“Wanting” to be mad at T

Ugh. My brain seems to be wanting to be mad at T. We have been processing a lot of trauma. Two weeks ago we had a long session and were back to our usual one hour this week. He read me a book that kicked up all sorts of stuff... and I just seem to be looking for excuses to be mad at him. I got a different picture of him that is more current than the one on his web page. His face looks much more like what I see in session but his clothes make him look more masculine. I seem to want to be upset by that. In session Monday he played a song on his phone for me. While pulling up the song a text message came in and he glanced at it momentarily before realizing what he did. I want to be mad about that. Another T in the same building is an art therapist and a couple weeks ago he shared with her (with permission) some of the art I am using to process. I did a new project in the sequence and asked him to show her seeing as she had seen the others. T was excited I asked him to show her... I want to be upset with him for that.

I know what’s really going on. I’m remembering loosing what little human contact I got as a child. I am remembering multiple losses of and abandonment by my primary caregivers... H jumped up and down on the abandonment button during a fight last week...

But I am so tired of this constant battle in my head this week to not blow things up with T.

I am constantly mad at my T. Usually for no good reason except that he is doing his job and pushing me to get better.

Sometimes I get nad at him for a good reason which I will eventually bring up and we will discuss.

All of my friends tell me to stop being mad at him and give him a chance. He is only doing his job and wgat is best for me. I am still constantly annoyed with him and hate going to sessions.

Hugs i too sometimes want my t to be mad at me too. I feel like i will get her angry at me very soon like with my other t's i have had

I am fortunate to know that if I do blow up at T he won’t get angry or push me away. He gets very calm and nurturing when I get triggered or angry. It would take a lot to get him angry. I am pretty confident anything that the only way I could really get him angry would be to do something that impacted his home and or family. Anything with him at the office I don’t think could get him mad... but... if I did something stupid I would feel really ashamed and I don’t feel like working with him on shame yet.

Oh, I can definitely relate! I am really sorry to hear that you're struggling with this. Your post made so much sense to me. I struggle with something very similar. It's exhausting. Even on weeks like this one where I'm a bit out of 'specific' examples of how T has "failed" me.

I am currently driving myself nuts. T made a fairly personal self-disclosure last week. I spent the following week driving myself out of my mind. I kept coming up with more and more reasons to be angry at T. I continued to spiral and spiral until my obsession with my therapy relationship started to absorb every waking moment of my life. FUN.

Then I went in for yesterday's session and became even more worked up and can't stop fueling the fire of my raging desire to quit. Except for the part of me that would be heartbroken if I did quit. I'd miss T and I'd miss the hope that I would be able to keep getting better. But the hell with those stupid feelings, since I don't want them to matter right now.

Normally I find his self-disclosure helpful and .. comforting, I guess would be the right word? Well, I mean, I used to react that way. But THIS week he said that he's observed that his self-disclosure is typically helpful for me. Um yeah, that WAS true, but now that I have heard him speak about it, no FREAKING WAY will I be participating in that mortifying little scenario anymore. Ever since he made that comment I have been repeatedly making plans to meet any level of disclosure with stony silence or rudeness. Because I apparently enjoy ruining things that provide me comfort and assistance.

Reasons I want to be upset with T:

• He caught me off guard with his disclosure & I'm certain he had no idea it would affect me as much as it has. (Because I can read his mind and I know everything. No faulty logic here.)
• I don't know why he shared with me. (Yet I have come up with a way to be angry at every possible reason I can imagine on my own. I am pretty sure I want to ask him this question JUST so I can be angry at whatever he says in response.)
• I don't think he's actually done enough work in his own therapy. (Based on .. little to no information, but who needs actual facts at this point, I say!)
• Therapy is a disorganized mess and I never understand what he's trying to get at.
• T lets me ramble on about nonsense all the time and we don't do anything productive. I have to be 'in charge' and I'm a hot mess.
• I now HAVE TO reject all of his self-disclosure.
• I want to reject anything that makes me feel warm and fuzzy about T or therapy. (At this point it's a bit like my inner stopdog has started freebasing cocaine.)
• T has failed me and everything has changed since his disclosure. (The fact that our relationship has not changed & the fact that there's a part of me that trusts things will be okay between the two of us MAKES ME SUPER UNCOMFORTABLE AND EVEN MORE ANGRY.)
• My therapy is supposed to be about me. (Which is also quite literally the first thing T said to me after he shared the info about himself, but whatever, let's just disregard that fact since it doesn't support my unjustified anger. )
• Actually, wait, his telling me that my therapy is about me cut me off and prevented me from asking questions and/or expressing myself. (Despite the fact that he also told me I was allowed to ask him any questions I'd like. Seriously people, I am SO SICK of this guy being a good therapist. It's like he's FORCING me to look back at myself instead. He's not screwing up enough stuff to be a proper distraction.)

The actual issues
(AKA the list of things I am trying to distract myself from):

• I feel like I am lying about my CSA. I feel like T sees through all of my lies and can see lies that I am not even aware are not true.
• Hell, I feel like I am lying about all of my feelings in therapy. I feel like T is just waiting for the right moment to help me work on my problem with exaggerating and lying and attention-mongering.
• I have huge problems with intimacy and vulnerability and I'm reacting to my own feelings of closeness that arose after he shared something personal with me. (No warm feelings towards T!!! KILL IT WITH FIRE!!)
• T had to move next week's session from my normal Tuesday to Friday. I refuse to acknowledge that it is hard for me to go longer than a week between sessions. Instead I am ignoring those feelings & reminding myself that I need/want/must quit therapy because I hate T. This is a super time-consuming and draining activity, yet I insist upon continuing to fuel the fire, rather than comfort myself.
• I now have a part that is terrified that my garbage behavior will prevent T from sharing anything with me ever again. Pretty brave of her to admit this when there are a million other parts screaming at her to shut up.

I can relate to this , it's a sign your therapy is going well ( although it may not feel like it ! ) I talked to my T in session this week about you and your T because I could see similarities and the insight I was getting. I think some of what comes up is conscious and we can see it , but what's unconscious often feels like just a sort of inner turmoil which we try to express in some way , sometimes it's anger. I'm sure your T will handle this well and see it as progress. I remember my T handling both positive and negative transference extremely well when I was experiencing it. Hugs.