In major PAIN over an email that T wrote me this morning!

I agree that he was probably talking about past Ts and I overreacted.

At our last session, I asked him if I was annoying him and he said no and that he had other patients who emailed him a lot more than I do.

Does he know about your situation with the pharmacist? Could he also be talking about him?

I did tell him about my situation with the pharmacist. That was the main example he used to express his thoughts.

I wish you the best but please try to work with him on this. Therapists have a right to set up boundaries as many do in a personal relationship. For example in my life if someone is not responding to me for someone reason depending on the situation I might try a max of 3 times, before I basically tell them the next move is theirs.

I think your past ts tried from what you posted and you made it worse before they shut if off totally. I get it ok? It happened to a former friend but she kept pushing it too. You can make sure it doesnt happen again. Work with him this time please.

Seaman, I think it would help you to talk to a psychiatrist about your problems.

Hope-how are things going today?

Emails to therapists are, more often than not, problematic for the sender. Tone of voice, facial expressions are absent and that is how we place the words in context. I feel any emails outside of scheduling should be curtailed.
Speaking to the therapist is so much more productive.

I’d bet 75% of emails result in MORE distress. Over and over and over again. Put a finger in the fire, it will get burned.

Thank you for sharing the Email, Hope, and good for you for trying to talk to him about it! Boundaries are SO hard to talk about anyway....but when they are being "discussed" by Email, it can be even harder to understand things. Sometimes things LOOK differently than they were meant to.... try to be calm, and try not to immediately react. You're doing well....keep it up!

Hope,

It's brave of you to post about this and forward the email. I agree with the previous comments re emailing vs. talking face to face. The latter is far preferable when there is high potential for misunderstanding, disagreement, or conflict. I'd ask the T in person directly what he was thinking of when he wrote the email. There could also be some projection or overgeneralization of previous experience on his part. Maybe the T has had some awkward experiences with patients via email or lost patients as a result. Often times there is more than one reason that a relationship comes to an end and there is nothing inherently contradictory between what he wrote and your experience of how those relationships ended except his may be incomplete.