Unjustified Anger At T

i was stuck in that same 'trauma loop' wit my ex-T with us reenacting it over and over again, no matter how many times i tried to discuss it with him and tried to approach it from differnt angles. round and round we went like being stuck in a hamster wheel, running and running but never getting anywhere.

although my T did have his own therapy years before he became a T and as part of his accreditation/licensing, and he paid for ongoing fortnightly private supervision, he still failed to recognise this and the harm it was doing to the therapy and the relationship. at times, when i brought it up, he did try to take steps back to break it, but for some reason he kept falling back into old habits.

the change for me didn't come until i was the one who was willing and courageous enough to take the reigns and start advocating for myself and my therapy. for me, it was one of the most empowering things i ever did in therapy. once i had a taste of that feeling of empowerment, i ran with it!

I had a similar trauma loop with my therapy, and totally agree with everything that has been said.

I knew I couldn’t continue therapy with my therapist when she shamed my anger and got angry and punishing in return. I also have a history of CSA and it felt like getting perpetrated and violated once again.

This is how I continue to feel, though the flavor is different from angry and shaming.

My T is injured and punishing, saying that we have done "exquisite" work together, that he has worked extremely hard on my case, and how terrible it feels for him not to be trusted by me after he has unequivocally both earned my trust and been/ is a trustworthy therapist.

I'm very shut down by this. I don't want to hurt my therapist , and be told that I think he fails me again and again when he is the best advocate have in my corner ( his language).

When we try to move on, it is by me complying . He makes clear that this is his training, this is his office, he knows what is best for me. He isn't curious or open to exploring how I feel, even though I reassure him I dont want him to change any rules, I just want to tell him how I feel about the stairwell becoming like the closet I hid in in childhood from the perpetrator , how when we end sessions abruptly on a disorienting painful note, and I go in the the stairwell to wipe off tears and get ready to face the cheerful streets bustling with people I know- my own clients, friends, family members, that is seems familiar, sees like replaying something . Instead of my other parent not helping, just letting me be in the closet with my dog for hours, it is like my T not helping, sit on the stairs for hours while doesnt know about it and goes on with his day. My boundaries are rock solid. I would never go back to my T, or intrude in his space once he dismissed me. But also I dont have the coping skills to talk about horrendous memories for 45minutes, and then get in the elevator and hit the friendly streets in 60 seconds. The emotional whiplash is beyond me.

I got my first traffic ticket ever for rolling through a stop sign after session, and the police guy was asking why are you crying so hard, is everything okay, can I drive you somewhere or call someone for you. WTF. I have been a high functioning human all my life. This seemed like a harbinger of things falling apart in therapy, getting out of control

He feels accused that he is responsible for containing my feelings after the 45 minutes is over. He says he is not responsible. I dont know if he is or isn't .

I don't want to lose this relationship that has become a touchstone in every week, month, and year now, so I try to "move on" from the impasse in the sense of agree to disagree, but I find I am tongue-tied to delve back into the excruciatingly visceral night mares and images with which we were working. My mind goes blank, he then thinks I am not trusting him, I then feel he is pushing me too hard without giving me what I need. It ends in tears. Cycle.

In a larger sense, I've lost the larger sense I used carry of my psychologist being the "real deal", someone who deeply knew how to treat C-ptsd / OCD , who cared about both me and my case, who was new to our city and freshet work hard building a practice. Now I am constantly asking a question if he is as he presents himself.

My attachment to my T is the definition of beyond. It is like trauma bonding all over again. Because I do no share these secrets in detail with people lin my real life, my relationships are long and harmonious, if marked by an omission of some horrible stuff from long long ago. With my T, telling the secrets and for the first time, created almost a hyper vigilance ON him I think. He is a port in a storm, he is the adult who finally cares. . . .

And yet he raised his fee to the insurance company without mentioning it tome once I met my deductible, he has told a few small lies looking right into my eyes, he wrote about my case on Reddit in a way that was both tender and alarming - does he know as much about treating me as he professes?

Ultimately, these doubts may be symptoms of my inability to trust men with my secrets, and not about my T at all. They may be about my T being a bit fake with who he is as an authentic individual, presenting himself as the learned psychologist , but having a bit less experience than that on real world resume terms. I dont know right now if it is me, if it is him, or if transference/ countertransference is afoot.

AllI know it I dont want to live after some sessions, and sui thoughts are not normal for me. It is more being awake hurts so much I take Ambien and try to sleep off the aftermath of sessions, but without missing work or responsibilities. My BF is on high alarm at this point, and is bewildered by the tears and fragility. It isn't me.

If I try to talk to my T about any of this, we go right back to the beginning paragraph in which he cares about me and we have done the best work, and instead of feeling that right now, I think he has failed me and he is hurt by that.

Around in circles.

I am more attached to my T than is normal. I am dependent on my T. I see him as an equal to the perpetrator in my life, just as tough, just as powerful. I also sometimes cast my T in the role of bystander- an adult who doest care enough too help ( this hurts him). I dont think we complete the triangle in which he is perpatrator, unless this right here is it. Certainly he dreads being seen that way.

This doesn't characterize my relationships outside of therapy, which tend to be long and easygoing. I feel somehow that I can't survive, literally, without my T. That is so crazy for one adult to feel that way about another adult, no matter the situation. We've had long periods of peaceful work and bonding punctuated with big failures of trust along.

In general , he has an overall attitude that as a psychologist, he is beyond answering to patients in the world outside of session. This leads him to blind spots, like putting up an ad on Linked In that I shared with Lonesome tonight and Elio, and would be happy to share privately with anyone curious, that misrepresented the character of his practice and set a fake image. The real deal is really good, a single psychologist doing good work - but he positions himself in the as as head of some kind of group practice with a clerical staff and a supportive WE. In reality, he is all by himself, but that has its charms.

Anyway, the larger point about that is how he doesnt realize , in a small city of professionals, everyone sees everything like that. I didn't go looking for the ad.I checked my linked in, and it was there in the Sole Proprietors , Small Business, Go Local Group. He doesnt realize my best friend Brooke and I read Reddit psychoanalysis for ten years before I tried therapy bc we giggle over what her old supervisor comments there. It is like he thinks patients are somehow less then, or that they dont really exist outside of session so it's okay to tell factual lies. Who will know? I am sure in the military hospital as an expatriate treating Amrican military families there wasn't the same level just bumping into one another that you have in a small city and in a rural state, when your patients suddenly are the same basic level education that you have.

Something I learned from PC in a different threat is I spend too much time focusing on M and if I can trust him, maybe as a way to avoid myself.

In this care, I find myself actively trying to find myself and separate from M bc it has become synonymous with separating from regressions that goes on and on until it is not safe.

We are both hurting, M and me. We are both trying. But the dynamic has taken on a liftoff its own, and inside the dynamic I am sui for the first time in a long productive life and he is defensive to the point of me not being able reach him and not feeling reached by him even when he says all the right things.

I am so thankful beyond words to have you all at PC has a resource full of experiences and wisdom and insight. I need the other views and voices tonight off tunnel vision, that I cant survive without my special T and will not go on loving if we cant work this out. I have many who depend on e, and many people dogs, and places that I love. Why is it my intense relationship with my T renders all beautiful aspects of my life invisible, and all I can see is him?

Oh, SE, what you wrote, is really heartbreaking. I feel for you so much.

I don't have energy right now to write much longer but one thing is certain - you can survive without your special T even if it feels right now that you can't.

Thanks for writing it all down, SE.

I do not think the professional training, knowledge, and theory is sufficient to deal with this. Perhaps some therapists can -- I could speculate about why yours maybe can't, based on what you have written about him, but that's all it would be -- speculation.

I agree with feileacan, you can survive without your T. Like a tiny kid who may feel (rightly) they can't (probably can't) survive without their parent. . .maybe something got stuck there, for you? How to move, or grow, past that? Or around or through? I'm not sure I ever did, so I don't have any clues.

I have physically survived the loss of my trust in therapy, and therapists. But the survival isn't good, and I'm not sure it's worth anything to me or the people around me. I was convinced I had to, and could, and they could, work it out -- but they couldn't or wouldn't. And so what I was left to "work out" was acceptance of that about them.

I'm so sorry you're struggling with all of this Esme.

My favourite quote from Winnie the Pooh has always been " You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think." You can and you will get through this,

I know it's easy for me to say this but right now this T is not good for you, and you need to break the cycle. You're life is too high a price to pay to prove that he's got it right.

Your first paragraph is all about him and why you should trust him, but it doesn't work like that.At the end of the day the only person who knows what is best for you is you.

How did your neurofeed back session go?

I, too, found your most recent post quite heartbreaking. And also, uncomfortable, because there are many parallels and echoes in my own therapy. My T and I hit a crisis point a few months ago around the trauma bond/re-enactments/trauma loop, and things very nearly ended badly between us, which was unfathomable to me (but continuing in the same vein was also untenable). I, too, was dependent and was suffering so much in therapy, but could not bear the thought of leaving him. I think we are on the other side, now, and things feel different. I am happy to share the details of my journey and how we overcame, but I'd rather do so by PM. Let me know if you want to know more.

When he says he knows what's best for you, to me that is confirmation of his own sickness. That belief and sound mental health are mutually exclusive.

When he says he is not responsible for what happens after the session, that tells me therapy is mostly about him. Most therapists are like children... take no responsibility for their actions and very self-centered.

The basic model of intensive therapy -- pair wounded and traumatized people with mentally ill "healers", with no direct third party involvement -- is a disaster waiting to happen.

Hope you can put this right soon.

sending hugs your way SE

He hasn't earned your trust. You don't trust him. Therefore, he hasn't earned it. Just because he feels entitled doesn't mean he's earned anything. Sounds more like he's bullied and manipulated his way thus far, but he's too stupid to know that he's damaged the trust rather than earned it.

I certainly wouldn't call him a trustworthy therapist. Or person in general, for that matter. His behavior disgusts me and I hate that you're the one who is paying for his idiocy and all around selfish, self-congratulatory, arrogant, and narcissistic character.

In short, I hate his guts and hope he embarrasses himself somehow in public in front of children who laugh and point.

I'm so sorry SE, this must be an absolute nightmare for you. I know it feels like you can't possibly survive without your T, but as others have said you can and will. It's the child in you who depends on an adult to survive, but the adult part of you can know and tell the child that it's possible to walk away from this harmful relationship and survive. It sounds like you have many positives in your life and once you have walked away from this horrendous situation these will be a comfort to you again. Unfortunately, it's a situation where you will only realise this by taking the action. It's very much like the harmful effects of a drug addiction - your body craves the drug and seems to demonstrate that without it, you will die, whereas in fact you know in reality you HAVE to stop taking the drug or else the drug itself will cause more harm.

It's not quite the same, but I reached a point with T2 where I knew that I couldn't go any further with her. It wasn't a trauma bond, far from it, but I needed to go places that she wasn't comfortable with going, plus she didn't really do the whole transference thing, and I felt that needed more exploration than she was able to work with. I was desperately attached to this T, so much so that many times I sat up all night crying wondering how on earth I would survive without her. This was long before I even considered ending. I had a break of 3 weeks shortly before the ending and that made me realise I could stop seeing her. The relationship was becoming stressful in a way because I felt her resistance. But I left and found another T. Trust me SE I was so attached but I managed it.

Could you take a break from this T? You don't have to tell him you're thinking about ending. Would that be easier than going cold turkey? See how you feel on a break, it could be a trial separation, as it were. Maybe even spend the time researching other potential Ts, or simply break from therapy altogether for a bit. See what feels most doable for you.

One thing is for sure - it's not going to be healthy for you to stay with this T. Be prepared that if and when you do tell him you're leaving, he may well throw all kinds of promises and even manipulations at you to persuade you to stay. I experienced this with a very messy marriage ending. Don't fall for any promises or anything that makes you feel bad or guilty for walking away - a good T would be concerned that you find a T that is right for you, even if they lose out.

Hi SE, thanks for the update. I'm sorry. I can see your pain and confusion about this situation. It's ok to need and want your T to be everything you didn't have; to be your ally, protector, or savior.

Trust will come and go, it does in all relationships. Trust also might be limited to specific things. Trust is not a static thing and when someone does something that is clearly untrustworthy, how can you continue to trust them? Your T has lied to you on little things and on larger things.

The number one rule of therapy is that it is the time and place where it gets to be all about you. In fact, that is precisely what you are paying for, a time and place where it is all about you. Your T seems to continually make it or a large portion of it to be about him.

Your choice of words here stood out to me. Perhaps it's my own history that causes the visceral response to 'dismissed me'. What is going on that is leaving you feeling like he is dismissing you? Is this feeling in anyway related to the power imbalance that he's has created in your relationship? How does this power imbalance reflect or create the reenactment of your past?

It sounds like you have a good support in your BF. Regardless of the "right or wrong" of your T, it sounds things are not safe for you at this moment. Please take care of you and do what you need to do to find safety. It might not feel like you can live without your T; that's fine. However, you've made statements that clearly indicate that you are struggling to live with him in your life. Can you take a vacation? Not a break from therapy but a vacation where you are gone and therapy won't happen because of that. The reason I ask you this question, is because it seems like if you were to try to ask your T for a break, he would throw all kinds of things at you to try to prevent you from leaving. If you were to go on vacation, well that's just a vacation and the "break from therapy" is a by product of you going on vacation.

domestic violence trigger:

I question his training, because anyone with childhood trauma is going to have trust issues and will question their therapist periodically as different things come up and are processed through the relationship. He cannot accept whatever you are feeling as part of your process. He is unable to separate himself from your experience. And he is unwilling to adjust to meet a basic need or simple request (basically to stop the hard stuff earlier so you have some time in what should be a safe space to recompose yourself).

As I wrote you privately - projection, perception, protection. Protect yourself (even if that is from yourself) regardless if what you are experiencing is projection or perception. You can always explore if it was projection or perception once you are in a place of feeling safe. Right now, you don't feel safe, and your T doesn't feel safe anymore. If later, you realize your T wasn't some big jerk, so be it. You can always figure out how you'll handle that then. There will at least be a later.

I agree with this.

SE - I find so many commonalities in our experiences. I was deeply connected to my therapist too, but had major deterioration in my everyday life like you are mentioning. For me, it didn’t improve at all after many years and adversely impacted every relationship I have. Only once I could aknowledge that I was in an addictive, obsessive and toxic relationship could i take steps to break free.

Please take care of yourself and seek a second or third opinion about what is going on. I know leaving seems impossible, but if it’s something you need to do you CAN do it. I endured complete and total collapse after leaving therapy yet don’t regret it at all. I’m still nursing therapy wounds but after feeling so helpless for so many years, I think it’s natural to have some residual trauma. Every day you lose to therapy misery is a day you can’t get back.

SE - I just received a book in the mail yesterday. I’m forgetting the name, but it’s one that you recommended perhaps on a different thread. It’s about therapy impasses, ruptures, 2nd consultations, etc. I just skimmed it last night, but it made me think of you, especially since you were the one who recommended it. I couldn’t help but think of how it might be useful to your current situation. Or maybe it would just serve to get you lost in the intellectual pursuits of reading a book. Anyway, hugs. This is really tough, and a lot of us are thinking of you.

The phrasing "dismissed me" also stood out to me. It conjured images of being in the principal's office. Power and authority. Things that he seems to thrive on. I've never once felt dismissed from my therapist's office. I know this is so hard for you. It breaks my heart that the only way you could go forward with therapy was by giving in to his views. That would make me feel absolutely defeated and I would be half-heartedly doing therapy. He is so rigid and set in his ways. I really think you could find a therapist who would be a better fit for you, but I also understand why you're hesitant to leave. I hope you're doing okay today.

So much happened in the last few weeks. The help here gave me perspective and more resolve not to get so cowering and people - pleasing, going to any lengths to mollify my T.

Since he defined resolving our impasse as my trusting him with gruesome and graphic childhood details, and I forced myself to say them , I felt both that I sold myself out and he sold me out too.

Mixed into all this was the logistics and his excitement about changing locations and turning his private practice to a group one, of which he would be “ Director” and his wife would be office manger and receptionist. The mix of my past with his present was surreal. It felt fairly callous, and I felt some crucial trust slipping away and an igniting of cynicism.

I looked at real life resume red flags I’d ignored, and terminated.

I went to a psychoanalyst who wrote a book I admire for three sessions . I figured out that my T is the right person with the wrong modality. Some of his training seems forty years out of date, even though he is relatively young ( we are the same age).

My T responded by saying he cleared the morning , and I could say when the session ended. He said he thought and thought about where we went wrong after years of good work, and he believed he should never have said he worried I saw him as failing me over and over. That he asked me to meet his needs without meaning to, and since then I edited what I said to only things showing progress.

I said the stairwell breakdowns in isolation from him, not being able to communicate about not containing emotion safely after session, and having to reel it in on my own or failing to do so made me lose confidence . Once I knew I had given all that was asked of me as proof of trust, I got bitter. I wondered if he had the real skills and experience to treat me, or if he wanted out now that he was busier, and that he took me on explicitly welcoming the challenge of “ Capital T” trauma, and now he was leaving me half way through the woods. I said I would see the psychoanalyst instead.

He was great in that moment, not defensive or my way or the high way. He said he realized cutting of at 45 minutes dogmatically made me feel like another brick in the wall, like one unit left and another unit came in. He meant the strict boundary to give me what my parents didn’t, but that he had gone too far bc now I didn’t see him as caring at all when he cares very much and is himself very invested in our relationship and doesn’t want to lose it to poor communication overshadowing truly pure and deeply caring intention.

He said he was authoritative not authoriatarian. I said even that connoted parent and child. I did not think a female csa patient needed a male vested in his own authority rather than the sharing of power , capacity for collaboration, and an eye to win- win scenarios . He said he was used to being “Doc” in a military chain of command , but he did see me as an equal and was wholly invested in my autonomy and voice of my own.

There is much more, but that is the jist. I was touched by the gesture of immense listening by letting me have so much time ( I used 90 minutes , not the whole morning). On the other hand, I wonder why it took such extreme measures to get him to show me the simple respect of really listening.

He said our relationship is layered. I said it is not at all romantic, but is is romanticized in the sense that we talk about ugly things but speak and write in touching turns of phrase, metaphor, and literary references that somehow try to mitigate the harsh truth. He agreed that met both our needs, but didn’t fit his modality in the way it squarely exemplifies psychoanalysis.

It was the most honest conversation we’ve ever had. He even agreed I could ask for a double session if I noticed I was not verbalizing things that were important bc of the way tight boundaries around short time periods heighten the pressure. For him, that is huge compromise.

By a week from Monday, I have to choose what to do as I cannot see both. The psychoansnlyst is 70 years old, and I loved his book Needed Relationships: a holistic guide to psychoanalytic healing. He is impeccable, and has the respect of the community here, the other psychologists and is in his final decade of a storied career. He retired to
my state from Chicago by a huge stroke of good luck. He says he is a very “clean” psychologist , and would be good for me bc I won’t find him enigmatic. He thinks prolonged exposure therapy etc is inhumane. My T said we are not doing that anyway.

But with my long term and first ever T there is a strong bond, perhaps a trauma bond , half unhealthy half productive and full of feelings. I am mindful that the reason I was able to collect and center myself is ironically bc my regular T has seen me through an end to the lifelong defense of dissociation , and helped me advocate for myself outside therapy. Everyone is in agreement we accomplished about ten years of therapy in three . One last thing my T said is he is known for a distinct style in his practice of therapy. It is let’s go , let’s go for it, let’s push for change and progress. He said some people openly say “ I don’t like you and leave.” while others progress with him after years of spinning wheels with other therapists. He said since I am afraid to disappoint him and I am one of those hard workers who needs an A or feel crushed that he pushes me too hard to fast without knowing it. The combination lets us accomplish so much, but doesn’t allow the healing power of simple time to do its job . Bad defenses do get efficiently dismantled but coping skills of a healthier order don’t take the place of the old defenses. Meanwhile my busy job and life demand good people skills, so the psychic pressure rises and rises and rises. My T says he suddenly sees this, and appreciates that I got the consultation.

I’m not sure what to do. My heart wants to stay with my T, but I suspect there’s a troubled aspect to the layers that will cycle again. I fear this heart to heart moment will recede as the “crisis” recedes. I am glad to know he cares so much, as before he seemed very remote and rigid.

The psychoanalyst is the one person in my immediate reach who is clearly a top therapist at the height and end top of a storied career full of ideals and s sense of calling to both the profession and his clients. In a practical sense, doesn’t take insurance and I don’t know that I can afford to see him.

But I am positive he has no red flags , and I was blown away by the respect I felt ensnuing from him and his level of insight and curiosity. The modality is so much more human to human, in service of all people helping each other whereas my regular T is very invested in being what he calls “ an authoritative doctor”.

That is where I am- your feedback helped me find a center away from the situation. That is the only time I have ever has truly sui thoughts and plans , and the seeming indifference of my T started to seem negligent after talking about it here , rather than me utterly failing my T and having no where else to go.

Thank you for this place and space . I do feel
The combined wisdom here is worth 10000000 PhDs in clinical psychology . I found the strength here that my T might be wrong, instead of me failing and being a bad patient and that the truth lies between these extremes.

Therapy helps me but it could also have been fatal . It’s powerful , and when gone off the rails can do the damage it is chartered to heal. I do believe in therapy, both that it can heal or endanger when the client is fragile. I hope I am less fragile for having advocated for myself, and I would have done that without PC.

Thanks for the update, SE. I had been wondering how things were going with you and I’m curious which T you will choose to see for now. You were brave to seek a consultation with another T. He sounds wonderful, but I understand that the decision is complex. Hugs.

I am sorry you are going through this.

Trauma work is painful and requires a lot of work on both the patient and client side. Often where there is trauma there is trust issues. It sounds like you rightfully so struggle with trust and your T doesnt know how to handle it. With my therapist we know trust work and trauma work can be like a dance. She is willing to participate in the dance and always allow me to lead. It sounds like your T struggles with the dance (maybe I am wrong)

His job is to be sure you are safe to leave. To make sure you are grounded and okay to leave. Yes you can be sad and such but safe. It is his job to manage the tune di that he shifts the focus during your appointment so when the time is up you are okay to leave.

It sounds like he isn't a good theraputic fit for you but I also know how daunting it is to even consider seeing somebody else. I am thinking about you

I would not go near anyone who described themselves as an "authoritative doctor"

I completely agree!!!