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Re: New Poster/Help -Awfully Painful Termination (long

Posted by pegasus on June 21, 2004, at 0:24:47

In reply to Re: New Poster/Help -Awfully Painful Termination (long » 10derHeart, posted by Dinah on June 20, 2004, at 8:37:48

Your post made me cry; There is just so much pain in this situation. I've been through it myself recently, with my old T moving away after 2 years of work. I had 8 sessions between when he decided to leave and my last session. It was really hard. That was last December, and I still cry about it frequently. It's just so painful to lose someone who you've come to depend on and like so much. It did break my heart.

Fortunately (in the long run), a broken heard is not fatal. I've survived it, even though I'm still grieving a lot. Some advice that people here gave me at the time helped:

1. Come up with some kind of ritual that reminds you of your T, so you can feel connected after they are gone. Someone suggested going to their coffee shop and ordering their favorite coffee drink, and journaling. I sometimes go to a certain location that he mentioned often that I know he loved, and think about him.

2. Maybe keep in touch? I know it's not always possible. I've been emailing my old T, and it's been immensely helpful. I know that there's some chance that it's keeping me from bonding with a new therapist as quickly, but I really don't think so. If he'd just abandoned me, with no communication, *then* I'd have a lot of trouble attaching to a new therapist. But since things ended well between us, and I still hear from him now and then, I feel like therapy might still be safe for me. If it happens again (a T leaving), it doesn't necessarily mean that I lose the entire relationship.

3. Talk to another therapist, if you can. I know it sounds awful. But maybe try not to see them as a replacement for you current therapist. I saw a new T for a few months after my old T left, and while I ended up not fitting that well with her, and have moved on to a new better fitting T (or at least I hope - the relationship is very young) having someone to talk to really helped. I got to express the depth of my sadness and anger that I held back from my old T (somewhat) because I didn't want to make his leaving any harder for him or me. So having someone new to talk to was a way for me to work on what *I* needed out of the whole thing. And to hear that it was OK for me to be devastated, even while I also supported his decision and wished him well. And a place to just cry my heart out for at least an hour every week.

I don't know if any of these suggestions will fit for you, but they helped me a lot. It will hurt a lot to lose your beloved therapist, but you *will* survive it. We'll help you. Write as much as you can to us, if it seems helpful.

pegasus

 

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