Couch 198: All the Countries Couch

On the plane I watched a documentary about the American branch of the Hitler family tree.

At one point the narrator said something like, “while we don’t have a lot of historical records for Alois Hitler [the ancestor of this branch], we know much more about his half-brother Adolf.”

I should hope so.

Deep, tough session today. I'm not sure what exactly has changed but something is different. In me. I've always worked hard in therapy but this... this is a new level. We've peeled back a lot of those metaphorical onion layers up until now. How many freaking more layers are there?! I never even got to asking more about that ego stuff today. Maybe next week. Anyway we're on weekly through the summer. I shouldn't have been nervous about asking.
Also I am rather wiped and am going to go watch mindless tv.

If anyone needs to watch something that won’t stretch your brain and you kind of just need to veg a bit- I would suggest Dead To Me on Netflix. But...only if you are a Christina Applegate fan. I am a fan but only of her older current self. I loved Married with Children growing up, but I didn’t love her on the show.

There was someone in the waiting room.

Didn't have a football. So I just strutted. Well, more like sauntered a little. Does that count?

Absolutely.

I walked out of my appt with T2 the other day, and there were about 5 people in the tiny waiting room (there is usually maybe about 1, max).

I just froze.

So way to go on the sauntering!

I told T during my session this morning about last night. And about another thing from earlier this week. He knew I had an appointment with my pcp and family therapy for my boys this afternoon, so he offered to call me this evening. He called and we ended up talking for 30 minutes. He ended up mentioning going to the hospital, and that he thinks that's what might need to happen to stay safe and not be so "violent" to myself. His words. He didn't mention any of this to me this afternoon. I'm not sure what changed. We're not scheduled to meet on Fridays during the summer, but he said he wanted to at least talk to me tomorrow. He asked if I would be okay with a phone session and I agreed to that because it's a better option for me than checking myself into the hospital. I wouldn't even know where to begin for something like that. He asked if I could tell H that's where we're at, not explain myself, just tell him. Tonight I'm going to try to focus on my online class, and see if I can knock out my 3 assignments for the week and my discussion post.

I caved and emailed T with everything... now to cower until he responds, until Monday or.... I really don’t have good enough meds for this nor is there enough chocolate in the state.

I'm a little worried about seeing L tomorrow. One, I contacted her every day this week except today. I was super clingy, needy, and constantly crying -- this is right after she gave me a scarf and I felt so much joy. Second, I bought her two books. She once told me one of her favorite things and even applied it to therapy. So I found 2 books that pair the two. I didn't ask her if I can give her another gift, or even if it's a purchase and not crafted. She also might have the books already, however I doubt anyone would think to look for such books, except maybe her. I'm just worried she might not accept them. I love gift giving to people especially when it's not expected. And I only have about 4 months left with her, so I want to give to her as much as I can during this period. The next thing I think I'll give her is a therapist survival kit. I think she'll appreciate that even though that is mostly purchased items.

For fellow coucharoonios RE: Dark

I got 60-34 = X mins left.

We're here too.



I'll trade you my Cadbury Hazelnut for a packet of Reese's peanut butter cups.

I'm exactly the same with gifts, but have toned it down a teeny bit. What's in the therapist survival kit?

You take a hollow book or a bag, and put little items in it.

For example:
Box : to help you keep it all together
Tylenol : for the headaches you will get
Marbles : for when you lose your own
Rubber band : for your thinking to be flexible
Toothpick : to help pick through the problems that can be helped and fixed, and which ones can’t.
Dryer sheet : For all your clingy clients

There are plenty of others. Just do a search survival kits.

"I don't like your attitude. What makes you think you can just demand things?".

I cut the call on him after that.

The preceding sentence: was "okay I'll behave but I want tuesdays and thursdays. I don't like thursdays and fridays".

It's the way he said it,.

Ugh, I'm sorry. That would really bother me. You weren't demanding, you were requesting.

It's not a T's job to like your attitude. Even Madame T wouldn't have said that.

I'm so sorry he said that. I can't even imagine. This is therapy, not a job interview or something. A client's attitude is not always going to be sunshine and rainbows and positivity for goodness sake. If we have to pretend to be happy and perky all the time no therapy will happen.

That last i speak from my own experience with L. While we did get a lot of good work done in the past, probably the last year (?) was me pretending and her trying to break through that until she did and I ran away.

H and I almost had a fight last night. He wanted to know about my session and when I didn't say anything, he asked why. I said I'm gathering my thoughts. Then he started guessing : "she said you're worse than she thought and you have to go another year?" I said no. "She said you're fine and don't need to come?" I said no. He started to say something else and I said "no, no, just stop." Thankfully he stopped. I am not ready to tell him what we talked about. For couchies with partners/spouses do you tell them about your sessions? I thought we'd gotten past him wanting to know a long time ago but apparently not. I went back because I'm starting to see clearly more of my part in our problems and I want help to fix those things, whether our marriage survives or not, so that if it doesn't and I move on to someone else I don't bring the same crap to that relationship. But I can't tell him that.

I am attempting to teach my nieces the finer points of economics. They want money to buy my mother a birthday present. It’s never too early to introduce the concept of interest rates.

and i thought i was a mean auntie!

I try to talk to H about what happens in session. Usually he barks at me about there being more to life than therapy... well, not when you are locked in your room all day so your son doesn’t hurt you... I have my IPad, some music and a sewing machine... doesn’t amount to much to talk about. Therapy day is the only day I get out as it is Hs day off from work. H also gets angry about why personal things about T are so impotant to me, I tried telling him a T is not like a dentist or surgeon. When I tell H about some of the things I talk about with T he gets angry or just dismisses everything as unimportant and tells me I am doing therapy all wrong... not that he has ever been in therapy. Then there are the million and two things that happen in a session that I don’t tell H about because they would make him feel insecure... much of which relates to your last line... so, I try to include H but it is still a no win set up.

Almost never. My husband and I saw the same therapist and we still rarely discussed our individual sessions with each other. It wasn't about secrecy as much as respect for each other's individual space.

It sounds like your husband is anxious about something. At least, that would be what was going on in my husband started asking those kinds of questions. Can you respond by simply asking him what is on his mind, or what is he worried about? Sometimes just letting him know you recognize his anxiety will help calm that down and even open up some real conversation. Most of our marriage issues came back to the basic problem of poor communication. We did a lot of protecting each other with our silence which really did exactly the opposite and created constant tension.

Thanks Lemoncake,
Last session T said two things that are really getting to me. The first was that women and men can’t be friends. I asked if I can be friends with one woman in a committed lesbian relationship without being friends with the other but he just looked confused and moved on. I honest to god do not understand most social norms and find them to be stupid. So T has, from very early on Ben very caring, nurturing and supportive and, for a T uses a lot of touch to support, anchor or help me pull things together. I have found this extremely helpful from the beginning... but if men and women cannot be friend by his standards/beliefs, even though I know we are not friends, it is a professional relationship, how can all this touch be appropriate? He has shared enough about his wife and I have google searched enough to know she is insecure and jealous which makes the men and women can’t be friends thing make sense... but then are all these nurturing supports he is offering even remotely appropriate in his world???? Not to mention him laying on the floor and doing silly things like stretching his back. I know therapeutically he wants me to be less physically stiff, he wants me to relax and move so he is showing me it is OK... But is it really OK if men and women can’t be trusted together?
Then he said last session “if I believed in hell my hell would be your life”. I know that it is true and I asked for his thoughts. I know my life would be hell for most people and I know he is trying to validate all that I am going through and still standing...
then last night, after knowing I am having a bad day and want to SH he sends another email saying by the way I have to cancel one of our July appointments (which, unless he has his dates mixed up means he will be out of town two weeks in a row)... then signs it “have a safe weekend”.
He has been so awesome, thoughtful, authentic... up until now and it just seems to be crashing. I can’t do another squirrely therapist, not now. And H is pissed that I spent the night crying over T. When I tried to explain H doesn’t understand why I would suddenly have a problem with T touching me just because T can’t be friends with women...
I’m a freaking mess. My anxiety is too high to even call Pdoc. Had nightmares all night about her rejecting me too.

ETA: I am not feeling nearly as protective of T as I usually am.

For me, in terms of talking to my H, it really depends. Sometimes I'll share some of what I talked about. I often will share some little anecdote from session, like something T and I joked about, so that I'm not being totally quiet/secretive about it. If I'm really emotional or zoned out after session, I might just share something vague like "We talked about stuff from childhood," mainly to let him know it wasn't something to do with him. When the whole thing happened with the stone, I ended up sharing about that because of how upset I was. Once, regarding ex-T, he said how sometimes I'll say, "That was a really heavy session," but then not elaborate on it any, which would kind of bother him. So then I tried to share more, or at least mention the topics we discussed.

But then I did step back from talking about it maybe a year ago when my H made this comment to me: "All you talk about is therapy." Which is completely untrue. When we went out to dinner shortly after he said that, I was like, "OK, I want you to note that I've discussed the following list of topics tonight, none of which are therapy." And I've said part of it is I want to let him into my inner world. But I never know how much to share. I feel it's particularly awkward to talk about if I'm having either a conflict with my T or it's something related to attachment or transference because T is male and because of what happened with ex-MC. I feel I tend to go back and forth from possibly oversharing to maybe undersharing.

I too am one that likes to give gifts. Mostly home made things. I made something for me to use with T and he really liked it so I let him keep it... it is in his office for all his clients to be able to use now. He has hinted he would like me to do more but then he mentioned his wife saw the other one I made and asked where it came from. Since then he has been much more reserved about the things I make and if I leave something to use in session he puts it in the closet even though I don’t care if other clients use it.
I know T and his wife eat healthy and we have a ton of fresh berries and things on our property which I share with everyone because even with all my cooking and canning a lot goes to waste... even the birds and wildlife can’t keep up. So, I offered to bring some in for him and it got really awkward. Holidays everyone gets home made cookies and candy and no one has ever complained. I bring them to work, send them to work with H... even some of my customers (I work retail at a farm store) get goodies... he’ll, even the gas station attendant down the street where we fill up our cars gets goodies... but I doubt T will accept. Pdoc does as long as I don’t buy it... I bought her one thing... a lithium quartz pendant (we both like weird gemstones) and when I went back to her after 5 years she made a point of telling me she still had it.

Omers, I think men and women as friends can often be precarious. I don't think your therapist is necessarily way off base there, but I think he's being avoidant by not just saying, "I'm your therapist; we can't be personal friends." Now, my son's best friend is female, but my son is gay which changes the dynamic. He has male friends who are not gay which doesn't seem to be a problem, but he'll admit, his friendship with his gay male friend is complicated, particularly with one of them.

I don't think therapeutic touch has anything to do with friendship, and perhaps that's where you are confused. My therapists all used touch at times, but they were very clear to ask permission before they ever touched me, and they were always very clear about their professional boundaries.