Posted by Dinah on May 4, 2007, at 17:08:05
In reply to last session w/ex-T, posted by pegasus on May 4, 2007, at 12:40:00
Could this possibly be one of those times when he was trying to answer your question, but wasn't able to do so in the way that you needed?
The things he said sound as if they may be the reasons why you're special to him, and why it was a loss to have to move away.
If he's anything like my therapist, he both does and doesn't get what it was like for you. He might understand intellectually, but maybe not viscerally? My therapist always says he understands and even repeats back what I'm saying appropriately, but then illustrates that he really doesn't understand the depth of my attachment in any gut level way.
I think it's great that he's giving you these sessions, and that you're able to be so open.My therapist and I were talking about my attachment the other day and he inadvertantly used the same metaphor I did. A duckling imprinting on it's mommy. He said that he was there when I came out of my shell. (And of course he had a lot to do with my coming out of my shell.)
Your new therapist may be terrific, and she may be very helpful to you, and you may like her very much. But... there's no way she can be what he was to you because the circumstances were different. That's not necessarily bad in itself. But I think you may always have some grief when you think about your old therapist, even though you continue to have a relationship of a sort. And maybe that's as it should be? It hurts, but maybe it's as it should be. I wish I could express that better. What I mean is that the special people that aren't in our lives the way we would like them to be, from death or moving away or drifting apart, it wouldn't be quite right if there weren't pain mixed with the positive feelings.
Oh, I don't know. I'm getting mixed up in my own mind.
poster:Dinah
thread:755778
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20070419/msgs/755834.html