In Session Today : Part III

I've been seeing my T for a year now. I'm in an emotionally abusive marriage that's been escalating recently into verbal threats of killing me and physical abuse. I send him emails probably more than I should, but right now I feel very dependent and attached to him. Some of the emails that I've been sending recently have been about the threats and violence and he's said that they make him anxious because when he reads them the next morning he doesn't know if I'm ok. He thinks that I should be calling a DV hotline when these things are going on instead of emailing him. He also said he can't provide an on call service to me.

I honestly don't think that I was asking him to be on call 24/7 with me. It just makes me feel better to send an email to him when this stuff happens even if I know that he's not going to read it until the next day. He said that he wants to know what's going on and that if I want I can send a summary email before our sessions. I think I get what he's saying, but it feels like he doesn't want to be so involved in my daily drama. I'm feeling kind of abandoned right now. I want to just do what he wants me to do, but I feel better when I email him. It's like venting a release valve. But I don't want to cause him anxiety. I also don't want to tell a stranger these things, I want to tell him.

I feel like maybe I've allowed myself to become too dependent on him. I've been going twice a week, three times a week sometimes when I need it. Should I cut back to once a week and try to not depend on him for support so much? I don't know what to do. We meet again in a few hours and I don't know what to say to him. I've felt my depression spiraling down since we had this conversation yesterday. I don't want to make him feel bad or make him think I'm trying to manipulate him, but I'm really wondering what the point of anything is today. My husband always tells me I'm a fool if I think any of these therapists care about me. I had started to think he did really care because he says he does, but now I don't know. I'm just so depressed and confused right now.

Cutting down is hard but it helps. I go weekly but for a while I did 2x a week and it only made my attachment worse. Cutting down is tough many times, you get the major emotions hitting you but it gets easier.

I remember the one time I went two days in a row, second session was my worst ever. Felt like "too much" so I space it out now when I go 2x.

I worry my T will be like yours with the call the crisis line thing if I ever am in a crisis. I get you though, I'd never stalk him or overdo it, I just like knowing, he is there.

NP -I'm sorry you are in a most difficult family situation.

I think the only way it will get better for you and your relationship with your therapist is to remove yourself physically from the violence in the home. I am pretty sure your therapist has told you this if you are being open with him as you are in this post. I certainly understand any therapist reluctance to receive these emails on a daily bases whether he reads them or not. And, I am not one to cut a therapist any slack when it comes to the amount of emails a client sends. In some US states he is obligated to report physical domestic abuse. Until you are physically safe it doesn't matter how many times you see your therapist or don't see him — you are in serious danger. If you have children they are in harms way. I urge you to contact a domestic violence organization and get the hell out!

If you stay in your family situation then I think what your therapist has offered you is a good deal in comparison to other email take-aways that other posters have had to deal with. But, I truly hope you find an immediate way out.

NP, I hope you do continue to talk with your T. I suspect he cares very much and wants to help you and recommended the DV hotline because in this situation, they can provide more immediate, specific, and helpful support. He can provide ongoing support, but when someone is making threats on your life and abusing you, you need crisis intervention thata DV hotline can help you coordinate. They can help you safety plan, assess the escalating abuse, and document what is going on.

I guess I'm not viewing the emails I send to him as a crisis intervention. I just want him to know what's going on when it happens and how I'm feeling about it. It can feel kind of lonely when this stuff happens. I get what he and you guys are saying though about calling the DV hotline. I think when I'm in the situation, I'm not seeing the danger clearly and they can help me with that in the moment. He's been extremely verbally abusive for a long time, but the threats have only started recently. He got mad at me on Monday and attacked me physically by kicking me and threatening me with a lit cigarette. That's the first time something like that happened. I guess I see why my email about it at 1 in the morning made him anxious. But at the same time, me emailing him provided me with some sense of connection even though I knew he wouldn't read it until the next day. I don't know if that makes any sense or not.

i get that, i do it often myself. my T is ok with it. he tells me he does not look at them on weekends but often i write them on fridays anyway. usually he responds at some point or he uses it to talk about in next session, it does make me feel connected and i like that.

Oh, yeah, it 100% makes sense. And if I were living through my trauma again, I would want to be connecting with my T very frequently through it, too.

Perhaps you and your T can work out a situation that helps you feel connected and makes him feel like your current needs are being better addressed. Maybe you can call a hotline from his office to get you connected with one, or he can find you additional services through a shelter program--not to replace him, but to supplement what he is doing.

I am sorry you are going through this. Your safety and mental health are paramount.

The other thing is that I sometimes send him emails when I can't stop crying, again because it makes me feel better. Occasionally I have asked him to please send me a kind word when I'm feeling particularly alone. I'm afraid he's taking those emails away from me as well. One of the things he said yesterday was that he doesn't want me to get hurt if he doesn't respond. I get that, and I have been hurt before, but I get over it. I feel like the benefit to me of sending the emails outweighs the risk of me being hurt. But I'm hesitant to tell him any of this. I don't want to seem like I'm begging for this contact with him. I have no idea what I'm going to say to him today.

NP, my opinion is I think your therapist is suggesting these things because he DOES care about you. He also knows his limits as a therapist and that he can't actually fix this situation in terms of what's going on in your household, or keep you physically safe, so he's trying to direct you to those who can to help you to be safe.
I do understand the feelings of rejection or feeling like you are too much for your T. I have sometimes had those kinds of feelings too. But I don't think it's the case here. In fact it's a sign that you have both a caring and a realistic and competent therapist, because he is aware of what he can help with but also of where his limits are.

Where do I begin? The lights were off which was nice, considering if it's a little darker than noonday outside she turns her overheads on because she can't see peoples facial movements well enough (her words, not mine). We talked about my new clothes (part of therapy to stop dressing like it's winter and hiding my body). She could tell I was overly nervous because of the previous days events. She leaned forward on the chair, was speaking in this odd volume that after 3 years of being with her I've never heard. It was a calming, quiet, but stern and 'this is important so listen to me' type of voice. I can still hear it.

We talked about it. We talked about how I have a dark side that I keep hidden. It's my secret. We talked about how it would calm me. She understood but that it isn't healthy, it's the calm before doing something stupid. (again, her words). Giving it space, allowing those ideas to live, and have grow is dangerous. That I can't have secrets if I want to be healthy, they cannot exist together in therapy.

We openly talked about my dark side and why I hide it, she said, "in this room - you cannot be **good ellah** all the time, you don't need to hide that side from me. I can handle it, yes it's hard for me to see you that way but it's my job."

I was crying the entire time. She said she wasn't there to shame me or guilt me or make me feel bad about all of the thoughts and what I've done, she's there to help me learn how to handle them. That she wasn't ready to have an with my crazy *** family all together in one room. That lightened the room a little.

I asked her if she was mad at me for keeping from her what I did. She said it didn't matter if she was upset about it or not. It's me that needs to work through it, her feelings do not matter. So that leads me to believe she was upset over it. Which I guess I don't blame her.

It was a weird session but I felt loved, held, understood, and heard. I texted her later and told her I wouldn't keep anything from her. Whether I knew the words or not. She gave me a close hug and told me that she'd , and told me not to do something stupid without calling her first.

There was more to the session, but that's all I can verbalize/remember.

On Thursday, we discussed the email issue again and he reiterated that he wants to know what's going on, but just to archive it and send it all at once.

Then Thursday night happened. My husband was acting angry and unstable. He threatened to set the house on fire, something he's done many times before. But this time he actually did it. He lit a fire in our thankfully uncarpeted living room floor. I freaked out. I called 911 and told them my husband had started a fire in our house so a swat team showed up. He put the fire out, apparently by dumping a whole bottle of laundry detergent on it, but then barricaded himself in our house for 6 hours. Our neighbors were forced to leave their homes. The whole block was cordoned off. They finally busted our door down and got him out. He's in jail right now. I was allowed back in the house around 4 am.

Somehow, the night of the incident I kept it pretty well put together. But after I came home, I fell asleep for an hour. My alarm woke me at 6 am and it all hit me at once what had just happened and I had a major panic attack. I really wanted to talk to my therapist at that point, but he's off on Friday, and we had just had this conversation about how he can't be on call for me and the email stuff I talked about in this thread previously. I called him and left a very teary, panicky voice mail and sent him an email with links to the news coverage of this stuff. I ended up calling a crisis line and the woman helped me calm down a bit. He called me back about half an hour later and we spoke for 7 minutes. He probably thought I was ok because at that point I wasn't crying or panicking. He offered to call me again on Sunday if I needed it.

I had several more panic attacks yesterday. Once because there was a news van outside my house and I started to feel like a prisoner in my own home. I called his voice mail again just so I could hear his voice during the panic attack and left a message saying I just wanted to hear his voice. Later that day I sent another email to him because I was having another panic attack and just needed to let him know what I was thinking and feeling at that moment. I hope he's not angry because I'm abusing the email. I am not really doing well at all. I called the crisis line again last night, but it almost seems like if you're not actively suicidal they just want to get you off the phone. I would give almost anything if I could just sit down and talk face to face with him today, but I know that can't happen. I am a complete mess today and I don't know how I'm going to get through this weekend without him. We have an appointment for Monday already.

NP complete, this sounds horrific. But you're doing so well. I think you should keep posting here, watch a film, take a bath ... sorry if these sound like stupid ideas, but do whatever you need to do to make it through to Monday.
At the point at which your H has set your house on fire and been arrested, I think in the long term you are going to need to seek support and advice from people who specialise in domestic violence. Maybe you can discuss that again with T at some point. But no need to worry about it right now.

Wishing you all the best.

At my t's urging I started attending a DV therapy group several months ago. I am so grateful for that because yesterday three of the women showed up at my house and spent hours arranging to get my front door fixed, taking pictures of the damage, cleaning up some of the mess in the living room and hauling the trash away. And of course letting me talk. I think I would have spent the day curled up in a ball without them.

How awful, NP. I'm glad you're safe and that your H is in jail. I'm also glad T called you back and was able to talk to you for a bit. Hang in there and stay safe...

MC today. Brief small talk about H's sore neck muscles. I thanked MC again for calling me and said it had really helped. And that I'd filled in H on what we'd discussed. MC said he was glad it had helped.

We talked briefly about how last session had gone. MC explained, as he had on the call, how he was trying to just focus on H's emotional state and thoughts that session. And he said this session we could continue with that, or move over to me. MC asked H if he had any more to talk about, and H said he didn't really. I told him that if he had more to say, it was OK, to not hold back on my account. He said he didn't and said how I'd commented at home how I wanted to continue some of the discussion but didn't say what about.

I said it was mainly about how H said he felt like he had to take D so many places, and felt put out when I asked him to take her to someplace I normally take her to. So we discussed that a bit, including me saying how I'm basically on call all night and have to get up with her early in the morning, despite not being a morning person. H started saying something else, and MC said he wanted him to acknowledge what I had just said, and he did. Came to a bit of an understanding on all that, I think.

Last session came up again, and I said how I'd felt really bad afterward...that I'd felt hopeless. MC repeated, "Hopeless?" with a concerned look on his face. I said yeah, that's just how I felt immediately afterward. H looked concerned, too. I said it felt like both H and MC, who I see as a male authority figure, were both being critical of me. And it was just sort of echoing all the negative stuff that was already in my own head. MC seemed surprised by this (probably because I didn't mention it in the call). I said it was like how T will say, how I can go from 0 to 60 in emotions.

I said that MC's call had really helped take me out of the spiral. He was like, "Good--wait, I mean of course I don't think it's good that you were in that place to begin with. I don't want to imply that. Just good that I was able to help."

Then, noticing the awkward silence in the room, I was like, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have shared that." MC was like, "Of course, you're not allowed to share big emotions in therapy!" Which did make me laugh. I said it was more that I didn't want H to feel bad, to feel like he couldn't be honest with me about his feelings because he'd worry how I'd react. H said it was OK.

Talked more about how H had said last time that sometimes it seemed like I wasn't listening to him, that I didn't care. And discussed some other ways to handle that, like if he sits down and just starts talking while I'm in the middle of something, it's OK if I say, "Wait, can you give me a minute?"

I said I knew T's probably roll their eyes at pop psychology, but that someone on here had mentioned the Love Languages book, so I read it. MC shrugged, like he didn't mind. Then we ended up joking about T's writing self-help books, because I'd forgotten he'd co-authored one.

I tried to explain it to H, saying what I thought each of our love languages were--words of affirmation for me, acts of service for H--and how maybe we just aren't communicating love/affection in the right way for the other person. H seemed a bit doubtful--maybe I need to let him read the book. We did end up talking about the importance of affirming a partner's efforts, like thanking them or even just acknowledging them for doing dishes, taking out trash, running an errand, etc.

MC said how he'd spent part of the weekend weeding, to which I said, "Good times!" He said it's not a fun task, and that if afterward, someone had commented to him how nice it looked, it would have meant a lot to him. (Of course, that made me think it would have been something his wife might have said, so I felt a twinge of sadness for him, even though I'm sure he hadn't intended that by making the remark--I know, the perils of knowing about a T's personal life...)

MC said we had to wrap up soon, which didn't surprise me--we went over by like 10 minutes last week (plus he called me, though i don't think he'd count that), so I figured we'd have to end on time today. He asked how this session had felt, and I said it felt OK, certainly better than last week, but that wasn't saying much. H agreed. I said I hoped I hadn't messed things up, if MC had been planning to run this session like the last one, and he said I hadn't.

I was like, "Hey, I didn't use up your tissues this week!" And MC replied, "Well, you haven't left the office yet!" since we still had to confirm next week's schedule. Which made us all laugh and joke around. Did scheduling, then usual handshake/"take care" exit.

It turns out R’s question last week was pretty important, as it re-emerged today. Am I holding back because I am worried about taking her on this journey with me? Today’s answer was influenced by where we are in the work and the imminent break. I held back some purely because I did not want to go into a three week break mildly unhinged.

I think we did good work today because I acknowledged that I feel anger towards these people, even though I don’t have it in me to get properly angry. I think this was the point where R mentioned the possibility of imagining talking to an empty chair, rather than directing it at her. I’m intrigued, but not sure whether that would allow me the release I need.


R acknowledged that I almost changed the subject at around the same time as I started down the path of ‘They ****ing knew what they were doing!’ I got beyond ‘We nearly lost her three times in the ambulance’ too. (Clutching my pebble, and willing myself to ‘Just say it, dammit!’ inwardly)

Now that is out in the open, talking about the next bit ought to be easy by comparison. Thankfully, I was able to psych myself up to ask for the note (with the phrase 'I'm with you') before she left. She said she felt ‘honoured’ that the phrase is symbolic to me, and she also observed that I had found it difficult to ask! Worlds away from P.


She urged me to look after myself during the break, and expressed a heartfelt desire that I get some sleep, and ‘perhaps some easing somewhere’ in the meantime. I feel comforted going into the break, in as much as R has said that she does not want to save me. We will meet again on the 24th of August.

Session with potential new T yesterday who's a psychoanalyst.

She was kind and thoughtful -- nothing spectacular (or terrible).

But, for the first time and among all the therapists I've seen, I had a visceral sense that she could take whatever I dished out and I wouldn't need to take care of her. And, that nothing about me -- even in the most literal sense -- would be truly foreign to her. Not that she'd have perfect understanding or attunement but more that she'd be curious and make a good faith effort to understand with kindness (rather than distance herself from it).

I can't figure out if all that -- stuff I feel is missing with current T -- is enough to make the switch and get over the loss of my connection to current T.

Ex-Echos M had a similar struggle when she was trying to adapt to her new (not new now) therapist. Although I think the dynamics with her old T were unhealthy in different ways than yours, she had a hard time with the meh feelings of the new therapist despite the fact that he had all the qualities that made him a good therapist (stable, secure, insightful, etc.). For a long while, it seemed, the new one just lacked the emotional charge of the old one, but she went with her gut to stay with the new one and it has really paid off. If she's around, maybe she can explain it better.

Sometimes, issues with therapists that mirror family dynamics cannot be worked out with that very therapist. If yours is that reactive, it's like you are forever locked in the same dysfunctional bond as what you have with your mother. I'd say something differently if she had managed to steady herself better, but it sounds like she's still bouncing around emotionally?

Hah! I was thinking of EM's situation too although yeah, it's different.

The part I'm also really struggling with is whether I'm asking for way too much from a therapist -- current T has bent over backwards and then some for me. So, even if she's said all of the stuff she's said (like I'm reaming her out; overwhelming her; attacking her; etc), if actions are to count more than words, that should mean something -- except I feel like I've worn her down to a point where she'll do anything to appease me. So, I've started putting boundaries (like I refused phone sessions over her vacation; refused to schedule a session when she said she'd have to adjust something with her kid although she said she was totally willing etc) -- I was telling this other T about it and she asked "Well, who is taking care of who now?".

It all feels like such a mess -- current T will of course say that she's resilient and was just having an authentic response to my crap and so I shouldn't assume that she's lost the plot internally. But, I just can't tell any more.

Btw, thank you

AY - Words, and the effect they have on their audience, are actions too. Just a thought.

Eta: if someone acts like they love you but never actually says so, that's when actions matter louder than words. Not when the words are hurtful. Imo.

Sniff. You explained it perfectly. (or I'm sure that's what Echos would say, wherever she is ).

That's a really good point about who is taking care of whom. Can you take a break from the current one and test out the new one for a month or so to see if you get any clarity?

fwiw, if guilt is playing into this at all, it might be worth it just to let the current one know that it would be a successful therapy experience to leave without guilt about her feelings. It could be a winning feeling to do that without having to send her checks or be dutiful to her by remaining a client. Just guessing...

I have been in a strange, lost place, dealing with incredible fatigue. Last week, I could not keep my eyes open, so my therapist suggested taking a short nap, and that she would sit with me (not next to me, just sit in her chair and not get up to do other work). I ended up doing that, more or less, but at some point asked if she could just talk while I closed my eyes. So that's how most of my session went and it was kind of amazing to realize that I could feel that safe there (or anywhere, really, other than alone at home). It was a turning point for me in therapy, I think.

So today I brought a CD that I found in my shed over the weekend. It had a melodic chant that my old yoga teacher used to play, and it's immediately calming for me. It's about 8 minutes long, but worth it to share in session. So we both listened to it at the beginning of the session and it set a nice tone for the rest. She loved it as much as I do and even took a pic of the cover to look up later.

I am still in a strange place, but the depression has dissipated for the most part, I think. So that's good.

eta: oh, and she said if I can go 6 months without a speeding ticket after session, we will celebrate with ice cream. But to do that, I need to be more grounded when I get in the car after session.

Trigger warning for content....

Because of the recent craziness in my life, I'm seeing my T 4 times this week. I spent the first session just relating the events of that night.

We spent some time today starting to deal with my feelings surrounding what's been going on and discussing how I'm going to deal with the rest of the week and the near future. I told him that I wish my husband had just killed me because I don't want to deal with any of this right now. I heard him sigh. I have no idea what that sigh means. Is he frustrated with me? Does he think I'm just attention seeking? Sometimes I wish I could look at him so I could see his facial expressions. I just want him to know that I'm so overwhelmed right now. I told him that I'm scared he is going to abandon me and I feel so ridiculously stupid admitting that to him, like I'm a scared child. I don't know why all the abandonment fears have come rushing to the foreground right now, but they have.