How did you talk to Therapist about Transference and Attachment

Hello everyone. I have been struggling with transference for more than a year and have developed a deep attachment to my female therapist, who is just a bit older than me, up to the point where i think about her everyday and she is slowly becoming the most important person in my life. And it is distracting, it is interfering with the therapy process and my daily life.

For you who are interested and who want to understand me better, i made a post a few weeks ago, where i elaborated the deeply pain that i am feeling due to this attachment, and thankfully, so many of you responded and helped me. If you are interested in the "backstory" of what i am going through, you can find it here, i would really appreciate it if you would read it: https://forums.psychcentral.com/psyc...e-therapy.html

I would be interested, if anyone could share their own experiences of how you brought up the topic of transference, the attachment, the longing and yearning for the only person (in my case anyway) who truly makes me happy, to your own therapist. What was the outcome? How did you approach this issue? How did your therapist respond?
I plan to make it my main priority this year, to overcome the pain that i am feeling, due to this deep attachment. I am not asking to tell me everything. Therapy is a very intimate experience after all. I would be very thankful if anyone could share something about those sessions, something to help me to find the courage and the right words, to tell her how i really feel after all this time.

I did never mention the word "attachment". Also, to me the attachment is not unhealthy or painful, nor inferring with my life. So I'm not sure whether you're happy with my response. But I can tell you my experience anyways.

I had to work in a different city for three months. At first I thought that meant I couldn't see my T at all during that time. Which to me was the scariest thought in the world. And I let him know that I was scared of that.

During these sessions, he reassured me that he would not leave, that we could have a phone call every week and tried to give me hope that I could make it through.

Then, I started working and realized that I would get a bunch of days off. All of which I used to go to sessions in person. Which meant traveling for over 2 hours.

A friend of mine mentioned that he thinks I "depend" on my therapist, which made me very insecure about the whole thing, so I brought that up. Actually, my T said something along the lines of "does it make you feel safe that you can see me from time to time?" and I replied "yes, but apparently that's not good either". He asked a few questions about that, including "who said that" because I think he noticed that I would never start thinking like that on my own.

Overall, what came from that conversation was that he told me that as long as I felt okay about it, as long as I was happy, felt it helped me come to sessions, everything was fine. He also told me that he thought about the fact that I was coming to sessions a whole lot more than initially discussed (during these three months) and about whether he should allow that. And he came to the conclusion that it would work to not allow it if somebody was more or less stable, but not if someone was as scared as I am of being abandoned.

He mentioned that at some point during my time with him, I will start feeling like I don't need him as much anymore. Like I could go on vacation for two months and never have any contact and then come back and have more sessions, and that would be fine. But he also said that I am nowhere near that stage, and forcing me to be at that stage without actually wanting it would only harm me.

We have, on multiple occasions, also talked about me missing him, seeing him as the only person I trust in life, or similar things.

Overall, I have very positive experience with bringing such stuff up. I always just straight out say what's bothering me. And he always accepts whatever I say, and tries to help me to the best of his abilities.

He never made me feel like being attached is something weird or something that should not happen. He actually encourages me to be attached (in a non-dependent way) to him.

I think if I at some point felt that the attachment was hurting me too much, like you mentioned, I would just go in and say "I think I become too attached to you, XYZ happens and I can't deal with it well." Knowing his style, he would explore with me what exactly was causing me to feel that way, and then we would plan together what we change about sessions or outside contact such that I feel better.

As for transference, this would probably come later, when I feel that the plan is more or less working, then we would explore whether I feel the same way with other people, where it might come from and so on.

Getting attached to your therapist is something that happens to a lot of people in therapy. Therefore, therapists are probably quite used to talking about it. There's nothing wrong about it, and talking about it will most probably help.

This is the main topic for me at the moment.
I'm also struggling and I know that it's an important thing to discuss and to work on.
But... it's so haaaaard!!!
For me, it's generally difficult to admit that I need something from someone, or that I can miss someone (especially it's not easy when it concerns the therapeutic relationship).
Well... it's easier when I have to write about this anonymously or write in my journal. But when I sit in front of my T. I just can't say how attached I am, or how often I think about her, how much I'd like to know her better etc.
I feel this inside, but outside I'm more like "blah, I don't care, when there are holidays I don't think about therapy at all".

But you know what? I'm sure that my T knows this (because it's veeery common). And she often asks - "do you feel angry that we have no session next week?", or once she said that "it seems to be hard for you to admit that you like our session that you think about me, that you're attached". Of course, then I joked that "me? attached? no way!". But somehow she knows the truth.

And still, even if I know that it's normal, that many of us feel this and T's use to this as well - I'm just not able to discuss this on the session :-/

But also my last two sessions were about this topic, and I felt sooo uncomfortable! But I want to (and I have to) continue. However, I have no idea how I will do this and survive I guess I'll try to take small steps.

I just said in an email once that I felt bad that I had bonded with him and I hope he was not mad at me, he took that as attachment and we discussed it.... things are crap now but until I ruined this all on Friday, it was great

My t and I just talked about my maternal transference stuff Thursday evening. It's been a common theme. I actually had called her a couple days previously and told her on the phone it was happening again and that I needed to talk about it (easier to bring it up on the phone for me cuz she's not looking at me!) So when I got there Thursday we just dived right into it. I told her i had realized she had triggered it and how she had and she said she could see how that could happen and we talked about me sitting with it, holding it, myself. Talking about it with her seems to take the pressure off somehow well until it gets activated again. I wish you all the best. Therapy is hard work.

I too think about my therapist every day and have become very attached so I really appreciate what you are going through. I have read your backstory and we have a lot of similarities. At times it can feel overwhelming and also distracts me from things going on in my everyday life. I find myself thinking about therapy, my therapist or myself in therapy at least 90% of the time and it bothers me as not only is it all-encompassing and I have other things I should be thinking of but I feel that I have become self-obsessed which I don't think I was before therapy begun. I try to tell myself that right now this is what I need to concentrate on myself more at least temporarily in order to get to where I want to be although not entirely sure where that is. I'm hoping that with time or maybe even when therapy ends that it will all begin to ease off a bit and my focus will begin to balance out onto other areas of my life.

I bring up the yearning, love and longing feelings I have every few sessions when they become too overwhelming to ignore although we don't ever really mention the word transference or attachment itself. At times the feelings can be so so painful that it feels almost like my heart is breaking. It's difficult to explain to someone who has never experienced it but from reading your post it sounds like you have had a similar experience. I find it really helps to bring the them out into the open and even helps to lessen them somewhat. My T has always responded with great empathy and understanding though, which is a huge part of being able to speak about it in a safe and reassuring environment. He tells me that I won't feel like this forever and it will eventually lessen but I don't see how. I am trying to trust in what he says and really hoping he is speaking from experience but that is very difficult too.

Speaking about it has greatly helped and IMO an important part of the process. It can be scary and often it is difficult to find the words but you can do it. If you have a good therapist she will be able to take all that you have to say and not let it affect her or your relationship. Maybe it might be helpful to start by telling her that you find it difficult to talk about the feelings you have for her but that you want to explore them more. Some people suggest if you have difficulty saying what you want that it can be helpful to write it down on paper and hand it to your T in the session.

I, too, have an attachment to my therapist. I need her so much. I so scared of o bring this up with her because I fear her rejecting me or telling me that it is unhealthy or telling me that she will not see me as much. I am terrified about this. I want to tell her, but find it so difficult. How do you start a conversation like this? Should I start with stating my fears or should I keep that to myself? What are the right words to use?

I have spoke about attachment and she knows i am attached to her, I struggle with holidays and have a push and pull kind of thing going on sometimes.
I really think if you feel this way the best thing is to be as open as you can be, from what she said it's a common subject and nothing to feel ashamed about, I think in my case it has taught me quite a lot about myself and also highlighted maybe some things I'm lacking in the real word and actually probably quite need!
Before we talked a bit about this, I would always be worrying if I told her things, attachment bring one of them she would leave, but I don't know I suppose my trust in her grew to the point I could just be open and honest about it. So far she hasn't disappointed me and actually I feel that I'm almost comfortable with having these feelings, which has in turn maybe helped with intensity of them!
I think that if you have a good, solid T, which I'm assuming many of you do in the first place to have grown the fondness towards them. They will be able to support and guide you with it, reassure you and help you work through some of the issues that arise with it!
It's a scary thing to put yourself out there this way, but it definitely helps ease the burden with it. Good luck to you!

I have mentioned it. I wrote it down for her and told her I loved and needed her. She was sweet about it, hut we sisnt talk about it for long. I know where she wants me to go, and when I mwntioned later that my inner child would jot listen to me but only to her, she said we would change that.
I am okay with this atm because I have understood where this comes from and why I feel this way, but I fely much better after I had told her.
I'm not sure if ill bring it up again... I might, depending on how I feel.

Im just kinda direct about it, and since im not great at talking about emitions, I usually write it down for her. I have used the wird attachment, but we never used the word transference, if that matters...

I wrote mine a huge letter and my day of the appointment do discuss it I froze in the waiting room and he had to come out and unfreeze me.

I developed feelings of emotional dependency, obsession, longing, desire for one therapist. Eventually i just told her (though I did not mention the obsession). She handled it ok in some respects, but didn't matter. It was an absolute train wreck, because the whole thing was dysfunctional to the core. There was nothing to be gained from such bizarre, one-way, purchased pseudo-intimacy. I could have opted to keep the feelings to myself, but that would have been equally toxic.

My only suggestion would be to recognize, fully, the insane and brutal situation you have been put in by this process. And if you are feeling major distress, I would drop all of that s**t on the therapist, who you are paying presumably to look after your psychological health and to at least not make things worse for you.

In my opinion, feeling worse as you are is NOT progress, NOT a breakthrough, and NOT a sign that the magical forces of transference are manifesting to save you. You don't have to drink that kool-aid.

And you should not feel ashamed. Therapy is very very seductive. It provokes intense, addictive longings. It sounds like you are just following your innate drives and needs. Nothing wrong with that. But in my experience it's entirely the wrong context for such needs and longings to come out. Ain't your fault though.

Why you can't feel worse when you start to dig and explore some old forgotten wounds? I think it's completely normal. Usually, you WILL feel worse at some point of therapy.

For me it's great that we have this "fake context". Normally we can observe these drive and needs in our real life. But in normal relationship we can't (often) discuss this and understand. Therapy is like a lab where you feel something and you can look at this carefully and think about where it comes from. And then you can move your new attitude to the real life.
Is it better to have childish drives in normal relationship where you can't do much with this? I don't think so...

I really do get where budfox is coming from.

It sounds great to be able to practise....

How bout we just go out and have sex with someone to make sure we are great at it with someone else who we can date?

Makes some logical sense for sure but life doesnt really work that way.

And for those of us that feel like we may be in love... what do we need to practise? The pain of a broken heart? Cos none of us knows what that feels like...
.

I agree with Pepper_mint about therapy being like a lab. The fact that all these feelings have come out is a just an indication that these longings and needs were within you. The thing is to think about why they are able to come out towards the therapist (what is the therapist providing that makes this safe) and how to get these needs tended to in your real life relationships. For example, if trust is an issue, and your therapist has generated trust, what would it take to start finding/experimenting with trust in the real world?

I will say that I had intense transference towards my therapist for quite awhile. It's pretty much gone now, since I've made some changes in my life and relationships and started some new projects. My feelings towards my therapist have shifted and although I still am very fond of him, my previous obsession feels foreign to me. I used to just think about him and therapy all the time and that is not true anymore.

How did I talk to him about it? I just bit the bullet and forced myself to discuss it openly. From my reading about transference, I got the impression that therapists are completely uncomfortable with any kind of explicitly sexual talk directed towards them. So I never said anything explicit like that.

But just revealing that you have romantic feelings and longings towards them? Therapists should be able to handle this sensitively and with understanding because it happens, like, all the time. If I was a therapist, I imagine it would make me more comfortable if my patient made it clear that she/he knew that a physical/romantic relationship was not possible and that she/he was telling me just to be honest about what was going on inside. Sometimes in therapy I thought a good rule of thumb was that the more excruciating it felt to talk about something, the more important it was to talk about it.

Also, sometimes, when my transference got bad (it waxed and waned) I would ask myself, why is this happening again now? Very often there was something I was avoiding thinking about, or an emotional feeling I was avoiding. Maybe ask yourself, "If I was not thinking about my therapist, what would I be thinking about?"

I found therapy to be a laboratory only for therapy and therapy culture. It did not model real life. It encouraged me to live in a fantasy world.

It's easy to make the argument that confessing feelings for someone who cannot return those feelings, but will instead analyze them, is a very bad idea and pretty dangerous.

Only in therapy is this sort of humiliating dynamic tolerated, and even framed as progress. Seems you have to give in to some sort of doublethink to see it this way.

The more crushed the client is by this experience, the more emphatic the therapist's pronouncements about "transference", which has the effect of putting the burden all on the client.

We so agree on things, again, yes I agree on this post. I have no idea how on earth this is supposed to model real life when this relationship is unique and how on earth its supposed to heal you, when you just get crushed and intense pain etc. i hate the spot I am in right now, if i could go back, i would of been way more guarded on my feelings.... i am so sick and wish i could undo this all so i can avoid this awful feelings

Sometimes I have an impression that people who don't understand (or underestimate) things like attachment or importance of a relationship with T just don't get the whole idea of "insight therapy"... For me, it's quite clearly explained (how does this therapy work) in books or some websites.

Anyway, at the moment I'm listening to the podcast from the other thread. And I found one quite interesting on this topic:
The Essentials of a Therapeutic Relationship, Getting What You Want