Posted by Asya on January 14, 2004, at 20:32:35
You guys are a really great bunch, and I can't believe I am already making my third post-- but I feel so safe and secure here. I will venture tentatively into making my first observation/commentary.
Many here (and indeed probably many in therapy generally) seem to be very focused on the fact that they don't tell their therapists everything, especially those things concerning the therepeutic relationship. I can understand, as, after 4 sessions with mine, I feel strange not having revealed certain things to her.
Still, I wonder whether sometimes we don't focus enough on the things we DO share, and the importance of having shared those things. Isn't it ok if we don't share everything? Does anyone on this board think there exists one person that knows everything about them? There are people in my life who know a lot about me, and my T is becoming one of them, but as someone so eloquently said on another post, for one to know everything about you he would have to be your shadow--which is humanly impossible.
The truth is, we have to accept that every clinical model (doctors, teachers, lawyers, and especially therapists) is just that, a model on the idealitsic relationship between the client and service-giver. Models by nature usually cannot be attained exactly. Human behavior, thought, and emotion is so infintely complex that no one will ever be able to tell us precisely why we are the way we are for everything all the time. And that's ok. We're not really looking for that. What we are looking for in therapy is how to better grapple with emotional problems that, in our perception, impede our functioning.
I have been reflecting a lot on whether to tell my T that I found out where she lives, who her kids are, her age, where she went to high school, etc., and I realize that the conversation might illuminate something to me that I already know: I am really grateful for the relationship with her, and I wish she could be a more significant part of my life. I also know the answer, she can't, but will probably not be weirded out. So, for now, I won't say any of these things, but I am working at not feeling squelched or weird about ir. Instead, I am truly trying to appreciate what she is being paid to do -- sometimes if you look at the relationship in the coldest, most clinical way possible, you might get the warmest, most rewarding results.
poster:Asya
thread:300894
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040110/msgs/300894.html