Just listened to a voicemail my ex-therapist left...

It might be that she doesn't have it all together.
Engaged after 4 months of dating
Unable to be truthful with a client
Needing to justify by lying when she really just wants/needs a day off
Not being in control enough of her stuff to plan for reasonable days off to take care of herself
Unprofessional when a client terminates
Unable to own her own stuff when a client terminates
Egotistic enough to think that she gets an opinion about whether or not/how you terminate
Thinking she knows better than you what is best for you

Hope this isn't too harsh.

No, not at all. I thank you. Too often, I put the women I am attached to, up on a pedestal. I need to hear the other side of it, to balance it.

I went to make a payment on an online portal that she has set-up for clients (I still owe her money) and she deleted my profile. Ugh. I should have requested that she leave it open, costs me less to make a payment there (not having to get a money order and then mail it priority, w/a tracking number)...

She knows you owe her money so she should have left it open for you. That's just immature and unprofessional. I would deduct the cost of your money orders and mailings from each payment. Seriously.

It is unfathomable an adult would use the same "my grandmother died" lie that high school kids try out when they didn't do their English paper or bio lab. That your therapist did that to her own longterm patient is so unethical and hurtful I don't see what you could do with the knowledge but end the relationship.

This might be a controversial view, but I don't believe that many therapists believe they owe patients any literal truth about their lives, and I am not really sure what I think, if they do or not intellectually. They do give the metaphorical truth about who they are by the stances and perceptions they share with us about ourselves, but they are often really paranoid about intrusions into personal details to the point they have really no problem telling flat-out literal lies. I have trust in who my therapist is at the core, but I am well aware he has lied by omission and lied effortlessly about facts several times. It creates a very weird experience from my chair, in which a larger trust battles with this sense of being manipulated ( for my own good??).

I could see if maybe , as an alternative theory, your therapist had a huge fight with her boyfriend about working too many hours, about if she cared more about her patients than him or something. It might not be about you being too much, or about the texture of your sessions, but could be about her and the boyfriend or whatever. The fact though is that in that case, she wouldn't see a problem with feeding you a lie, since the lie was about her and not mirroring yourself back to you. I hope that makes sense.

If she lied to you in order to avoid you, she is the worst therapist ever. I rather suspect she lied to you and got busted, bc of some other reason in her life about her, and now she is cornered.

There is a Vietnam writer named Tim O'Brien who plays around with the idea of the Story Truth versus the Happening Truth( the facts), and how creating a frame for the story to feel true to the reader is more important than telling the truth. I believe many therapists, especially those trained to establish and maintain a one-way frame, even if softened with some personal disclosure, feel perfectly justified in doing the same- they don't feel they owe clients any truth factually about who they are and what they do or why.

I am just curious. When you miss this therapist, what isit that you miss about her or your interactions?

It's like a miss her companionship. She was right what I needed when I needed it the most. She was like a friend and she admitted if I wasn't her client, we'd prob be friends, but our dynamic blurred boundaries and made things confusing. I was leaving my husband, transitioning my sexuality, going through all of these things all at once and she didn't judge me. I could feel it. And she made me laugh and smile during a crisis. I guess I miss her companionship.

It got rough at the end. I feel like she bailed when things got tough and that she used my feelings of loyalty against me (not intentionally).

I guess I miss the way things were. We had hit an impasse and when I told her I was ready for her to dig deeper and "trigger" some of my attachment trauma, she refused. Our next session was supposed to be about my treatment plan, but really we didn't talk about that at all...we pointed the finger at the other and I sat there and allowed her to be harsh with me because I didn't want to act out.

I miss the potential of a friendship that could never be and I know I'm not looking at this in its entirety.

Well, then it's not so much the therapist that you miss, but other things that existed more in your fantasy?

Also, it sounds like whatever happened with/around her, it did trigger your attachment difficulties? It's so sad that this happens in many therapies and then the Ts don't know how to deal with it, or make it even more destructive. I hope you will find someone who will be more responsible/helpful. Or perhaps just try to work on the attachment stuff in everyday reality, with good friends that you trust and you could talk with them about these things directly?

Thank you for your kind advice. I know you're right, I'm just struggling at the moment and attempting to ground myself. Difficult now that I have to detach.