[Explorelife]

Hello, I have written here a couple of times over having some romantic feelings for my therapist. I ignored those feelings that I had for him and I never told him about it because I felt embarrassed about it. I did tell my husband and he told me to be more aware and not let anything happen. I ended up just moving on and I did find someone else attractive for a while but decided not to take it anywhere.

I have started talking about possibly moving away because my husband wants to move out of the city. I have also wanted to move out of where I live for a long time because it's very hectic. My therapist and I were still getting closer and having some chats about everyday stuff.

I have noticed him being different with me. He seems annoyed or sometimes makes me feel like the stuff I am talking about is silly to him. I don't like it and I have been ignoring it but it has happened for weeks now. I am starting to like going less to therapy and we barely work on my issues anymore.

I'm scared to talk to him about it as therapists usually just deny being weird with me and make me doubt myself. Which makes me more distant. I really liked working with him because he does EMDR but he rarely ever does that anymore. I am just getting really frustrated with him and scared it's not going to go right if I bring it up.

Does anybody have some experience or advice over how to handle this type of situation? I don't want to just quit going without saying anything first, I think. I have been very committed to therapy since the beginning so it's kind of hard for me him seeming to be making fun of stuff that stresses me out.

It could very well be his own personal issues unrelated to you.

Unless you ask, you can only guess. Perhaps write a letter about it to him if it makes it easier

[SalingerEsme]

It seems like one of those dynamics that gets started, and spirals until confronted. I doubt, in his mind, he is giving you less than positive regard, but he is misattuning and blowing it with you anyway. You should let him know. We have all these threads on how defensive therapists ironically become when put on the spot, so maybe wait for an incident to come up and say hey that hurts my feelings? I feel less close to you than I used to and it makes me sad/ feel less like coming to therapy?

[Explorelife]

Originally Posted by Coming up tails

It could very well be his own personal issues unrelated to you.

Unless you ask, you can only guess. Perhaps write a letter about it to him if it makes it easier

That's a good idea about writing him a letter. I think it's kind of been building up and I'm feeling pretty upset about it now. I'm a lot better at expressing myself in writing sometimes.

I have considered that it's his own personal problems that I might be being affected by. Thanks for your advice, @Coming up tails.

[Explorelife]

Originally Posted by SalingerEsme

It seems like one of those dynamics that gets started, and spirals until confronted. I doubt, in his mind, he is giving you less than positive regard, but he is misattuning and blowing it with you anyway. You should let him know. We have all these threads on how defensive therapists ironically become when put on the spot, so maybe wait for an incident to come up and say hey that hurts my feelings? I feel less close to you than I used to and it makes me sad/ feel less like coming to therapy?

Thank you @SalingerEsme, I really appreciate how you wrote that. I do find it very hard to be vulnerable like that, so I am going to tell him something and hope it goes alright with him. At least I'll know I am trying to work things out with him, as I have stopped going to therapists in the past. One I confronted said I didn't have a right to be angry at him for repeatedly changing my appointments almost every week... My last one made me very uncomfortable, so I prefer going to the one I am seeing now.

The problem I have is reacting on the moment when it happens. I have this late reaction thing from being in social interactions where things don't start to bother me until later or the day after.

[ruh roh]

I've had this happen recently and told my therapist how upsetting it was. She disclosed that she's under a lot of pressure in a different area of her life, which made her impatient. It helped to know that something else was going on. Of course, it continued and I again thought it was me, and she explained that the situation is ongoing. I am hoping it's not permanent. I don't know the specifics, just the general situation.

If your therapist is acting different, it's worth clearing up.

[zoiecat]

I have recently had this same issue as well. It has been coming on for a few months now and I have hinted around a bit but never came out and laid it on the line. It just feels like he doesn't want to hear what I have to say anymore and he feels the need to distract himself from dealing with me in session. It finally came to a head last week. We spent an entire session talking about my SI thoughts. Then something personal really knocked me down mid-week. I was so upset I cancelled my Friday session because quite frankly I was so depressed and I had no idea what to say to him. I knew if he responded with his usual distracted self I would only feel worse. He ended up calling to check up on me Thursday.

Anyway, I took some time to calm down and wrote him a letter explaining exactly how I feel and what it feels like he is feeling during sessions. I told him it seems like he really doesn't want to hear me anymore and it seems like he needs to multi-task just to put up with me. I told him that he seems to have changed in the past few months and asked him to be brutally honest with telling me if that is how he really felt. I was prepared to accept his answer as long as it was honest. I was prepared to quit and fine someone else even though I hoped that we could come to a resolution.

Since he had already requested me to email him to confirm I would be at the next session, I sent him the letter the day before in my email and told him I was sending it early to give him a head's up with what is going on in my head and to not put him on the spot I session.

He addressed my letter first thing in the session. He sincerely apologized and told me he felt very guilty for making me feel that way. He also said he would stop doing the main thing he was doing that caused me to have those feelings. I feel guilty for causing him to change his style/technique but I accept his attempt to make things right. He still didn't answer the brutal questions as to why things changed but like others have said it might be something personal going on with him.

I am still not over my bad feelings and still don't feel comfortable confiding in him but I will try to meet him halfway and work on it with an open mind.

I encourage you to let your therapist know. Personally, I never email my therapist except for scheduling but in this case I think it was important to give him my thoughts outside of session. I think maybe some therapists get defensive when we confront them because they are put on the spot. By giving him my letter the day before he had time to process everything and respond in a more positive manner.

Good luck. I know it is a horrible feeling when it feels like they have changed.

[JaneTennison1]

You could try mentioning it when he does it, so not approaching him with a list of things but just when he says something that invalidates you, you could tell him. Today my T said something I was upset with and I told her straight away, it helped to have an example and to talk out what made me upset.

A few weeks/months ago I had this with my pdoc. He seemed less interested in me.. more impatient. Somewhat stiff.

I'm not sure if it was him reacting to me (we're more therapy-with-meds than true doctor's appointments, but maybe he felt the need to 'play doctor' because of my situation?), me/my perception (there was a lot going on. It also didn't help that I wanted him to offer me to stay the night or the weekend on the ward, because I wasn't doing well at all, and he never mentioned it. I know that if I had been a new patient or this was my first bad time, he'd have suggested it, and now he didn't even say "Would you like" or "Remember you can" (I am allowed to stay 1 night on the ward whenever I want to, it's called a PRN Bed Contract. I never do, so he couldn't have felt I was doing it too often). That felt like he wasn't seeing me. Also, it didn't help that when I apologized for my behaviour in session by email (I was very agitated, and he was scaring me by wanting me to do something that is very triggering to me because it has gone wrong in the past. I didn't shout, but I did raise my voice slightly and interrupt him a few times), and his reply was simply 'Okay!' and not 'Perfectly understandable' or 'Don't worry about it' or 'No need to apologize') , or him (getting tired of me or having something personal going on). *shrug* Maybe it was a combination. It probably was, actually.

Anyway, it's cleared up and has mostly gone back to normal now. :-)

I didn't talk to him about it, but I don't I would no matter what happened. (I might mention it, as in "I was rather frustrated last session" but not "I was frustrated because you were playing games on your phone.. you haven't seemed interested in me in a while" (made up example, he hasn't done anything close to that)) But that's because he's not on the books as my therapist, he is my pdoc and thus his primary function is as my doctor/prescriber. So I don't feel I can demand a 'non-medical' or 'therapeutic' interest.

I hope you'll T starts also going 'back to normal'. It sucks when you don't receive what you need and deserve.