What am I supposed to make of this????

I had my session on Friday with my T, it was so disconnected, I have never seen him like that. The first 30 minutes he kept asking me over and over again what I was feeling, why I was feeling this way, how do I stop feeling this way! When I feel this way is it better to self medicate?? Then asked if I would of been better off never disclosing?? Would it of been better if I just had shock therapy to forget??? At this point I felt like I was being interrogated, and told him he was being sarcastic!!!! He said he wasn't trying to be, well I felt like the abuser!! Then he went into hypnosis to connect with the inner child, but it was rushed....he didn't do the relaxation before, didn't bring me around after.........I cried during hypnosis, and when it was over, he talked about things, and then the session was done!!!
I left feeling worse then when I went in!!! After calming down, I emailed him and told him that I felt incredible sadness after that session, from the hypnosis, he rushed me through trying to get me to talk and hold the scared little girl, who wants nothing to do with me right now!!! Then I asked him what was up with the million questions on my feelings, and if he didn't believe me about the abuse anymore????????? I am so confused....hurt.........feeling like our trust was broken!!

He emailed me back tonight, apologizing for the session going so wrong, he does believe me, but right now he is feeling overworked, and may not respond to any emails or anything right away!! He is the one who wanted me to do the email, for communication!!!

I emailed him back, told him the hypnosis helped me see her more clearly, which it did, but she is angry and isn't going to talk to me. I told him I was sorry for him feeling over worked and to try and relax and get some rest. I also told him that maybe we should not have a session this week, that there was no connection at all this past session and maybe he needs a break from me for now!! Right now I don't want to go to Wednesday's session, and even if he emails back and says everything is fine, I am going to cancel!!!! I really feel like I am the bad guy in all this........

((((confused4ever))))

I'm sorry you had such a difficult session. Your post resonated with me. When I have a disconnected session and T seems far away, it's more than annoying, it flat out pisses me off! Sometimes I have also felt that T is moving too fast in session. In fact, it just so happens that during our last session I told him that sometimes I need him to slow down, that I may be processing things more slowly than he realizes. He understood that and appreciated that i told him.

I have also had sessions where I left feeling worse than I went in, sometimes because some deep hurt was stirred up. On those days I often have to talk to T later on to help me process the session. In either scenario, T needed to know how I was feeling. If this happens, and he isn't available to you, you must feel very frustrated.

As much as we want to believe our T's are superheros, they are human like us. Could it be that T was trying to communicate with you why he may not be able to respond to your emails right away, maybe so you don't worry if he doesn't get right back to you? (Of course I would worry immediately)

However, you are not the bad guy . There is no bad guy here. Just two people, talking and healing.

So, do you think it might be helpful to use the next session just to talk about the process? To air your feelings about "the bad guy"? Rather than cancel, use this time for you to let T know what has been happening for you. You deserve to be able to do this and you might be surprised by T's response.

Take gentle care and be good to yourself.

You are not the bad guy.

Like Sister said, I have also had session in which I feel so disconnected and end up walking out of the session feeling worse than when I came in.

I would always assume that the disconnection was my fault since I am the patient and he is the therapist.

So how could he do anything wrong?

Until one time when he took full responsibility for the session being disconnected. It was very surprising and I found myself sort saying things like, "No... It couldn't be you. It was because of me."

Not true... sometimes it can be the T. Your T has already admitted to you that he is overworked. And he apologized. Now please realize that I'm not saying this to suggest you should dismiss what happened... I'm saying it to help you realize that you are not the bad guy here. If perhaps his is a bit burnt out and this is affecting his work.... well, of course this is not a good thing, but.... T's are human (sort of) and this sort of thing can happen... I urge you not to cancel your next session, rather go ahead in and try to work this out with him.

I have had sessions, too, where my T keeps firing questions at me. They are a rarity, as normally he is fairly quiet in allowing things to naturally come out... I had to tell him to shut up, lol, because it was making me so mad.

Take care.

Thanks, I think I get what you guys are saying, it is hard to not take the blame in this last session. I just felt like he was firing all these questions at me, and he was doubting me. He said in the email, he is trying to understand how I feel. I know this is not his area, I feel almost like he doesn't know what to do with me, he doesn't work with sexual abuse survivors. He is learning as we go, but he told me months ago, before I disclosed, because he was urging me to disclose that he was with me until the end!! I don't feel like that is what he wants anymore, part of me wants to just say,FINE.......I will find someone else, but I don't want to lose him. I trust him! I know he can help me, but I am a difficult patient............I know that.........so all night I tried to think of how I can overcome this barrier of not showing my emotions to him, not talking to him at times, and not beating on myself anymore........I just cannot think of anything!!!!!!!!!!!! All this is just added stress right now!! I will think about keeping my appt and talking to him about what happened and what I felt...........and why he acted like he did with the million questions, and when I couldn't find the words he was short with me!!

Who knows whats going on in his life right now! I agree it's best to go to the next sessions and talk it through. Do you think he needs to know that you trust him and you want to stay with him? Maybe he's feeling a little insecure/unsure of himself as you're his first CSA survivor. I'm not really sure how much one should support one's therapist, but they are only human.

You don't want to be hiding emotions etc from him, that's not what therapy's about and I don't think you should blame any of this on yourself.

He knows I trust him, I tell him that all the time. Feeling alot of rejection right now!! I know he is only human, but I can't help feeling this way! Part of me was hoping he would call or email today, but nothing.......so I feel rejected right now, then I feel guilty for feeling this way if he is feeling overwhelmed!!!!!!! I hate feelings, and emotions!!!

confused4ever, that sounds like a really difficult session. Too much, too soon. Do you think because your T put you under hypnosis that you became unable to tell him to "stop, you're going too fast"? Maybe you need to be more conscious when you try to access your inner child so that you have more control? There are quite a few techniques for accessing your inner child that do not involve hypnosis. Could your therapist work with these techniques?

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He emailed me back tonight, apologizing for the session going so wrong, he does believe me

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confused, that seems like an interesting comment to me. Why wouldn't your therapist believe you? Has he doubted your feelings and experiences of therapy in the past?

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I just felt like he was firing all these questions at me, and he was doubting me.

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Why would he doubt you? He thinks you are not being honest? I think it would be good to talk with him about how you feel he doubts your words and doesn't believe you. It is hard to have a trusting relationship with a therapist who doesn't trust you.

I am sorry about the email thing. Your T may have had every intention of encouraging your emails and responding to them when he invited you to email him. But then he got busier, or maybe he told all his clients that and his email box is busting full. I think he was being honest to tell you he couldn't get back to you right away. It will help you to clarify this policy with him.

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Right now I don't want to go to Wednesday's session, and even if he emails back and says everything is fine, I am going to cancel!!!!

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What I'm going to say is different from what others here have recommended. Sometimes when we have a really, really strong feeling about something, it is best to go with our gut. If you are not ready for another session so soon, skip a week. You are not bailing out of therapy or anything, just need a little more time to recover and process. It's OK. You can return the following week. I went through something similar once, when I was doing couples therapy with my husband. One week was just not enough time following a really intense session. It helped to not push things and give ourselves a few more days before seeing T again.

I don't know, I do know that when I was under and he was telling me to hold the little girl and hug her, she was turning away and I was pushing away from the hypnosis, that was when I started crying. In hypnosis you are able to make your own choice, he is guiding me, but if it doesn't feel right you do not have to continue with it, that is what I think happened, he was pushing to fast and I pushed away from him.

I do trust my T, and he has always trusted and believed in me, just this past session with the questions being fired at me for 30 minutes, I felt like I was being backed into a corner or something, it didn't feel good at all!!!

I am pretty good at reading body language, something I had to learn as a child to survive, I should of guessed it was going to be a out of the twighlight zone session when he came in to the office, he sat down and was fidgeting, playing with his cell phone case, and a rubber band, dropped all the papers from my file on the floor.....it was just wierd, like he wasn't really there with me!

I emailed him that night after the session and told him how I felt, and asked him what was up with the 30 minutes of drilling me on my feelings, and talking about shock treatment and so on, I asked him if he was not believing in me anymore, he emailed me back saying NO, he is just trying to understand what is going on inside of me!!

Maybe it is all me, maybe I am so terrified to start this inner child work, that I am on the defense. I do know that I have to help my inner child, I just don't know how to do that!

not sure it is worth going on with any of this!!!

Confused, I think you might be on the brink of a good breakthrough? It took me 5-6 years to realize that when my T asked me questions it made me anxious because my stepmother was constantly asking me questions (that I couldn't answer -- "Why did you do that?" sorts of questions) and so ANY questions (even my T's when she was exploring, trying to understand me better) felt like an assault; I could not yet differentiate between "types" of questions and why they were being asked and lumped them all together as if the other person was always trying to get information to use against me.

It's a catch-22, T's can't help if we don't talk to them, tell them about ourselves, but then if they ask questions to make sure they understand, we feel under attack.

That is how I felt exactly!!! I didn't get what he was doing, and felt under attack!! Now I am not sure it even matters, I don't think I can go see him right now. He has hurt me, and even if he didn't mean to, he has..........

Confused .... first of all, I'd like to say I am sorry that you had such a weird session with your t. I know there are some days when I go into therapy, I really need my t to be there with me 100%, and it sounds as if your t had his mind elsewhere during that session.

But like others have said before me, this is not necessarily your fault. Your t admitted afterwards that he was overworked, and whether we like it or not, our ts are regular human beings who have their off days. Hopefully most ts can be on their game more times than not - if not, then its time to get a new t - but when my own t has been acting weird with me, we've talked about it, and she has taken responsibility for it if it really was something to do with her, or we've discussed what could be triggering me if she thinks that the 'weird' feeling about the session was more about something inside my own head.

Maybe all those questions your t was asking you was just his way of trying to do his best for you in your session, but because he was really tired and overworked, all those questions came out the wrong way and like he was attacking you, rather than his genuine attempt to understand you better. I've noticed that my own t tends to resort to asking me some unusual questions about the same sorts of topics whenever she seems very tired and not mentally 'with me' - thankfully that has only happened three times in almost 4 years, but it was extremely hurtful every time it happened.

But the thing is - if you've got a good relationship with your t, you two CAN work through this. Good on you for emailing your t straight away and addressing this issue and telling him how it made you feel, and hopefully when you see your t next, you can talk about it some more and he can take responsibility for his contribution to that session.

I have confidence that you can work this out with your t. Good luck with it