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It sounds like miscommunication to me » B2chica

Posted by Racer on April 28, 2006, at 12:50:49

In reply to Re: I HATE THERPY!!! » bent, posted by B2chica on April 28, 2006, at 11:43:27

Now, I'm only going off what you're writing here, so this could be totally off base, but it sounds as though you're speaking different languages here -- which totally S U X, just because it's so hard to do good therapy if you're breaking everything into unmisunderstandable sentences.

When you say you need to feel protected, and she says it's not her job to protect you, I think that might be a place where that's happening. I assume you don't want her to go out into the world and fix things, and I hope don't even want her to tell you what to do/feel/say/think. You just want her to help create a feeling of safety within the therapeutic relationship, right? You want to know that, when you walk into her office and expose your emotional self, you will be safe doing so. That's what therapy is supposed to be about.

This came up for me my last session. My T wants me to get to my emotions, and I am afraid that I will be overwhelmed by them, that they'll break me. When I said that, she said, "That's why we need to make this a safe place for you, a place that can contain them." I think maybe that's what you were trying to get out in saying you needed to feel protected, and I think that that's NOT what your T was hearing.

As for the parts about your mother -- and I can feel my mouth pursing into a little frown as I write this -- I doubt it has anything to do with talking to your former T. I would bet that she just assumes that if anything went wrong along the way, The Mother was behind it.

And don't discount your own trauma. (all together now, the PsychoBabble Chorus sings, "There is no hierarchy of suffering.") Just because no one chained you in a closet and kicked you daily does not mean that you "shouldn't" have felt pain. And if anyone tells you that you're over-reacting to something, ask for clarification. MAKE that person explain exactly, precisely, specifically HOW you were "supposed" to react, including who dictated what the reaction should be. I would be very surprised if your T did react the way you imagined in your post.

In my therapy group, one woman was always the family scapegoat, one was the one expected to be quiet so that everyone else got their needs met, I am trying to come to terms with the fact that what happened to me as a child WAS abuse -- and another woman received unconditional love and support from her parents, with no pressures on her from her parents to accomplish anything. And you know what? I think it's hardest for that last one, because she can't point to anything that ever happened that she "should" feel bad about. What hurts us, hurts us. Doesn't matter how it might affect someone else.

Hope that helps.


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