[hopealwayz]

I’m so nervous about my session tomorrow because of the stuff that I have to talk about.

[hopealwayz]

I have to explain all the stuff that I told him in my email.

[zoiecat]

Don't be stressed. This is his job. I'm sure you will not saying anything he has not heard before. Your T needs to hear about what is going on with you. Most of the time we are nervous about saying things because it is our stuff and embarrassing or upsetting to us. We forget that our T has probably hear it all before; it takes a lot to shock them. Write it down and hand it to him if you feel you will be too nervous to say it out loud. Good luck. You will be fine and I'm sure he will be kind.

[liveitfullordie]

it's okay to be nervous

[Purple,Violet,Blue]

Thinking of you.

[Fuzzybear]

I'm thinking of you

[hopealwayz]

Thanks everyone. I’m truly dreading this. I really don’t want to go.

[velcro003]

You got this, Hope. Your sessions generally seem to go well despite your anxiety.

[Purple,Violet,Blue]

Let us know how you are.

[Taylor27]

Thinking about you Hope. I hope you had a good session hugs

[hopealwayz]

It was horrible!! I regret going because it was a waste of time and money. He lectured me for the entire session about what I did wrong. So now I didn’t get any painful stuff off of my chest and I’m at home both in pain and disappointed. He seems like he has changed. He used to listen and be empathetic.

I think it’s over with us.

[LonesomeTonight]

I'm so sorry, Hope...

[velcro003]

Aww hope, I'm sorry.

[nottrustin]

Originally Posted by hopealwayz

It was horrible!! I regret going because it was a waste of time and money. He lectured me for the entire session about what I did wrong. So now I didn’t get any painful stuff off of my chest and I’m at home both in pain and disappointed. He seems like he has changed. He used to listen and be empathetic.

I think it’s over with us.

do you want to tell us some of what he said?

[hopealwayz]

He was lecturing me about what happened when I had a meltdown. I called and emailed a bunch of times and I don’t even remember what it was about. I apologized and told him that I had been up for 4 days and I was out of my meds and I didn’t mean to do that.

He said the rule was that I could send 1 email the night before a session and if I was having a difficult day and needed to talk to him, I can call and then wait patiently for him to call me back.

I was confused because he also scolded me for sending an email asking when my appointment was and I told him that if I hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t have been there because I had the time wrong.

I understand why he wanted to discuss these things and I don’t have a problem with that.

The problem for me is the fact that he repeated it for the entire session so I feel like that was a waste of time and money.

I’m so upset at him right now and I really don’t want to see him for a while.

How do I get past this?

I actually felt like quitting today. I miss how he used to be. I feel like he doesn’t listen to me and I can’t sense any empathetic feelings.

I no longer feel any connection with him.

I feel like I’m battling these monsters alone.

[Shotokan]

I am sorry that things didn't go well today. You might want to find ways to distract yourself from contacting him or his office staff. You could call the crisis hotline instead. I state this because it sounds like you are contacting them too much. If I remember correctly, you had a problem with excessively emailing your former psychiatrist. You don't want to get into trouble again nor do you want him to stop seeing you. Or he may just no longer allow email or any contact between sessions. I know some therapists do operate that way. Anyway, by constantly breaking his boundaries, the aforementioned could happen.

I am not saying any of this to be mean. I am saying this to help you avoid further pain.

[divine1966]

I am concerned why are you often off meds. It might be the root of ongoing problem. You were acting irrationally but then it turns out you are off your meds. It happens quite often. Could it be that thats what he lectured you on?

He is a psychiatrist and he prescribes you meds but then you don’t take them and it results in some behaviors that aren’t productive..

Can you not afford meds? You mentioned that you’d not qualify for state assistance because you have money left to you in a trust. Can you use money in a trust for your meds so you don’t run out?

It’s extremely bad idea to not take your meds as prescribed.

Would you consider applying for disability if you are unable to work? You were under psychiatric care for so long, you gave ton of evidence of having hard time. You can apply online and see what happens

I also wonder if seeing psychiatrist for therapy is too expensive as you have no health insurance. I’d think psychiatrist charges more for a visit than therapist would? Or same?

[hopealwayz]

I didn’t have my meds because I didn’t have a ride to the pharmacy.

Therapy with him costs the same as it did with the last LPC therapist I’ve had.

I was doing well for awhile and then I fell into a dark hole.

If I frequently call or text the office, he’s not going to work with me anymore.

However, I think I’m quitting and not going back.

[hopealwayz]

I’m really sad and hurting right now. I really liked working with him but I just don’t know how to get past what I’m feeling. I’m disappointed and angry at him. He said that I can come in there angry but right now, I don’t even want to see him. It doesn’t seem too far gone and it seems that I still have a chance to try to work on the relationship with him but I don’t know why I should because he doesn’t really care about me.

[Shotokan]

I am sure that he does care about you. But, he can't work with you if you keep breaking boundaries that he sets. Why do you need to contact the office so much? You can call or text the crisis hotline if you need help outside of your sessions.

As for getting meds and getting around, there should be disability transportation in your area. It is available for psychiatric patients. You should look into this.

It would be a good idea to try for disability transportation, medicaid, and disability. Trying to get help, would be a much better use of your time than contacting them.

[divine1966]

Your treatment is about you and not about him. If you didn’t find him helpful it would be ok to switch therapists but all the other ones ended up not being helpful in the past either. In fact none were. I felt like this doctor is a bit more helpful in some sense. I see no point in quitting him. Plus you need him for prescriptions too. Just give it more time with him. If you do switch I highly recommend you go for female t and see if that makes a difference?

I think if he absolutely didn’t care about his patients he’d be in a different profession. I am sure he cares. That’s why he keeps giving you suggestions.

It’s ok to be angry at him. I felt angry once at my primary doctor when he suggested I should lose weight if I want to improve my digestive health. I felt offended because I don’t feel I am huge or anything. But he was right about what I needed to do.

Quitting seeing him because he said I’d benefit from losing weight wouldn’t get me into better health. Same here: quitting seeing your pdoc isn’t going to make you better.

Can you arrange meds delivery? So you don’t have to pick it up? I know people do that. It comes to your house

[hopealwayz]

I know deep down I don’t want to quit with him but how can I get past these feelings?

[Merope]

I’m sorry you’re hurting., Hope. I don’t think that stopping therapy with him is a good idea at the moment. Correct me if I’m wrong, but you felt this way before with a previous t, and when you tried working through the feelings, you felt like he cared again? I guess what I’m trying to say is that when we are being emotional it’s hard to see things clearly and we jump to conclusions that are not accurate.

I’m not necessarily saying that taking a whole session to tell you off is good, but it might be worth fighting the urge to run away and just go to your next session feeling whatever you are feeling (even if that is anger).

From experience, people aren’t as black and white as “he told me off therefore he doesn’t care about me anymore”. You can deeply care about someone and be stern about boundaries at the same time. Plus, it’s not exactly untrue. I’m not trying be mean but this does seem to be a pattern—you emailing a therapists a bit too much and then feeling like they don’t care about you when they uphold their boundaries.

I’m sorry if I’m overstepping, but I think it might be a good idea for you to look through your past posts on here and see if you recognise this pattern (boundary talk=they don’t care about me/I’m going to leave). Might be a good idea to take this to your next session and explore it a bit? Change is not going to happen unless you at least try to tune down the emotional responses (easier said than done, I know ) and think about things a bit more pragmatically.

I wish you all the best.

[ArtleyWilkins]

Originally Posted by hopealwayz

I know deep down I don’t want to quit with him but how can I get past these feelings?

Just let the feelings be the feelings for awhile. They’re just feelings; they won’t actually hurt you. They are just uncomfortable. They will start to subside just given a little time and space.

I agree that not consistently staying on your medications is adding to your problems. Going off meds once can create issues simply from discontinuation, but the on and off and on and off actually creates more issues than that and can start making the medications even less effective. You wrote in another thread about wanting him to put you on depakote, but the issue you have of not being consistent with your medications is another reason that is not a good idea. Can you speak to the person responsible for your trust about needing access to more funds to repair your car and maintain your health? It seems like something could be done there.

[hopealwayz]

I have been doing a poor job with the medications and the off/on stuff. I think that probably confuses my brain and effects my emotions and behaviors.