Therapist terminated….again

So on Monday my therapist terminated via email for the second time after two and a half years of twice weekly sessions. He terminated last year but then contacted me to say he believed he had made a mistake.
I tentatively went back as I am so deeply attached to him and we were able to get back on track and things seemed really positive.
But then we hit another rough patch, I fell back in to a repeated behaviour pattern of getting frustrated with him for not meeting my needs (blinded by paternal transference which I couldn’t see at the time). He encouraged me to express that anger towards him and I ended up sending him an email saying some not nice stuff because I wanting to try and hurt him.
He then responded and said that he felt the therapy was beginning to cause me harm and therefore it wasn’t right to continue. He offered a few closures sessions but I said I felt like all I would be doing was trying to beg him to change his mind.
I have major attachment and abandonment issues and this has totally devastated me, to the point where I don’t see how I’m ever going to move on.
He was the only meaningful relationship in my life and knew that doing this would destroy me.
In some ways I understand why, I kept repeating the same behaviours, blinded by paternal transference, and getting angry at him and lashing out because he wouldn’t fulfill all of my needs. I feel like the termination was a punishment for being angry, even though he told me it was ok to express my anger at him.
I’ve had all of these realisations since he ended things, that I know if I had realised before we wouldn’t be in this position. I’ve emailed him a couple of times to let him know I can totally see where I went wrong and how that prevented me from doing the proper work and how I believe we could have a totally different relationship now I have had these realisations, but he isn’t responding to my emails, I think he may have blocked my email address which is killing me.
I can’t move past the hope of him changing his mind. I don’t want to go to another therapist, I just want him. I am so deeply deeply attached, I can’t let go. There is no way I can trust someone new and I can’t go through my whole traumatic history all over again.
I can’t eat or sleep and have had to call in sick at work because I can’t think about anything but him. I can’t stop crying and I’m so angry at myself for messing things up yet again. I know we can do amazing work together, if he just gives me another chance but I don’t think he’s ever going to and I don’t see how I accept that.

I'm so sorry, KLL. He should not have terminated you for this. He perhaps could have sought supervision/consultation on how best to handle it. But it was wrong for him to just terminate you without giving you the choice. It would also be very wrong for him to have blocked your email.

It is possible that if he thinks you've officially terminated, he may not feel he should respond if he's not officially your therapist anymore. But he also should tell you if that is the case. Like to say he won't respond in detail over email but potentially offer to have another session if you want to continue.

Please try not to blame this on yourself. This is not your fault for being attached. It's his fault for not knowing how to handle it in a way that helps rather than hurts you. And if he doesn't know, to figure it out. Or to admit he doesn't know, but leave the decision on whether to terminate up to you.

Hugs, if wanted...

This is an extremely distressing and potentially retraumatising event for you to experience. Those of us here who have experienced an unethical ending to our therapy understand how devastating this can be. It's heartbreaking.

Be clear about one thing - he did not terminate because there is something faulty with you. Your anger, needs, attachment, all of you has a place in therapy and therapy is precisely the place where you should be able to explore these aspects of yourself. He has ended the therapy because of his shortcomings. What you describe is unethical and harmful, that lies with him.

My therapy ended abruptly and unethically two years ago. I am still processing it and am now on my second therapist since the ending. It's hard. It does become less painful, as impossible as that might feel for you now.

Also, something which has helped me is understanding that different parts of me responded differently and wanted different things. One part of me wanted (wants) her back at any cost and yearns for contact with her. That part has become smaller and less demanding as time has ticked on. Another part was angry, another part was grieving, and so on. These different parts also had different timescales, some responded quickly, some are still processing.

It strikes me that there is a part of you who is desperate to negotiate at any cost to yourself. That is not the totality of your response and be careful about allowing that part to dominate. Listen to the other parts of yourself too, they will want something different and some of them might be protective and wise, bringing you to safety.

I agree with the others. Your transference and anger are normal parts of therapy...even life! You are NOT bad for these things.

L says to "come as you are". I'm allowed to be angry. I'm even allow to slam a door. I just can't physically harm her or anything, of course. She says big needs and big feelings are okay.

Your T encouraging you to express your feelings, in my opinion, was healthy. However, to then turn around and punish you for those feelings, is wrong on his part.

And yes, because he knows of your transference and issues, he should have done a better termination IF that was necessary (which I don't believe was). To terminate via email is inappropriate. And if he blocked your email, that's inappropriate too. Even my ex-T didn't block me!

I'm sorry you're going through this. Again you are not bad. And it does get easier, but it takes time. I don't know if it fully goes away, but it gets better. And sometimes, you wind up finding someone even better! After ex-T I found T and then L. So in a sense I'm now grateful ex-T let me go. I know it doesn't feel like that bow for you, but I say that as there is hope even after this horrible experience.

Thank you all. I’m just utterly bereft and so very confused. I sent a text telling him that I had changed my mind about a closure session and would like to come tomorrow as suggested and that has also been completely ignored. I genuinely think he’s blocked all forms of communication with me.
I keep thinking about all the things I should have done and said to have prevented this. He’s a good, ethical therapist so I’m completely in shock that this is happening. He was always the one who believed we could find a way forward.
I can’t understand why he would not be willing to give it another try when I’ve explained how I can see now where I was going wrong, how I can change that and the difference that would make for us to be able to do the work. If he genuinely did end it because he thought he wasn’t helping, surely by me recognising all these things he should be willing to give it another try?
I feel like he really must have hated me to do this.

I'm so sorry. Have you tried calling him? I'm not sure if there's a way to tell if you've been blocked when calling or not. Does he just have a cell or does he have some sort of office phone? Option d is to mail him a letter, though that would take a little time. Or, I suppose, drop it at his office, if it's someplace other than his house (if his office is at his home, that could be problematic).

His behaviour around these terminations indicates that this is not a full and complete description of his practice. It took me a long time to get to a point where I could accept and understand the differing and often contradictory aspects of my therapist, her character, and her practice. However, once these aspects became clearer to me, the mess began to become a bit more tolerable.

I haven’t called him as I have real issues with phone anxiety. He only has a cell as he’s in private practice, and I think turning up at his office would make me look like a stalker.

I just don’t know how to get over the feelings of yet another person not wanting me. That I’m too much and too needy, which he always told me I wasn’t. But clearly I am. And I know this reaction is all stemming from the transference again, I just feel so powerless and helpless.

I know how devastating it feels to suddenly have therapy terminated by email. I'm so sorry you are going through this.

Having been given no explanation other than he felt therapy was beginning to cause you harm, which seems a bit of a cop-out in my view, it sounds to me as though there might have been some counter-transference going on with him, which he wasn't willing to face or work on in his own supervision.

His sudden inability to continue working with you says more about him than it does about you. His inability. His failure. His shortcomings. I know that's little comfort to you, being the one who is desperately hurting in all of this, but hopfully it will help you to keep in mind that the fault is all on him, not on anything you did wrong.

My therapist have terminated a couple times