. so abandoned. so alone. i need to see him more. i need more of him. he isn't enough. he isn't enough.

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Do you share this with him?

Could you change your appointment time and what could that potentially do for you?

You were plenty angry when your T was out with the new baby....with a transference it seemed of historic feelings for your father...of anger. I think the anger is within you...perhaps afraid to come out as it is so large. I could be wrong.

no, i don't share that with him. maybe i should... i don't know. i sent him all these poems i wrote last year. some of them were about my attachment to my father. i can't find much on 'attachment to father' online. i guess i always thought that i simply attached to my father instead of attaching to my mother. i said something to my t to that effect once and he said that i would have attached to her initially but maybe turned to him later. maybe. whatever. can't find much on that online, though.

(aside of course from 'electra complex' which is rather old now and has been subject to much critique... maybe it has been replaced by something but i can't get the search terms to find it...?)

poems kind of start with my dad leaving. the pain. being in hospital. where i am now. don't know what there is to say about them. i guess that it has only been fairly recently that he has started to understand my attachment to my father, though. my father never sexually abused me or anything like that. he was just kinda... aloof... distant... avoidant... dissociative, maybe.

can't change the appt time. we are meant to see each other every friday at 8 and then every second tuesday at 1. tuesdays run a bit differently because i have a seminar i need to get to afterwards. that pulls me out of the sleepyness thing. i feel kinda gyped though cause i don't feel like i get the chance to process the session properly. maybe that is best, though. i don't know. kinda want to savour them. remember them. try and imprint them in memory somehow.

anger... was i angry about his time off? i don't remember. faintly remember the hurt... the pain... don't remember anger... maybe i should check the archives...

thank you.

I remember your having a plethora of emotions. Sad, anger, questioning why and questioning trust and feelings of abandonment. WTF kind of emotions.... but you were the one feeling them. That is what I perceived your experience to be and more I am sure.

I think you have a right to express your thoughts and your feelings of need. It is difficult particularly at this time for these needs / desires to be met but they certainly are worthy of exploring....putting out there. They are part of you.

hey. i did an archive search... yeah... angry... i remember it a little... but i don't remember it episodically... can't access the feeling.

angry...

i don't feel angry at him :-(
feel sad
feel hurt
feel needy
feel a bit grizzly... like something is a bit wrong.
feel... confused
want to placate him
soothe him
if i can make him feel good then maybe he won't leave me
maybe he will care about me
maybe he will want to see me
maybe he will bond to me

:-(

:-(

:-(

but...

its not allowed.

What is not allowed?

What about wanting him to placate YOU? Try THAT one on for size.

i'm not allowed to comfort him.
and he's not allowed to hold me.
and i'm not allowed to ask him.
even touch. that's not allowed.
i understand why...
not about my dad...
though i would have done anything for him
he never did anything inappropriate with me
he was just distant. aloof. avoidant.
but then there were others
and i would have done anything for them
anything to keep them around
well... not quite anything
but almost anything
more than i should have done
so now i feel...
sometimes i feel...
sexual attraction.
i know that it is about wanting them to stick around really
but it feels like sexual longing sometimes.
of course behind those longings are other longings
more innocent longings more childlike longings
to be held
to be rocked
to be soothed
trouble is that the other ones have become kinda intertwined with them
so the innocent ones need to be carefully guarded against
because of the not so innocent ones.

i've read a bit about that.
it is a hard topic.

i read something about how... even if a young kid approaches an adult for sexual contact... it is the adults responsibility to not do that. i read something about how... it kinda does come up with young kids at some point. they try all the rest of the boundaries and i guess trying physical boundaries is part of that. but like how they have to learn not to pull hair or bite or not to touch themselves in intimate places in public they also need to learn not to touch others in intimate places either.

ugh.

anyhow...

i guess that comes back to the notion that having the feelings is probably normal. the issue is that they are not to be acted on. i need to be responsible for making sure that i don't act on them. and... t needs to be responsible for making sure that he doesn't act on them. theoretically... it is supposed to be okay for me to express longings because he is meant to be the adult. but my history means... he can't be trusted. nope. can't be trusted. because i can't trust myself. if i thought it would mean he wouldn't abandon me (as i do) then i would feel powerless if he were to express willingness.

ugh.

rationally... i understand.
emotionally... damn it is hard.

i wondered whether i had projected onto my dad. i thought he was helpless and needed defending but maybe what happened was that i was projecting my feelings of helplessness onto my dad. maybe he didn't feel helpless after all.

or maybe i tried to defend and soothe him 'cause i thought that if i did that then he would reciprocate. he never did though. i do feel kinda betrayed, i guess. i guess that means that i did expect him to help me. i thought if i was good oh so good oh so really really good then he would take me away from my mother so she couldn't hurt me anymore. but he didn't.

:-(

i thought if i was responsive to his emotional needs then he would bond with me
that he would love me like i loved him
that he would need me like i needed him
that he wouldn't leave me like i wouldn't leave him

but it didn't work. you can't make someone love you. he left me. he left me. he walked away. he can't even look outside his own circle of pain to acknowledge me at all.

"you can't make someone love you. he left me. he left me. he walked away. he can't even look outside his own circle of pain to acknowledge me at all."

Alex, i'm sorry that you're hurting so much.......xoxox pat

Erotic countertransference: Hazards, challenges and therapeutic potentials

Jarl Jørstad, M.D.

The views on countertransference in psychoanalytic theory and practice have undergone a change within the last fifty years. From being considered an impediment to analysis, countertransference is today looked upon as an important potential for a tentative understanding of what is unconsciously communicated from the analysand to the analyst. This implies that the analyst is susceptible to the unconscious interaction in the transference and the countertransference, and that he/she becomes conscious as quickly as possible of what is taking place. This applies especially to erotic feelings which are often intensified in analyses with patients with a serious psychopathology, as well as in analyses with patients in regressive phases where projective identification is the dominant factor used as a defence and a communication. Opinions differ as regards the question of how to deal with such a situation, especially whether it is right to be candid about the analyst's countertransference feelings towards the analysand, something most would caution against. In an example from an analysis, the analyst describes how he was influenced by an unconscious erotic countertransference. After three years of therapy with a patient with a serious psychopathology, he developed “motherly” feelings, which he interpreted as reflecting a child's longing for closeness and physical contact. The result was that a few times, he “forgot” to indicate the end of the session, which was then prolonged, and also that he embraced her on several occasions before she left the session. One year later, he had intense sexual fantasies and dreams about the analysand, which he experienced as both enticing and alarming, and as an impediment to the analysis. He soon became aware of the element of projective identification in the interaction, and by interpreting the analysand's unconscious communication, he regained his ability to maintain an analytic attitude and clear boundaries.

http://www.pep-web.org/document.php?id=spr.025.0117a

(the following might trigger)

http://www.chironcentre.freeserve.co...ticdesire.html

hmm... not sure what i think about that one...

can anyone say 'projection'?

groan.

still... projection aside... interesting to think about. found myself cringing at times... but... i think there is a lot to that.

hmm.

it is a hard topic, i guess. i have trouble getting the distinction between experiencing urges / desires and acting on urges / desires. i don't have very good self control. i worry that to feel something will fairly inevitably result in my doing it. i felt like my mother controlled me a lot when i was a kid. i felt like she had the power to induce emotions in me and get me acting them out... i feel like when i experience an intense emotion that often i am compelled to induce them in another and have them acting out... i feel like my feelings are dangerous. dangerous.

in therapy... sometimes the emotional connection is longed for and welcomed. mostly... i kind of avert part of myself, however. don't look. at the beginning i sat very rigidly forwards with my arms on my legs. an attempt to resolve myself to connect. i started to find my arms were so resolutely pressed into my legs that they would go numb and fall asleep. now i sit back. but once again it is fairly resolute. sometimes i fold my legs. connection is hard. feels like there is something dangerous about it. connection feels hard.

i worry that it will be overwhelming. that i'll possess him somehow and he will act out and that that will be my fault.

:-(

i'm scared.

embodiment is hard

:-(

i don't trust him. i don't trust that he will be strong enough to resist my emotions if they get projected onto him (as they inevitably will if i allow myself to feel them). i feel bad for characterising him as weak... but really... it isn't just about my weakness... it is about my mothers immense strength. the immense strength and power and seductiveness of her / my emotions that invade others and get them acting out. i guess i should tell him this, huh. but to do so... risks connection... dammit... need to take the opportunities to communicate with him via email and phone (he said we could do that a bit since he is taking a week off and i'm off next week with conference). easier to talk about it when embodiment isn't an issue. i don't think my mothers / my feelings are all that powerful to control someone for a long period of time... just a few hours to a few days... a few minutes sometimes... just while the emotion lasts...

little me. they were too strong for little me. but he isn't little me and i'm bigger than i used to be too. hard so hard. so hard.

:-(

okay so i know this thread is getting long... and i know that sometimes people just have no idea what to say... and that is okay. i mean really, that is okay.

but... uh... doesn't anybody else have this kind of issue coming up for them in therapy?

if not then that is okay. i mean different things come up for different people at different times and so on and so forth. maybe this is a hard topic too. makes people feel squeemish or something... but... uh... i'd be interested to know if anyone else can relate...

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alexandra_k said:
but... uh... doesn't anybody else have this kind of issue coming up for them in therapy?

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Alex, is the issue you mean erotic transference? This thread is so rich with ideas, I'm not sure which issue you mean. I'm curious about what you mean when you wrote:

"i don't trust him. i don't trust that he will be strong enough to resist my emotions if they get projected onto him "

What do you mean, "resist"? What would his resistance look like? What would his giving in look like? Do you think he should resist or give in? I don't understand the scenario--can you explain?

Sometimes when my T feels something strongly in session, he really struggles to contain the countertransference (of the non-erotic variety) and he will acknowledge it outloud, and I think that helps him. It's like it disarms the power of the countertransference to speak its name. For example, he will say something like, "I'm struggling right now to keep this about you and not react based on similar episodes in my own past, even though I feel very strongly about what you have just said. This is about you and how you will deal with this, not about how I might feel or what I might do. What are you feeling right now?" Or something like that. It redirects the therapy to me, but also helps me feel not so alone, because he has acknowledged I am affecting him. It makes me feel really close, strengthens our bond. He holds himself back to let it be about me, but gives me the gift of knowing that I have affected him.

So I wouldn't say my T was "giving in" when he experiences countertransference. But he resists in a gentle and human way, acknowledging the countertransference instead of sweeping it under the rug. His acknowledgement reminds me that this is my therapy, and he is here with me, but it is not about him, no matter how much he empathises.

> Alex, is the issue you mean erotic transference?

I'm not sure

> What do you mean, "resist"? What would his resistance look like?

Uh. It is hard to explain. I guess...
When I was little I felt like my mother could induce feelings in me. She could make me feel a certain way. I felt like... She could control me with her emotions. That when they were in me then I was forced to act a certain way. So... If she induced anger in me then I would do bad stuff. So... I had to not feel anything.

I worry that I'm just like her in the sense that if I feel something then I'll induce that feeling in others and then they will act on them. That their actions will be my fault cause my feelings were controlling them. Anger, erotic desires, despair, whatever. Any intensely felt emotion. Especially t 'cause he is sitting there trying to pick up on the faintest of signs from me as to what I'm feeling. He is so receptive to my feelings so I have to take extra special care to not feel intense emotion. Or... He might wake up shaking his head going 'what on earth have I just done!!!' and then he will need to terminate me. Make sense?

That is good how your t is up-front about his counter-transference. Really good. It is nice to know that one affects them (sucks to feel ineffectual, huh). But it is also nice that he is able to appreciate that he is experiencing counter-transference such that he is able to step back from what he is experiencing and refocus on what is going on for you. Nice that he isn't forced to act them out. Kind of making a mental note for him to think about what the counter-transference response means both with respect to you and with respect to him later. Can take time for t to sort that out just like how it can take time for us to sort out our transference responses from our responses to the therapist as an individual in the present. Your t sounds really great with that.

I think my t will be too but I guess I don't know... He seems to be encouraging me to feel anger. He doesn't seem afraid of anger. I have expressed a little rage (briefly) and I didn't see him cringe or anything. Need to be careful with erotic feelings, though, cause they can be the sticking point for many a therapist. Result in untimely termination etc etc etc. Little gentle disclosures and assessments...

The way that you described your mother putting her emotions in you is similar to what my pdoc recently described as the transference though I am not making him act in any way. I am making him feel what i feel in this way. After I leave, that leaves him he says. Sounds exhausting. Also, explains his frustration with me... Interesting.

i think it is called projective identification.
when one projects emotions onto another that is 'projection'
when they identify (experience and act consistently) with what is projected it is called 'projective identification'.

it is meant to be a kind of 'primative' defence mechanism.

sometimes it feels like experiencing an emotion (and expressing it) is like throwing something that shouldn't be caught. it kinda comes at them suddenly though and the reflexive response is to catch.

i worry about my t catching some of my emotions. yeah, i figure that they probably go away after i leave... but i don't want him to feel anxious about spending time with me :-( and i don't want to 'trick' him into doing something / reacting in a way that he regrets.

probably i need to trust him more. i guess this kinda trust takes time 'cause i need to see how much he can cope. there are a lot of people who can't cope so i need to gently test the waters. it is hard though :-(