[Lrad123]

Today my T said something like “the relationship is the therapy” or something like that and I’m wondering if anyone can give me their interpretation of what you think that means and also if it’s legitimate. He said it after I told him that it feels like therapy has created a whole new problem for me, one that is different from the reasons that initially brought me to therapy. Mostly, I have this huge push/pull dynamic with therapy where I want to go, but I don’t want to go if that makes any sense. I don’t feel like this ambivalence is a problem (at least not an obvious one) in the rest of my life, only in therapy. Anyway, he mentioned the word attachment and abandonment and said how my ambivalence is coming from a “younger place” and how “the relationship is the therapy.” Does that seem right? I mean, isn’t that a little vague? Shouldn’t we have more specific goals?

My t told me one time that "this relationship is your work". I wonder if she meant the same thing. I never asked her to explain. I get the push/pull thing I do it all the time. I have quit (and gone back) several times over almost 7 years now. It is a weird, convoluted relationship that is for sure but ultimately has been very healing for me, as frustrated with it that I get sometimes. I am very attached to my t.

[atisketatasket]

Info has said something like, “it’s all the relationship.”

To me it is vague, fuzzy, and a way to keep clients coming back even when there’s no reason to or they want to leave.

I would encourage you to set specific goals and not worry about the relationship (unless you want to). That has worked for me.

[downandlonely]

I've never been that close to any of my therapists, so I can't really relate.

Thank you for bringing this up. My T sometimes talks about "our relationship", which seems bizarre to me. I'm not sure what they are getting at. I'd love to hear what others have to say.

[koru_kiwi]

yup....completely get this and can relate. therapy with my psychodynamic T became all out the 'relationship' and it also became all consuming and quite drama filled with strong transference reactions on my end and some not so helpful countertransference issues on his end. felt like a complete mind f#ck even in the best of times. i had never experienced a relationship as all consuming and drama filled as the one with my ex-T. it wasn't until i was able to start regulating (calming) my emotional dysregulation with the help of neurofeedback therapy that the transference started to fade. the transference didn't completely go away, but it was manageable and i was able to start focusing on the the issues i originally came to therapy to address without always becoming triggered by the relationship with my T.

so the whole 'the relationship is part of therapy' is somewhat true...you need to have 'workable' relationship to develop the trust so you can hash out all your painful dark secrets and fears to an almost complete stranger, but the relationship should never become all consuming that it is all you can think about day in and day out. that's unhealthy and a recipe for disaster, especially from where the client sits in that 'relationship'.

[ElectricManatee]

My T mostly does relational therapy, so the therapeutic relationship is pretty important for me/us. Examining the dynamic between us, the assumptions I make about how she sees me, and the feelings and desires that come to the surface with her have allowed me to understand myself and my history more deeply than anything else ever has. It can be stressful and intense and sometimes I want to back away, but it has really helped me open up to other people in my life and recognize my relational patterns more quickly/clearly and with more self-compassion. I have had fewer depressive symptoms since I started working more intensely with her too. So yes, I think this can be a legitimate approach to therapy, in the right hands. But whether it's the right approach for you is something only you can decide.

[SalingerEsme]

I am going to neurofeedback on Friday bc of your posts - I am excited.

Originally Posted by koru_kiwi

yup....completely get this and can relate. therapy with my psychodynamic T became all out the 'relationship' and it also became all consuming and quite drama filled with strong transference reactions on my end and some not so helpful countertransference issues on his end. felt like a complete mind f#ck even in the best of times. i had never experienced a relationship as all consuming and drama filled as the one with my ex-T. it wasn't until i was able to start regulating (calming) my emotional dysregulation with the help of neurofeedback therapy that the transference started to fade. the transference didn't completely go away, but it was manageable and i was able to start focusing on the the issues i originally came to therapy to address without always becoming triggered by the relationship with my T.

so the whole 'the relationship is part of therapy' is somewhat true...you need to have 'workable' relationship to develop the trust so you can hash out all your painful dark secrets and fears to an almost complete stranger, but the relationship should never become all consuming that it is all you can think about day in and day out. that's unhealthy and a recipe for disaster, especially from where the client sits in that 'relationship'.

[Lrad123]

Originally Posted by ArtieSwimsOn

My t told me one time that "this relationship is your work". I wonder if she meant the same thing. I never asked her to explain. I get the push/pull thing I do it all the time. I have quit (and gone back) several times over almost 7 years now. It is a weird, convoluted relationship that is for sure but ultimately has been very healing for me, as frustrated with it that I get sometimes. I am very attached to my t.

Glad to hear it has been helpful for you. That makes me feel hopeful. The whole therapy process still can feel very strange for me even after a year. I tend to be analytical and evidence-based so sometimes I wonder what the heck we are doing. Part of me is very skeptical and another part is very interested, thus the whole push/pull dynamic. I do like my T although sometimes I feel like I’m under spell. I guess maybe that’s what attachment is.

[Lrad123]

Originally Posted by atisketatasket

To me it is vague, fuzzy, and a way to keep clients coming back even when there’s no reason to or they want to leave.

The skeptical part of me is worried about exactly this.

[Lrad123]

Originally Posted by ElectricManatee

My T mostly does relational therapy, so the therapeutic relationship is pretty important for me/us. Examining the dynamic between us, the assumptions I make about how she sees me, and the feelings and desires that come to the surface with her have allowed me to understand myself and my history more deeply than anything else ever has. It can be stressful and intense and sometimes I want to back away, but it has really helped me open up to other people in my life and recognize my relational patterns more quickly/clearly and with more self-compassion. I have had fewer depressive symptoms since I started working more intensely with her too. So yes, I think this can be a legitimate approach to therapy, in the right hands. But whether it's the right approach for you is something only you can decide.

Ok this gives me hope. It all just feels so unnatural to me at times, but I want it to work out and I think my T is good. It’s particularly hard for me to be the center of attention and it can feel awkward and intense to talk so much about “us” and “our relationship.” It would be worth it for me if I knew I could have some of the positive outcomes that you’ve had.

[Ididitmyway]

I expressed my views on the "relationship is therapy" idea in this article
Therapy Consumer Guide - What Is “Therapeutic Relationship” and Does It Exist?

It's hard for me to discuss it because this "relationship is therapy" concept was the main reason I was severely traumatized by my first therapy experience, and it makes my blood boil every time I hear anyone say that therapy is supposed to revolve around the "relationship". I would run away from any therapist who has such idea as fast as I can.

[ElectricManatee]

Originally Posted by Lrad123

Ok this gives me hope. It all just feels so unnatural to me at times, but I want it to work out and I think my T is good. It’s particularly hard for me to be the center of attention and it can feel awkward and intense to talk so much about “us” and “our relationship.” It would be worth it for me if I knew I could have some of the positive outcomes that you’ve had.

I can relate to some of the things you've said before about being independent and responsible in the rest of your life and then having seemingly uncharacteristic emotional responses to your therapist. For the first few years that I saw my T, I was very conscientious about following what I thought were "the rules" and not expressing negative feelings about her and trying to be a model client at all times. We made some progress on dealing with external events in my life during that period, but it was only once I started opening up and being able to share really difficult and complicated things (often about my view of myself or her or our relationship) that therapy really took off for me. There is a level of safety with her and a level of commitment to our mutual connection that has started to show me what I missed in childhood that has kept me stuck for so long.

Originally Posted by ElectricManatee

I can relate to some of the things you've said before about being independent and responsible in the rest of your life and then having seemingly uncharacteristic emotional responses to your therapist. For the first few years that I saw my T, I was very conscientious about following what I thought were "the rules" and not expressing negative feelings about her and trying to be a model client at all times. We made some progress on dealing with external events in my life during that period, but it was only once I started opening up and being able to share really difficult and complicated things (often about my view of myself or her or our relationship) that therapy really took off for me. There is a level of safety with her and a level of commitment to our mutual connection that has started to show me what I missed in childhood that has kept me stuck for so long.

Yes yes, that last part for me too.

[stopdog]

I saw two who both claimed to be psychodynamic. The first made some feeble attempts at talking about attachment and bonding but never (one of the few times she showed good sense) told me anything as completely bonkers as the relationship is the therapy (she did tell me I fought the process more than any client she ever had - she was given to exaggeration. She also refused to tell me what the process was so I simply discounted it all and told her to stop talking as it was not useful to me). The second never mentioned bonding, relationship to her or anything of that sort. It worked out better for me. I have no better idea what the second one thought she was doing at me -but it was a lot less contentious.

[PurpleBlur]

Originally Posted by Lrad123

Today my T said something like “the relationship is the therapy” or something like that and I’m wondering if anyone can give me their interpretation of what you think that means and also if it’s legitimate. He said it after I told him that it feels like therapy has created a whole new problem for me, one that is different from the reasons that initially brought me to therapy. Mostly, I have this huge push/pull dynamic with therapy where I want to go, but I don’t want to go if that makes any sense. I don’t feel like this ambivalence is a problem (at least not an obvious one) in the rest of my life, only in therapy. Anyway, he mentioned the word attachment and abandonment and said how my ambivalence is coming from a “younger place” and how “the relationship is the therapy.” Does that seem right? I mean, isn’t that a little vague? Shouldn’t we have more specific goals?

i imagine he was referring to irvin yalom- "its the relationship that heals."


he believed that even without all the cbt and evidence based therapies out there- it is the relationship that heals- that soothes your brain and makes connections where there werent any...

without the relationship all you get is a few bandaids to control your bleeding (cbt) but lasting change is not usually found (my opinion and experience.


but thats not to say its not impossible...

[NP_Complete]

Seconding PurpleBlur. Check out Irvin Yalom. If it doesn't speak to you on some level, maybe try another modality like CBT.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/00...t_bibl_vppi_i0

[Lrad123]

Originally Posted by NP_Complete

Seconding PurpleBlur. Check out Irvin Yalom. If it doesn't speak to you on some level, maybe try another modality like CBT.

The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients: Irvin Yalom: 8601300045320: Amazon.com: Books

I actually read the Gift of Therapy a while ago and thought it was great. Maybe I should reread it. Thanks for the reminder.

[stopdog]

I sometimes think there is a great divide between those who read yalom and find him not horrible and don't want to club him into paste and the rest of us who do find him reprehensible and think clubbing might be too good for the likes of him.
And CBT was the one modality I found actively damaging as opposed to psychodynamic which I simply found puzzling.

[feralkittymom]

I fall into the relationship camp because I'm extremely analytical and evidence-based, as well as because it was my experience, but I can't stomach Yalom. Pass the club!

That said, while the relationship was a driver (not a focus) in therapy with my former T, we hardly ever talked about it while it was a driver. And he would never have said anything remotely like, "it's the relationship that heals." The only reason for talking about it at all was at the point of resolving the transference. I think too many Ts who spout such rhetoric have no clue of the psychoanalytic underpinnings of the relationship and its part in transference and just see it as a warm fuzzy--and that can lead to unpredictable consequences for some clients.

[Myrto]

What it means is obvious to me: typical therapist nonsense to suck clients in and have them come to therapy for years and years and have them obsess about this pointless and fake drama that is the "relationship".

[MoxieDoxie]

Originally Posted by koru_kiwi

but the relationship should never become all consuming that it is all you can think about day in and day out. that's unhealthy and a recipe for disaster, especially from where the client sits in that 'relationship'.

but literally, right now, that is all I think about. How did this become so unhealthy and all consuming? Something in me is so broken. It saddens me to no end and I know this is a core problem and not sure how any therapist can fix it.

[feileacan]

To my mind it makes perfect sense that relationship is the key. What else could it be? Some specific skills? Then you need a book and a teacher, and I suppose that some therapies really are of that type (DBT?). But this skill-building approach cannot solve interpersonal issues. Interpersonal issues were created in the relationship and they can be overcome only in the relationship. The relationship is the only sensible context where such issues can be explored and healed. The relationship generates new experiences or novel interpretations of known experiences and that's why it is pivotal for healing.

Mine never said anything like that directly - fortunately, as I might have come back with something cynical such as "if you cannot do anything else as a professional but be in a relationship". My last T said other things about using the relationship in therapy for insight. I have no problems with that because I analyze how I relate and react to people on my own as well. But my issue with therapy was exactly that I never saw much therapeutic in it - it was having conversations with someone, little else, for me. Some of it were good conversations (especially with my last T) but nothing I cannot have with intelligent friends/colleagues, where the relationship/collaboration itself is usually much more beneficial than the artifice of therapy. Also that whole idea about therapy providing a safe environment - I experience that in good mutual everyday relationships much more than what therapy could ever create. For me, what could have been useful perhaps is if the Ts challenged me and called me out on my BS in insightful ways - this is what a very few people in ordinary relationships will do but when it happened with people I respected, it helped me more than anything. That can be a uniquely useful relationship for me that is not easy to find anywhere. None of my Ts did that well. One mostly just created artificial drama centered around him when we had conflicts and the other one was way too accepting.

I have no problems seeing how the relationship with the T can be an important element of some people's therapy but I think it's going too far to generalize that concept. Not even everyone aims to address interpersonal issues in therapy, I think - I wasn't, for example. I was interested in addressing bad habits and negative patterns that got in the way of achieving my goals and made me stuck in circles. Of course it can be interesting to uncover the origin of those, which sometimes go back to old relational issues, but my lack of discipline and making bad choices for myself are present issues that I practice on my own, not much to do with relationships.

[PurpleBlur]

Originally Posted by feralkittymom

I fall into the relationship camp because I'm extremely analytical and evidence-based, as well as because it was my experience, but I can't stomach Yalom. Pass the club!

That said, while the relationship was a driver (not a focus) in therapy with my former T, we hardly ever talked about it while it was a driver. And he would never have said anything remotely like, "it's the relationship that heals." The only reason for talking about it at all was at the point of resolving the transference. I think too many Ts who spout such rhetoric have no clue of the psychoanalytic underpinnings of the relationship and its part in transference and just see it as a warm fuzzy--and that can lead to unpredictable consequences for some clients.

no they probably shouldnt tell it to the client if that client is relationship gun shy... but theyre probably still thinking it.