Posted by Rigby on April 10, 2004, at 10:17:48
In reply to Extra session next week stressing me out, posted by crushedout on April 10, 2004, at 0:13:57
Hi Crushed,
Wow--you are moving towards termination with her? What's up?
I agree with the others on this--it sounds to us like her language is fine but you know her better than we do.
If it were me I think basically I would have been secretively happy to get another session b/c I wanted to see her but if presumably the reason is to discuss leaving her it becomes painfully ironic.
I did a whole trip on leaving. Tried quitting four or five times. Real painful. If you're leaving because you feel obsessed, you can't get over her and you need to Get A Life I can completely relate. I think if my situation had dragged on for as long as it sounds like yours has I might have not only considered quitting but done it.
In my case I ended up admitting to myself that I wasn't ready to go. "They" always say that you know when you're done--you just are. Feeling now *sooooo* differently than I did a year ago I can finally "get" that. I've been out of the country so haven't seen my therapist for a few weeks and it's no biggie. Hugely different than a year ago--not even comparable to two years ago. I think one big thing for me was admitting to myself that I wasn't ready, admitting I was dependent and allowing myself to be okay with it. I think in some ways it helped to set me free of these uncomfortable feelings of longing I had for my therapist. Weird stuff the way this works.
Hope this helps a bit and take care.
Rigby
> I was only scheduled to see my T once next week because she's taking a day off, but last week I asked her if she could find an extra session for me so we could meet twice. She said she was booked so I asked her to let me know if anything opened up and she said she would.
>
> So, she emailed me today and told me she had a cancellation for Monday and that she'd pencilled me in. But she also said that she was "doing this especially so that we have time
> to talk about what is bothering you about me."
>
> Now this is precisely what I *wanted* to talk about, but the way she said this disturbs me because it feels like she's giving me the session on a *condition*, when she had already agreed to give me a session if one opened up, before I even brought up the whole termination issue. And now I feel really stressed out. I don't know what to tell her is "bothering" me "about" her, and I feel enormous pressure to come up with some kind of good explanation.
>
> I can't even quite put my finger on what seems wrong with this picture, but I almost feel like this email is the place I should start in addressing the issue. Am I crazy? Is there something wrong with the way she framed the offer of the session she had already agreed to give me?
>
> I feel really confused.
poster:Rigby
thread:334773
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040409/msgs/334857.html