Telling my therapist i love her?

I realize I'll get hurt in the end no matter the outcome. I just want her to at least know how i feel before my therapy is over. I am planning on telling her on my last session and giving her a gift that symbolizes both her and expresses my feelings for her. I feel a sudden urgency to tell her because I think my life is going to end soon.

I don't really know what will happen. I don't think anything good will come of it at all. I just feel an urge to let her know. It scares me thinking my whole life could fly by and I could never get a chance to tell her how much she means to me.

I understand that afterwards she could choose to never talk to me again. I understand the conversation could get unpleasant or uncomfortable. I also understand she could throw my gift back in my face afterwards. I would be devastated, but I want to at least say what I feel. I've kept it a secret for 2 years now and I don't think I would be OK ending therapy with her without even letting her know. I don't care what happens after, i feel like life is too short for hiding my feelings. If I get hurt it's better to know she doesn't love me back than to spend my entire life afterwards thinking about her. I've spent the past two years crazy for her, I don't want to spend anymore time in secrecy.

Thoughts?

Hi Sadness2008. I am sorry you are having such mixed feelings about telling your T about your feelings. It can be difficult to discuss because the T must not get personally involved with their patients in a romantic relationship or face revoking of their license, so it is not easy for T either.

Many report feeling love and caring from their T because often they are a person that really cares about them. It is natural to FEEL this way, but it is not appropriate to want to start a relationship with your T either during or after therapy. I do not think they legally can.

Here are articles that may be of interest
https://psychcentral.com/lib/in-love...es-what-to-do/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/archiv...-my-therapist/

https://psychcentral.com/lib/why-you...e-your-friend/

https://blogs.psychcentral.com/unplu...our-therapist/

I tell my T I love her frequently (in my writings to her). I use it as a gauge to where I am with things as the intensity of the feeling seems to ebb and flow. Right now (mind you) I have gotten to the place where I see the feeling as just another piece of information and sharing that with her lets her know how things are going or where things are at in my treatment. My transference is mostly maternal and we've talked only once about it not being erotic.

ETA: she also gets to see when I'm happy that I love her, when I'm mad that I love her, when I'm frustrated... giddy.. the whole range of emotions around the feeling of love towards her.

Sadness, can I ask why do you think your life will end soon?

That IS really sad. But coming back to your T and the gift - is she a gift-taker? Some Ts just don't, because of boundaries or policies or whatever.

Have you thought about talking with her first? Maybe starting a conversation about how you know the therapy will need to end sometime and it's something that's been on your mind, and could the two of you talk about how that might go?It might help you get more of a sense of how she sits on these things, and how your thoughts and feelings might be received. Otherwise there's an awful lot of risk and guess-work involved.

And have you thought about how you hope she will respond? What it will mean to you if things go one way or the other? And how you'll deal with that, either way?

Just things to ponder...

There is an older movie called "Mr. Jones," starring Richard Gere and Lena Olin. It's the story of a Bipolar man that is on the edge of self destruction and is saved by love. It illustrates both extremes of mood and in typical Hollywood fashion has a romance between patient and therapist. It clearly illustrates the danger of that sort of involvement. Danger to the therapist and to the patient.

Hi CANDC. I realize she could lose her license, although she's told me she's quitting her job when my therapy ends anyway.

Hi Elio. I do not think this is transference. I've always had crushes on older women and she's shared a lot with me. I remember just the other session she was telling me about her granddad. We have a very mutual kind of relationship when it comes to talking about ourselves. Unlike many other stories of transference when the person falls in love with a therapist and it's very onesided because the therapist never really self discloses much, my therapist in fact self discloses a lot. I've gotten to know her well and she's gotten to know me well also. I don't think it's transference.

Hi slowandgentle. Yeah my therapist is a gift taker. We've exchanged many gifts over our time together. She once refused a gift due to it being too big, but she explained it would get her into a lot of trouble with her boss if they knew I'd brought her a gift this big. I was pretty upset and she ended up taking the gift anyway. It didn't feel like it was against her ethnics, but rather she was afraid of getting into trouble.
I have talked to her about my fears of when therapy ends. She told me we will keep in touch. I told her my life is going to fall apart and she said: "well you'll at least have me". Which made me happy, yet still didn't really put my mind at ease. She also said she cares about me as an individual person rather than just a client. Other than that I don't know what will happen. Part of me hopes we'll meet up every weekend, but part of me knows that's just fantasy land. I do want to mention it to her, but i find myself very suicidal after talking about after therapy.
I find myself becoming more and more suicidal each day. I don't really have plans to do anything, but i feel that when my therapy is over I won't cope. I've always found the idea of seeing my therapist again after long periods of time alone at home get me through my suicidal feelings and times of depression. When my therapy ends I won't have anything else to keep me going. Therapy is what drove me to get out of the house in the first place. I have nothing else. Even though my therapist says they will keep in touch, im not sure if I believe them.

Hi Plastic Fork. I'll research the story. I haven't got bipolar, but i imagine it'll still be worth a watch. Thank you.

I think she means well but I think her response to you was inappropriate. She's encouraging you to feel dependent on her.
It is normal for people to have needs for social connection and support like what it sounds like you are yearning for. Instead of saying she will fill all those needs for you, she should be trying to help you come up with a plan for how you can find this kind of connection outside of therapy. You can make a life for yourself where you have enough keeping you going that you don't need to rely on her for a reason to live.

I would encourage you to think about your connection with your therapist as showing you what's possible. It shows that you CAN find a connection with someone that will give you a reason to live. Now the trick is to find that kind of connection with someone you can safely see as an equal, a friend, and/or romantic partner. Unfortunately, the nature of a relationship with a therapist makes it impossible to have a truly equal relationship.

A good therapist should be able to help you work on the skills you need to find this kind of connection outside of therapy, instead of trying to put themselves in that role for you.
I am sorry that you are feeling so sad and struggling. I'm glad that you came here so we can try to offer some support.

Hi southernsky. Sometimes i feel like she is encouraging the dependency too. At first i felt very independent and didn't really feel that close to her, but she started doing things like getting me gifts and texting me a LOT. It all ended up with me being highly dependent on her and very attached. In my head it would make more sense for a therapist to wean you off their support rather than encourage a dependency. I would rather keep in contact with her, but that's just because i care about her a lot.

I think your feelings about this are very understandable. It can be irresistible when someone takes an interest in you, especially if you're lonely normally. However to me it seems like her boundaries are not great and that even though she probably does care about you she isn't doing as much as she should to help you be your own independent person. Do you think there is any way you can see another therapist to help with making sense of this situation?

I guess my first question is... is there a pending ending date?

My next question is... what kind of T is this, what is her background and education? I feel like there are many red flags in what you've shared. I personally believe in encouraging or supporting a level of dependency is not bad in and of itself depending on the issues one has when coming into therapy. With that being said, the fostering of a level of dependency needs to be done with long term goals of a client's life.

This statement scares me... verse some statement like, this sounds like our work together. Or what do you think it would take for you to feel like things would not fall apart... or one of many other T statements out there to get you to focus on why it might not fall apart or what skills and set up you need to enlarge your world enough that it won't fall apart without her.

I found this a no-win situation. Bottle it up or spill the beans and face some awkward rejection. I chose the latter and it was humiliating and miserable. I felt set up, as with a cruel practical joke. Sounds like you would regret not revealing it, which makes sense.

Hi southernsky. Yeah I feel like she cares about me a lot. It sometimes feel like her personal feelings sometimes get in the way of her boundaries though. It's strange because nobody has ever seemed interested in me. Then suddenly an attractive woman comes along who seems so confident, smart and beautiful. It's hard not to get attached when they buy you chocolate for Easter and remember your birthday. Yeah it's strange she seems to encourage my dependency instead of encourage me to be more independent. I cannot see another therapist about my current therapist... Although it would probably help a lot to talk about it with someone qualified.

Hi Elio. I don't know the pending date for my sessions. It makes me feel really depressed and suicidal even thinking about checking. I don't want to know how many days I have left as it would make the remaining days I have left hell. Background and education? As far as i know of my therapist is a qualified psychotherapist and counselor. I don't know much else sorry. Why does it scare you? I feel like she said it to make me feel better, but in all honesty it failed to bring my piece of mind. I kind of wish she said something else, but in all honesty I don't know if there was anything she could have said to bring me comfort at that time.

Hi Budfox. Yeah I would regret not revealing it. I too would feel it was a cruel joke if she was to reject me. In all honesty I'd be thinking what the actual hell has been going on and probably feel hurt and angry. Sorry to hear about what happened. I find it especially isolating when you have feelings for a therapist and nobody to talk to about it. Especially when your therapist is the person you usually talk about your feelings too. Seems so cruel to think that when you finally pick up the courage to reveal your feelings the rejection squishes your feelings like a bug.

I definitely think if there was a way to see another therapist it might help to put things in perspective. However, I am glad that you have been talking about it on here. I hope that all of us here on this site can offer some support along the way to you.

It scares me because it doesn't seem to acknowledge the need to build a support network outside your therapy. It sounds like she is trying to make her you entire world and that to me is the opposite of what therapy should be about. (given a lack of support network is one of the issues going into therapy)