Posted by vwoolf on July 16, 2004, at 14:05:04
I wonder if someone can give me some advice.
I started therapy just under a year ago with a female psychologist whom I found very difficult to approach at first, as she appeared to me to be quite hard and uncompromising. I felt as if she did not really accept me, or could not accept me the way I was. I reasoned with myself that this was some kind of projection of mine, and that it would be best if I tried to work through it with her rather than trying to see someone else. In fact I have done precisely this, and am still in therapy with her. I have opened up a lot to her, often not trusting whether she would still be there at the end of the session, but she has invariably been there for me, and has swallowed all the insults I have paid her along the way as well. I have grown to quite like her over the months. I find her very down to earth and pragmatic – perhaps too much so. She doesn’t really leave much space for my creative side (or maybe I don’t?) or the unconscious things that come up. She knows how ambivalent I am about her and accepts the ambivalence, even though I accuse her of being there only for the money. I have been away on holiday twice in this time, and have had no sense of loss or anger towards her.
A month after I started seeing her, she referred me to a male psychiatrist for medication for depression. It was a totally different experience at once. It felt as if he really understood me, as if we spoke the same language, as if he understood every metaphor I used. Everything that is said in my sessions with him takes on a heightened importance for me, which means I remember things so much better and can reflect later on what was said. I have had many dreams involving him as a mentor, priest etc. I was away recently for a few weeks and felt a huge loss – I telephoned most days just to hear his voice on the answering service. In other words, a classic case of transference, such as many of you describe. I don’t really have any sexual feelings about him, although I have no doubt they could surface, while I have had sexual fantasies about my T. Strange that! I have discussed my feelings about him with my T, and have also let my Pdoc know that I am ambivalent about my therapist.
I have also told my Pdoc what I feel about him, indirectly via a dream.
However we have now stabilized my meds, and I have no further reason to see him until November. I tried to talk to my therapist about this, as I would ideally like to see both of them on an ongoing basis. She says there is no way this can work, and insists that I should stay in therapy with her and work through the transference issues surrounding him with her. I accept that it probably doesn’t work to be in therapy with two people at the same time, but since I have to choose, I think I would rather choose my psychiatrist. I feel it is almost impossible for me to give him up.
My Pdoc has been very discreet and non-committal about the whole matter, although I must be honest and say that I haven’t left him the space to turn me away – I told him I was not going to see him again when I last saw him at the beginning of June, but I have thought of him so much since then that it seems impossible to stay with that. I have also quarreled with my T over her insistence that I should stay with her. We are now in crisis mode, according to her.
Please can you advise me what you think I should do, since you all have experience of therapy and transference issues. Should I keep trudging on with my therapist? I had decided at the outset that I should be in therapy with a woman because I have been sexually abused in the past, both by my father and by a psychiatrist many years ago, but I feel I can trust this pdoc, and that the sex of the therapist does not really matter, it’s really a question of understanding. I have this horrible feeling you are all going to say that I should stay with my T., but I really feel that I have to keep seeing him.
I hope this message is not too garbled.
poster:vwoolf
thread:366878
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040716/msgs/366878.html