Unresolved transference

Do you think unresolved/long term transference is a sign there are genuine feelings also there, not just unmet longings from childhood,?

I think it could be. Either that or an unhealthy obsession/ fixation perhaps.

I do, I still strongly believe in SOME cases that there is real feelings there from both sides, it is two people after all, feelings happen when people get together, your heart doesn't know what your "roles" are

I agree.

I even wonder if my transference would be so intense if there wasn't some genuine feelings fueling it.

Exactly DP_2017, "your heart doesn't know what your 'roles' are". I even told t something like that once I said "My heart wants what it wants" or something like that. I think perhaps the intense transference I had wouldn't have ever been so intense if t and I didn't genuinely like each other.

T said to me one time, that "This wouldn't work if we didn't like each other. You'd have stopped coming when the work got hard." I guess that's true. I've come through a long, crazy, painful and embarrassing period of intense, child-like attachment and maternal transference that could be both negative and positive and everything in between depending on the day. But we always somehow managed to talk through it. Even when we'd fight and ruptures would happen we'd always talk them through. And it was always my feelings about her that would make me go back.

I'm grateful for all of it now. But oh my gosh it could be painful.

Yes, if I didnt care, I would have bailed by now.Which makes me feel like he has me wrapped around his finger. But when the work is hard, I think there needs to be some kind of loving motivation. Love and fear are powerful motivators.

I think there can be genuine feelings there, and especially if the T self-discloses a lot. But if it feels more obsessive or fixated than friendships do, I would still tend to think transference is mixed in.

I'm also not sure how one could tell if maybe the transference was long-term and unresolved because of ineffective therapy, as opposed to something else? That's not to cast aspersions on the T, just that sometimes one method or model works and another one doesn't. Transference could linger because the right approach hadn't been found yet with that T (or because a different therapeutic relationship was needed).

That also could be a possibility for sure.

T has always told me she likes me very much which is why she likes the term heartmates.

Transference are genuine feelings. However, I'm pretty sure that if these feelings have some childish qualities (longing, obsessing, hating etc) then they have their origin from childhood. Also, transferential feelings do not necessarily have to be loving or positive, they can be all sorts of.

I don't have obsessive feelings to my therapist (have had though) but I do have long lasting negative transferential feelings. Sometimes in the session I also feel positive transferential feelings (when I feel like a baby cared by him) but mostly I just hate him. When I go home then I'm not in the pull of either of those types of transferential feelings, then I just respect him as a therapist and I feel grateful that he is so patient with me.

At the same time I've discovered that I'm now able to develop transferential feelings to older men because my T is an older man. Previously I never thought anything about them, couldn't imagine that I could have anything to talk to them. Now, because I know my T, I've discovered that I'm more willing to relate to older man and I expect them to be like my T. Transference.

If the transference is, still unresolved after a long time. Then the therapy is, either not right kind or ineffective.

Of course there are deep genuine feelings having worked on such intimate emotions. But they don't overwhelm or occupy ones who existence.

I don't suscribe to the idea that an attachment to a therapist (don't like the term "transference") is necessarily about unmet needs from childhood. Wasn't the case for me. It's a fantasy. The fantasy of that perfectly attuned therapist who hangs on the client's every word, the idea of being completely fulfilled by one person, etc. It's very human of course to want that but it's not of this world because nobody will focus on you like that: not your spouse, not your BFF, not your parents, not your child. Nobody. Which is why it can be so intoxicating when a therapist does it. But it's not real and it is often a distraction as well: by focusing so much on the "relationship" the client forgets why they came to therapy in the first place, they stop looking for ways to improve their life and sometimes spend years in therapy to try to "resolve" it, to "work through it" . For what purpose?

What does it mean for transference to be "resolved"? What does that look like?

It's not a cliff top thing. It's gradual. You begin to take an interest in life around you. You no longer have to do internet searches and the like. Being apart isn't painful. You know the (m) other is still there. You don't have too keep testing the T.

Your own emotions are more stable. You're not one thing one moment and another later in regarding the T.
You can tell by the pattern of some of the posts here.
One minute is all over the place and the next it's all back together. That begins to balance.
You begin to feel more your self. And you keep that feeling of who you are when away from T.

Others might have different experiences of it.

Ah yes, this makes sense. I guess I have some unresolved transference

Hmm....I never thought of that before. Wow this is so true and I think I might be hitting that issue now with a new EMDR therapist. I am not liking him that much and I only had 1 real session. How am I suppose to do the trauma work if I do not really like him? I think his skills are ok but I have to want his comfort and compassion when things get rough otherwise I will just push him away.

I like the concept of transference and I think it drives many choices and behaviors, not only in therapy, some therapists just use the phenomenon. However, I don't believe the old psychoanalytical ideas that transference is always about unmet childhood needs and parental lacks. Like for Myrto, a lot of it wasn't for me either. Some was/is, but far from all and if I had only looked for explanations in childhood and caregivers, I would have missed a lot and would probably have been grossly misguided.

A massive transference pattern in my life was related to my own development of my values and personality. It got resolved when it was developed to a satisfying level in my mid-to late 30's. If we want to use psychoanalytic terms, when I met my own ego's needs and superego's needs and achieved some important goals in my personal journey. I did not use therapy for it at all, and I got into therapy only after it was no longer an issue for the most part, but the interactions with my Ts kinda verified and cemented it.

I think though. Resolved or unresolved is maybe the wrong term. Perhaps awareness. We always to a certain extent being or earliest relationships into am our interactions. But worth therapy, we learn to recognise what was, to what is before we destroy present relationships.

Also when your 'real' life starts to feel more interesting than going to therapy.

I find therapy interesting so for me it's a thing I like to do to enhance my outside life.
Others go to museums etc. I like going deep lol.
I have skipped sessions for photography trips. Nothing beats that!

My marriage was what my T calls "two peas in a pod", and featured that intoxicating attentiveness and focus . It might be that I try to replace the feeling through my T, but for sure it is not the only relationship in which great intimacy has been a part. In a way, it is the oddness of not being allowed to reciprocate that keeps me puzzled and sort of hyper alert to my T- he seems like he thinks he is in the CIA hiding his identity. I don't want all the attention on me, bc it seems self absorbed and not charming whatsoever lol. The other thing is that he is a very good T, and he has dismantled defenses and asked for secrets and taboo topics etc. That kind of thing makes a bond, but it isn't made of all good things. It has some trust but some paranoia, it has some intimacy but some hatred- it is a strange brew compared to a real life relationship .

Oops, wrong thread.

I think it's same as with all the relationships outside of therapy. It's just felt more strongly in therapy.

I actually think the transference in therapy follows the same trajectory of relationships outside of therapy and that it never fully 'resolves' itself, but it does lessen.

When 2 people 'fall in love', I think that is just a strong transference. After a while, the 'in love' feelings dissolve, and the transference will have the quality of being more resolved.

Really, what it is is just getting to know the person for who they really are rather than your idealized version of them (using the concept idealized liberally here). In therapy, there are parallel phenomena--not knowing the therapist allows a big space for the projections and transferences to emerge. Similar to when you first date someone. The 'in love' is the strong transference that emerges similar to how it does in therapy. I actually think the psychoanalysts back in the 1800s took this falling in love concept and used it in therapy.

I was aware of my transferences long ago, before starting therapy. Childlike feelings came out while dating. Didn't think of them as childlike back then, and they were playfulness and spontaneity. Amplified in therapy, I could connect them to childlike states as they were stronger and more isolated in that we analyzed them. But they are the same feelings both in and outside of therapy.

No not for me. My transference stems 100% from my traumatic past

Mouse, can I PM you about this topic?

I want to say , I too went through a transference.
A love transference towards my therapist.
I be honsent it got worse. I wasnt able to take in anything from therapy. I felt more sad and suicidal.
Once my student therapist left the public health system and went on to pirvate practice.

I was assigned to a psychologist with years of experience. She told me this and I feel its very important for anyone going through a love transference towards there therapist needs to hear this.

She said to me in her words as I recalled clear as day.
Quote "From my humble opinion and experience, I have not seen love transference work. It just gets worse. Thats why I have felmale clients"
She told me how my frontal cordex would be overactive with anxeity around my therapist and I couldnt take anything in.
How each time I went into therapy I felt rejected which would cause the saddness and the suicidal thoughts.
How it be failure of therapy.
She said she knows at the place where they study they learn about working through love transference.

She also mention how she went through a love transference with her lecture and how it got worse.
Eventually it stop once he left.

What Im saying is. Its not worth it.

Yes maybe the therapist would say yes well that person said that because they didnt heal from there wounds.

But I say get out and find a therpaist that knows what they doing. Its seriously not worth it.