[nutters]

Well I've joined the ET club I guess and I need a bit of advice. Here's a bit of an explanation of what I'm experiencing, my thoughts and questions on how to address the matter...

My T is also my pdoc and I was originally seeing him for meds until I no longer had a therapist and needed a new one. I started having sexual fantasies about him probably after the fourth visit for med check-ups, there isn't any romantic feelings or desires there, it's strictly sexual fantasies. While I'm in session I don't think about it at all but it's between sessions is where I'm thinking about it and a lot! I do think it is the reason why I'm having a hard time with eye contact though and perhaps may be part of the reason I'm having a hard time opening up more.

In a recent session with him I got the feeling he has a suspicion when I was having a hard time opening up, he asked "is there something between us." I of course lied and said no because I wasn't prepared to go there. The more I think about this the more I want to have the discussion and get it out of the way.

What's interesting to me is that I'm bi, well I lean heavily on the lesbian end, meaning I am romantically and sexually attracted to women. As far as men, its sexual attraction but very rare and I have no interest in dating them. So as you can see I felt completely blind sided by just how intense these feelings have become and how often I think about it.

I have a feeling it will be brought up by him again but part of me just wants to bring it up and get the cat out of the bag so I can get it over with now and move on. He has a lot of experience under his belt (no pun intended) and I get the feeling he would be able to handle the discussion... I hope.

So I guess my questions are:

1. Do I just go for it and say, "hey, I have something on my mind and I need to just get it out there and out of the way..."
2. Do I wait for him to bring it up again at the risk of me being nervous, having eye contact issues (which is worse since the transference), and not being able to talk as much lately? Who knows how long it will be until it comes up again if I wait.

I feel I'm able to bring it up and talk about it, that uncomfortable topic is the least of my worries, it's the risk of it going wrong and he doesn't handle it well.

Your thoughts are greatly appreciated.

[RedSun]

I think if you are confident to bring it up, then do that? As then you won't feel so nervous, waiting to see if he mentions it. Worst case scenario really is that he is shocked or embarrassed, either way he will probably recover quickly and talk it through.
But, as you say, he has experience so he will probably manage it fine. Good luck!

[Soccer mom]

I think you should bring it up. I told my T. and it helped but I still have it. Interestingly, when I described my transference to potential T. about soon-to-be old T, I later emailed her about the ET. She said she suspected it. Yikes! So, he might not be surprised and may have asked that question to try to help you talk about it.

[Chummy]

It better to bring it up yourself. He has asked it and you denied it, so he might think there's nothing and won't bring it up again (soon). Or he still thinks there's something, but because you denied it he waits until you want to talk about it.
If he meant with ''something between us'' ET, then he might know how to handle it. He asked you, so it's probably not something he'd want to ignore.

[nutters]

Alright, I'll just have to bring it up perhaps by playing stupid and ask what he meant when he said "is there something between us", even though I knew what he meant. I just want to get this out of the way so hopefully it goes away and doesn't interfere with my progress.

[iheartjacques]

I didn't. It went away by itself.

[nutters]

I came really close the other day to bringing it up in session but I failed to do so. The ET is bad, real bad. Next week I'm going to bring it up, I have to, these thoughts are going on far too often.

EDIT: I also suspect some countertransference as well as I have noticed our last few sessions he has looked away from me a few times when I met his eyes or if I held eye contact longer than I usually do -- btw, he keeps consistent eye contact but I noticed he hasn't been keeping it as long when I'm making eye contact. Perhaps I'm just reading into that too much, I don't know.