Posted by cricket on September 27, 2005, at 8:14:48
In reply to Re: hm... » Shortelise, posted by Tamar on September 27, 2005, at 5:19:40
ShortE and Tamar,
I hope you don't mind me jumping in here too. This is a topic (my T and my sexuality) that I have thought about a lot.
Before I started therapy, I had never had a relationship, or even an interaction for that matter, except forced work ones, with a man that didn't involve sex. From step father on down.
Then when I first started working with my therapist,and it wasn't formal therapy at first, it was a one on one class, I was astonished, dismayed, insulted, angry, terrified that he didn't express any sexual interest in me. It was something I had never experienced before.
One of the first readings he assigned was a translation of poems by buddhist women from back around the Buddha's time.
One of the women poets is a prostitute, born into prositution (mother was a prositute) and she tries to seduce a monk. The monk responds very negatively basically saying get away from me you bag of pus, you vile smelling thing. I don't remember the exact words but that was the gist of it.
The prostitute didn't recoil in shame or even get angry. Instead she comes back and asks the monk to teach her the ways of the Buddha and she works hard and becomes enlightened.
The editor/translator of the book says that this shows the misogyny prevelant during that time, how even a monk belittles a woman like that and the woman just accepts his words.
I completely disagreed with the editor and I went back to my T shaken to the core by this. I was in tears. For the first time in this woman's life, a man tells her she is more than just a body, she is more than an object to be used for sex. And this editor calls that misogyny. And then the woman changes her whole life, she is completely transformed. What difference does it make that the monk used harsh words? He obviously knew the exact right ones to use.
My therapist just nodded wisely.
And after that I started therapy with my T.
So three years later, yes I still worry that I am not attractive to my T. And if I'm not attractive how can he stand to be in the room with me much less listen to me?
But deep down inside, I am so glad he ignored, or even "disdained" as I think ShortE said, my seduction. Because he said to me you are more than this show, more than an attractive body.
And maybe ShortE that's what your T is saying in the dream. You are so much more any adornment, any jewelry. And as much as you want to show him that and have him approve you have so much more that is so much more valuable.
Does any of that make sense?
I also agree with Tamar that there is definitely a sexual element to therapy. And at times there is an electric charge in that room between us. But right now it doesn't feel so much like let's take our clothes off and do it sexuality but more a desire to sit inside him and feel warm and comforted and have him sit inside me and say it's okay in here.
poster:cricket
thread:559414
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050920/msgs/560143.html