So very confused

I have a bad bad crush on my CBT T and I've never told him about it but there are moments where I think he knows. I did not originally see him for relationship issues so it feels weird to bring it up so I haven't so far.

I am seeing him in part to tackle health management issues…and a phobia and anxiety management.

Why am I confused? I have a crush on him but I'm pretty realistic about how that will never become anything. He wears a wedding band and it never bothered me too much.
So why does the fact that he has a daughter hurt so much more than knowing he is married.

He does not self disclose much, but today he told me an anecdote in which he told about how he and his daughter did something athletic together recently.
I am torn--happy he self disclosed and horribly horribly jealous of his daughter. I'm in pain over this but that's stupid…He's in his 50's or 60's of course he has an established life and family.

Do I tell him how much this hurts or will it keep him from disclosing anything more? I even feel like quitting. He has these people in his life, why should he care about me or if I'm in pain, or care if I get better or not?

Just a thought...could it be that you also have some paternal transference for him? That can coexist with attraction--I know, since I've been there (marriage counselor). Mostly just paternal transference for me now. I think for me, it was like, "I'm drawn to this person, I feel safe with him, I want to be around him--it must be that I'm attracted to him!" So then my brain started going in that direction. But then I came to gradually realize for various reasons that it's more paternal (even though in my case he's only 12 years older). And the paternal stuff has hurt in a way that more romantic/erotic stuff wouldn't. (Mine also has a daughter that he talks about some, but she's a teenager).

So if you wanted to talk to him about it, you could say you think you might be feeling some paternal transference. Again, just a thought. (And I've been told it can be completely normal to feel both that and the attraction, too--nothing weird and incestual going on or anything.)

Thanks, LT. I know what you mean, that he is oddly feeling like a parental figure all of the sudden.

I am familiar with more paternal transference feelings, due to the relationship with my longer term T. Long term T , I met when I was still practically a kid so that makes sense.

With CBT T, I felt attraction from the start, so feeling jealous of his daughter took me by surprise.

I wish I could just fess up with him and talk to him openly about it. It might even be a relief. I'm in a lot of pain, having a whole week to wait to discuss it, if at all.

I bypass the " jealous of his kids" thing and go straight to "i wont allow THAT kind of language when im their stepmother!" attitude. Youre not the only person who believes in the tooth fairy! lol but you shoulda seen ts eyes when i said that. But you shoulda seen mine when he told me what his daughter said!

Jeez....I'm torn about sharing this with you but I will. Things changed with the relationship between my T and I (female) after I disclosed something similar (T and her daughter talk). Things changed to the point that I'm afraid, months later, that things will never feel the same again. If I could take back that disclosure, I would. Because yes, the disclosures became much less, for awhile nothing at all, and our relationship changed. I've been fighting hard to try to get that back. I go from having pure respectful love for her (non sexual) to being SO angry with her I want to quit. This has been going on since March for me. I would give anything to take back some things I said in February, some things I admitted to I mean, because things changed drastically after that, and has only put me in a worse place. She says it's not the disclosures. But the timing is just too "coincidental." But, T chose to bring her daughter into my sessions quite often, and I finally had to respectfully tell her that was triggering to me. I didn't want the disclosures to stop completely, but I didn't want her daughter to come up as often as she was. I have a great T. I greatly respect her and would recommend her to anyone. I think most people who aren't quite as screwed up in the head like I am would work wonders on themselves while working with her. I think I'm just too far damaged. And in some way, my disclosures didn't help that. I'm still hurting, months later. But I continue to go in twice a week like a robot, whether I'm engaged in the session or not. I see her in 12.5 hours. I'm afraid, by the mood I'm already in, that I'm not going to be too vocal or receptive during my session...I'm afraid I'll just curl up in a ball and shut down. The bad thing is, there is pressure too, as after today, I will miss two sessions as she's going away (she used to tell me what she was doing....but she hasn't said a word, and I haven't asked.) I hope your T is different. But I wanted to share what happened with mine. She says that's not it. BUT. The timing is too perfect, and if not that, she will NOT tell me what it was then. I put it all together right away. In fact, I fought to tell her. I said I was afraid things would change. She said "nothing will change here" (if I disclosed), so I believed her and disclosed. I swear, everything that meant something to me changed after that. I want my trust in her back more than anything, and I've been trying real hard. I feel like I'm too broken for therapy. The boundaries are too difficult, I'm not strong enough to handle them. All I see is rejection. That's all I see everywhere.

Thank you for this!! I do get this, and worry that I will put the brakes on his self-disclosure. Bun then again part of me wants to try to break things, to see if this therapy relationship is truly strong enough to be worth doing in the first place.

For what it's worth, I think what you did was needed. She needs to know that the topic of her daughter hurts you so much. I bet you two will work through it, maybe it will take some time.

I am similar in the sense that any shift in the therapy atmosphere feels like rejection. I'm in the "boundary haters" club too.

Let us know how it goes!!

This is all interesting because I'm gradually feeling okay with my T being married and having a personal life but when she mentioned having kids around on vacation, it was strangely threatening to me. They aren't her kids, but still. I was jealous. I think therapists should avoid mentioning their kids, their spouses kids, family kids generally. Like Musinglizzy says, it can be very triggering.

Growly, you can say matter of factly that your T's mention of his kids was unhelpful and you'd like to avoid that in the future. And no he does'nt need to analyze your feelings on the topic. It's on him, not you.

Fellow member of the "boundary haters club" here!

It must be the opposite for me. I prefer that T is married with kids even though I don't know how many or how old, because I know that he knows how hard work marriage and kids are. He knows the challenges that come with school holidays and how scared I am that I'll screw them up. It helps that he's around my age because of the generational differences.