Posted by Racer on May 25, 2006, at 12:48:21
In reply to Re: maybe the hardest talking I've ever done. LonG, posted by llrrrpp on May 25, 2006, at 8:30:16
> > I think T was successful in making me feel responsible for my own progress. I probably wanted someone to hold my hand, but that's not a realistic expectation. We have to be strong enough to fight our own demons.
But we also need to learn to ask for help when we need it.
Truly, LL (I need something short to call you), don't underestimate the importance of that lesson, nor the difficulty in learning it. And your T's methods here might just make it that much harder for you to learn that.
Admittedly, that's one of my issues, so there's some projection going on here. But what I'm reading in your post screams at me that you're not comfortable asking for help, and that you feel as though you MUST take care of everything for yourself in order to prove your competence. That's not necessarily any more healthy than being completely dependent on someone else. It's what I call Pathological Independence, and I don't think it's uncommon in smart women.
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> I see him in 1 week. I'll ask him some of these questions, but I'm scared of being hurt if I ask him why I can't call HIM in a crisis. I don't think that there's an answer to that question which would make me feel good. It's a lose-lose.
>And that's a huge red flag to me: if you can't ask about that, then you don't have a good therapeutic alliance with this guy. If you can't trust him to help you in a crisis, that's also not acceptable. Truly -- you gotta trust this guy, or it's not going to do you any good.
And, take it from one who's been through it, a bad therapeutic alliance, with a T you don't trust, can do a hell of a lot of lasting damage.
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> Thanks for all of your thoughts, posters. I know I've been pretty incoherent, but that's the name of the game. Thanks for helping me make sense out of some of the fragments of this complicated interaction. I'm not sure if I'll ever figure out what's really going on, but at least I'm working on it. -llrrrpp
>And you haven't exactly sounded incoherent to me. Maybe it's just those silly things like paragraphs and syntax and all that, but your posts are always clear and easy to read. Just a reality check for you there...
poster:Racer
thread:647965
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060517/msgs/648405.html