Intimacy in a theraputic relationship

I don't know how you can have intimacy with someone you don't even know. I mean, I guess therapy can be intimate in a very cold and clinical sense, like a pap smear or a colonoscopy, but in that sense, it's certainly nothing special and is very one-sided. I think the feeling of being known and of routine might be mistaken for intimacy. I don't think I would define it as intimacy unless both parties felt intimate with one another. Not both parties simply having intimate knowledge of the history, concerns, etc. of one of them. I guess that's what it comes down to - I think there is a difference between having intimate knowledge and intimacy.

But why wouldn't you know your therapeutic partner? I guess that is where I struggle most. A person's place of work may say quite a bit about them. If the feeling you get from where they practice is cold and/or clinical and that is not the type of relationship you are looking for, look elsewhere. Personally, I'm working on my social skills and understanding of group stuff, so that is what brought me here to PC.

The therapist isn't always a complete stranger. Sure, in the beginning they might be. But as your relationship develops, the trust increases, and they become less of a stranger.

I've known my therapist for 15 years in other capacities before he became my therapist. I had to learn to trust him as a therapist, and that's something I'm still doing 15 months in, but I had the benefit of knowing him as a human, a priest, a friend, a professor beforehand. I think it's made a huge difference for me. And I get that this is a really, really unique situation. Most people are assigned a counsellor and you meet. I don't think any good therapist expects you to spill your guts at the first session tho. You have to establish rapport and build the relationship over time, just as you would any relationship.

Clinical encounters can certainly be intimate in a way that's not at all cold or impersonal. They don't have to be, but they can be. I've had many experiences where there was real, genuine (completely appropriate) intimacy between me and a patient, even though they may not have known anything about my personal life.

Very good points. Hadn't thought about that but I very much agree.

I was more alluding to the illusion of intimacy created through having intimate knowledge. I did not say clinical encounters are always cold and impersonal, and that latter word is yours, not mine. As for your experience, what you describe as intimacy is not what I would describe as such. But you are free to define your own experiences as you like.

I've seen many therapists in my life. I've never felt like the words intimate and therapy could be used in the same context. This changed for me a few months ago when I started with the T I have now. Something clicked for me the first meeting & I'm finding myself able and willing (to the degree I can at this point) to open up. I have even found myself making making a conscious effort to look her in the eyes and putting some real thought into what I want to talk about in our sessions.
My point is that I never wanted to be in an intimate or vulnerable space with a T because I was with the wrong T! Your post sounds like my past thoughts when struggling with sharing deep things.
Maybe you need a fresh face that gives off good vibes that you feel comfortable with. I wish you luck and hope you find a safe place to share in.

So you're distinguishing intimacy from intimate knowledge but also saying reciprocal intimate knowledge is a consistent, mandatory prerequisite of intimacy? I would disagree. And I have some very intimate knowledge of my therapist's life (some purposefully shared, some accidentally), which I think leaves me pretty well equipped to say that at least in some cases, emotional intimacy can occur without reciprocally intimate knowledge being shared, since that intimacy predates and has not been impacted by the presence or quantity of intimate knowledge about his life. And ultimately my therapist and I have both characterized our relationship as intimate, and calling that an illusion when both parties to a relationship agree seems silly to me.

Agree.
Intimate knowledge isn't intimacy.
Intimacy is about feelings.
Why everyone is hung up on needing to know intimate stuff.
To sit in silence. Sharing that space together, is one of the most intimate things we've shared.

Like I said, people can define their own experiences how they wish. Doesn't mean I will agree.

What makes sitting in silence intimate? I sit in silence with the therapist all the time, and I do not experience it that way. What makes sitting in silence with a therapist intimate while sitting in silence with someone else (a stranger, for example) not? I don't get it.

Sure, though it's a strange and condescending choice to blankly disagree with how two people characterize their relationship in a situation you're not party to, without even elaborating on the basis for your disagreement. But hey, of course some people go for that.

I did experience a form of intimacy in therapy, without much knowledge of the therapist, but it was shallow second-rate intimacy, the kind of thing you rent by the hour and which leaves a bad taste.

No. I see you don't.

The idea of intimacy in a therapeutic relationship is very new to me. After reading all the deep thought provoking contributions to this thread, I felt so immature in my thoughts on the topic. Then I came across your posts, and appreciate the simplistic way you put it. Your words grounded me a bit.

For me, there is often a deep and palpable mutual feeling of connection in those moments. It differs profoundly from how I experience silence with anyone else. My assumption is that it taps into infant-like needs of connection without language.

Interacting with the therapist was never anything I would describe as intimate for me. For me, the appointment with a therapist was not a place for such. Not only did it never happen, I don't know what the point of it would have been for me and the reason I hired the woman.

The silence in therapy is something I cannot grasp no matter how I try. There are quite a few things people often describe on this forum that I have not experienced in my therapy or not anywhere near to that degree, but most things I can understand easily using my imagination and reasoning at least intellectually. But the silence in session... I do not doubt its power given how much literature exists on it and what clients say, but it's something I can't even visualize happening for me. If anyone cares to write a bit more about it, I would be very interested in what it's like, what happens even? Client and T just sit in the room doing nothing but staring at each-other? Or looking elsewhere, scanning the room or something? Sitting with eyes closed? Meditating?

I think I get the intimate times spent together with loved ones in ordinary situations, e.g. in our home just chilling in a cozy room and feeling warm and fuzzy in the company of a partner or friend, going on long drives and not speaking a word but feeling perfectly relaxed and connected, pensive silences in deep conversations, etc. But in a meeting that is set up for a limited time frame and I pay for it?? Especially in a talk therapy session? Again, not doubting anyone's experience and the value of it, just cannot wrap my mind around it.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that in my childhood, most often when I experienced direct silence with my parents, it was due to their style of reacting to conflict - with those long passive aggressive silent treatments. That was how they "managed" conflict with each-other and also reacted to arguments with me most often. They did not often have fights by any means but when they had, that was the most likely "follow-up". I hated it intensely and did not understand at all back then, only much later when I was older and learned about psychology and communication some. Luckily I did not pick up that style from them and I never react to conflict with people that way. Also, as an adult, I still intensely dislike passive aggression and silent treatments - much easier for me to take even the most hostile fights. So maybe this is the reason, or part of the reason, why I cannot fathom the value of silence in therapy easily or imagine how it might feel other than discomfort. I am also very verbal in general so it's definitely not that I tend to be in situations where I don't find words or don't know how to express myself.

Sorry about going on a tangent on this thread but the posts about silence reminded me of this and, if silence in therapy can feel intimate to some people, I may not be so off topic saying that I cannot imagine it. And I am an introvert, quite high on that spectrum!

You've written quite articulately in previous posts that you are hostile to therapy, which makes it extremely unlikely that you would have the experience of intimacy in general in therapy. But I think your question is genuine despite this and this is my explanation:

First, the "silence" is not for an extended period of time, as I've asked my T not to let it go on too long, as it gives me anxiety. I said that in my past silence was weaponized, like the stillness a cobra uses to collect itself and prepare for the strike. Maybe someday I'll be more open to the possibility.

But for me the seconds of silence, maybe up to a minute or so (I've never looked at the clock, but I would say more than the usual space between words exchanged), is intimate because it often follows a moment of connection or an expression that we've climbed up that peak of something difficult, talking about something like a mountain climber with a pickax creating footholds, to get to somewhere like the top where you overlook where you've just been, and you admire the magnificent view and rejoice in both the experience of getting there and knowing the hard part of something-- maybe it was something hard to admit to, hard to describe, hard to be in the fear or emotionality of the moment (will I fall off here? is the top of thing actually possible to get to?)-- has been accomplished. A deep breath in the beauty and joy of being there.

I think there are all kinds of silence, like the kind where something really true just gets plunked down there by me; it's a little like watching the beating of my heart out there.

And I think there's the kind of silence where something humorous floats along like a feather twirling in the wind, and we just enjoy the ride as it lands in silence.

And I have experienced a kind of silence where I might have said something to the effect of "I've never told anyone this before . . . " Or I'm feeling it and I need a few moments to gather my words into my throat. A waiting, anticipatory kind of silence, and T is never impatient and waits. I think if he were to say anything, like "go on," or "I'm willing to listen" or anything at all, it would scare my words back to their hiding places.

I think these are all experiences of silent intimacy I've had with my spouse or friends or even my kid. Maybe others have experiences with extended silence and that would be cool to read about, but my therapy (by design, at least at this time) does not. One last type of silence, during the times when the trauma work was pretty intense, we did a silent "containment" exercise at the end of session to leave my "stuff" in his room-- I visualized the containment after he opened the drawer to leave it in.

Some try to ensure the relationship is one-sided with the goal to fuel idealization. I wonder if some of the feelings of intimacy are feelings of intense transference instead?

I have had both-intense transference feelings and what seemed to be intimacy. Despite the intense feelings explored in depth in my current therapy, I rarely experience feelings of intimacy with him. I have experienced intimacy with my former T as the relationship was less one-sided.

About looking into one another's eyes:

I really like the video, very expressive and relatable for me (not so much from therapy) - thanks for sharing. They are not really silent through the end, they just have minimal/simple verbal communication to accompany the eye contact. I absolutely get this - why I usually look people in the eyes when I communicate with them, naturally, automatically and kinda unconsciously, it is part of my normal communication style. And also part of the reason I don't like phone calls much - it always feels deficient to me unless I know the person very well and have a well-established relationship. I like eye contact and have no problems having eye contact with anyone really. Sometimes I lose it and look elsewhere when my thoughts and speech start to wander too much, I turn inward and get lost in my mind, but that's about it. I also love long, silent, deep eye contact with lovers and had a few amazing experiences where that sort of eye contact and physical intimacy preceded anything verbal... but that's probably a somewhat different, very specific scenario. Usually, outside of romantic/sexual encounters, verbal communication comes first for me and pure eye contact would not establish any intimacy before we connected via verbal exchange.

Also thanks Anne for the metaphors and sharing your experiences with silence - what you describe is familiar and, if that's what we mean by silence in therapy, I had some of those short silences with both Ts. Maybe I misinterpret the whole concept of silence in therapy sessions then? But I did read and hear many times about long silences, even completely silent sessions. That is what I have hard time imagining I guess. Anyone?

This may again be a bit off topic, but has anyone seen the movie The Double Life of Veronique? My last T described it as his all-time favorite movie and said that he watches it quite often. He mentioned it to me in our very first session and I wondered why... I watched it after he told me that because I got curious. It is very poetic and has many aspects of non-verbal intimacy integrated into the story quite beautifully. He certainly did not mention the movie to me because of the non-verbal intimacy factor, there is another main element in it why I reminded him of the film that became very obvious to me immediately. But the minimalistic verbal style and unspoken intimacy comes across quite boldly in that film, I think, and I really liked that aspect. Would not be my favorite movie but I understood my T, I think. It is not hard for me at all to imagine that he probably experiences similar (at least metaphorically similar) things with many of his clients.

Haven't heard of that movie but found out there is a cultish movement related to this, known as "the Power of Silence" which kind of freaks me out.

Braco (faith healer) - Wikipedia

Articles App. Braco

Maybe we can all live stream Braco and have a discussion afterwards as there is an event in January Events. Braco

Creepy group therapy.