Dear Client

dont be difficult today

T

Hoped ---
Dear E,
Yes, I felt motherly towards you on Monday. I loved fulfilling that role for you and helping you feel attended to. Yes, I could tell you were feeling little. I am glad we both shared the experience. I felt close to you, as well. I am glad you had fun and laughed. I had fun too. It would have been ok to ask for a hug, I would have given you one. I would have held your hand too. It's ok to pretend, to want, and to experience these things.

You can bring the cars back anytime. Once I move to my own office, I will gladly house the cars as long as you want them to stay with me.

Dr. S

PS, no it is not wrong to let yourself feel little or to feel these things.

I'll do a hoped one too!

Dear Art,

I'm looking forward to seeing you this evening so we can continue what we talked about Saturday. And you can do a sand tray while we talk, if you want. Do you still want to do one together? I haven't forgotten, but I probably won't bring it up.

Warmly,
T

I keep reading these as you and your t will be doing a sand dance together! Dont mind me!

Well maybe the little figures we place in the sand will dance.

You and your sand dancing..... haha

(What she may be thinking)
Dear Jersey,
We met for the first time tonight. Thank goodness our sessions will be bi-weekly and not weekly. Your going to make me earn every penny aren't you?

Dear T,
Damn straight. I'm gonna call you on all your crap. Last T was 8 years of practice. I got it down now.

I want to do a hoped one too!
Annie,
I have really enjoyed getting closer with you these last few months. I keep hoping you will let down your guard and let me in, because I really want to know you better. I want to be important to you. You matter to me and mean so much to me.
T
P.S. I saw you at the basketball game... I wanted to wave but I was too shy!

What I hope she'll say:

Quiet Mind,

You're not too much or a burden. It's sad you've so many experiences with that from other people. Remember what I've said on how I check in periodically to read your messages, because I don't get notifications? They aren't just piling up unread. I won't give something which I'll grow to resent later and take away.

I look forward to our sessions. I know you work hard in them. I wish I could see you once a fortnight like we've agreed - sorry about the system being overloaded. I hope you understand needing to prioritize various patients equally - so many of you who are working want that slot.

There's no maximum number of sessions for you to keep seeing me. I hear and see how you only feel functional at work and that's all the doctors care about. I care about you holistically and I hear and see your pain. Your worth is not determined by your functioning or contribution to the economy. I want to tell you what are the good qualities I see in you.

Don't keep calling me Dr C, we've been through this so many times: Call me C.

- C (with it underlined twice)

Dear client,

Shut up.

-T (no she didn't really say this).

Dear Chasse,
You're stronger than you think.
T

What I worry -

MBM, you really ARE too much. I know you were telling me before, but that was before the last month happened and I've found out all this other stuff. I know I said I'd stick around, but I'm sorry. It would really be best if we parted ways here. Please don't come here again. It would be inappropriate since we won't be meeting in the future.

T

What I hope -

MBM,

I read the notes [about one of our sessions] file that you sent me. I'll tell you again, I'm not going anywhere. It wasn't too much. Yes, I did read the whole thing and am still saying that. I think it will make you worry less if you did indeed send one of the 8-page versions, not because I want to see more to feel justified in telling you to leave but because then you can see that even the most won't make me leave. The 8-page version doesn't ruffle me either.

I hope you can believe me. I know you are scared that the past will happen again. All I can do is show you every session that I'm still here.

T

Dear Art:

I meant it when I said thank you for emailing the picture you drew last night. It is gratifying for me as a t when you do something I suggest as "homework" even if i don't call it such. Seeing the drawing made your dream more alive for me. You had some really good thoughts about it, too. I really enjoy working with you, btw if you don't already know that. But I also understand your thoughts about ending. As i said last evening, it is up to you. What you want.

Warmly,
T

Dear ATAT,

I am very happy to be getting rid of you. I didn't know how to handle a client like you and that made me feel insecure. Plus people who are smarter than me make me feel inferior. Or who don't let me slide on stuff but call me on it.

I pity your next therapist. But let someone else deal with the damage I did, just like your ex-therapists and ex-psychiatrist did. Pay it forward.

DBC

Dear ATAT,

Despite the fact that I have mentioned that I think you have two mental disorders/conditions that are usually rooted in or caused by childhood abuse or neglect, it was too early in our work together for me to say that childhood abuse and neglect are in your background. It wasn't too early for me to say you had these conditions, though.

Mere mortals cannot understand the ways of the therapist.

DBC

Dear LT,

What do you want from me? (Well, besides for me to somehow be your father. Or husband. Or friend.) It was the end of the session. Maybe we ended a couple minutes early--I'm pretty sure I wasn't a full 20 minutes late. But really? To complain about a few minutes when I talked to you on the phone--free of charge--for 20 minutes last week? And read your e-mail? And yet another e-mail today?

You might think you weren't trying to avoid the topic of your needs, but I see right through you. Though, I guess I should commend you for at least making an effort to not make it all about you for once. I mean, God, you even managed to make my wife's illness and then death all about you....

I know I promised never to abandon you or unilaterally terminate. I don't want to hurt you that way. I do care about you. But you're taking way too much of my time and emotional energy. I guess in some ways that makes you "special," a special PITA! No, I don't really mean that.

Maybe I'm subconsciously trying to push you away. Maybe I can't deal with how much you seem to care about me. It's so much easier when patients don't give a ****.

I don't know what to do with you, LT. I just don't.

--MC

Dear atat's DBC:

"mere mortals cannot understand the ways of the therapist"?
Have you seen your analyst lately?!

Art's t

Annie,
I'm really dreading our session in three days. You're just going to come in and we're going to have the same conversation that we've had in every other session. You're going to come back and say my coping strategies didn't work, you still have anxiety. And then I will give you new coping strategies. Then you will "promise" to try them but I know you'll be back in two weeks saying they didn't work.
I can tell you don't want to get better. You're just a stubborn SOB. Why do you even bother coming?

Quiet Mind,

You're not my family or my colleague or my friend and can't you see that's a good thing? I have to hide my irritation and make this "therapeutic". You must be such a pain outside sessions, especially how often you message me.

Hi captgut!
See you in an hour (although i don't want to)

Please, be more talktative!! I'm afraid I'll fall asleep...

Dear Inmydreams
Its gonna get better .......

Was nice to see you!
But
You were not talkative again, arrrrrgh!
You annoy me

Dear Brazen,

It is fun to play with you. I like to see you smile and hear you laugh. I'm sorry I don't always understand you. I am really trying to. Help me understand you better. You matter to me.

Dear Art:

What the hell?!

T

Dear CC,

I don't know what to say to you. Maybe you could stop dancing around the issue. I don't want to turn you off but I'm afraid I will.

Hi P -
So you're really going to file the ethics complaint? I will be with you all the way. It's going to get bad, but I'll be right here. I can't say it in session, because, you know, boundaries and all that ****, but I do think this is the only way you can move on. You have to kill the last shreds of hope for that relationship. And then you will truly be in pain. But at least it will be a pain that can heal. Like cutting out a cancer. If you leave it in, you will surely die.

'The queen of diamonds let you down
She was just an empty fable
The queen of hearts you say you never met
Your twisted fate has found you out
And it' fin'lly turned the tables
Stole your dreams and paid you with regret'

See you tomorrow.
-K