Posted by Dinah on September 23, 2008, at 9:55:43
In reply to Re: I am so distressed, posted by lemonaide on September 22, 2008, at 23:09:50
Well, I don't have any way to know if you're overreacting. I have what you say, and I have how you've sounded since he came back, and I have how you've sounded before he left. How long has it been? I'm bad at time.
But as SeldomSeen and Antigua have said, there is no reason you need to do anything at once. If there's any doubt in your mind that you may be overreacting, you don't have to decide today.
I may be completely reading you wrong. When you left your last therapist, even though you sounded ready and confident in your decision (which was certainly the correct one on many levels), I could hear unresolved attachment in your words, heavy as molasses. Then I felt the changes in you with this new therapist. I loved how he didn't distract you from the deeper issues, and how he balanced maintaining your defenses with delving into the underlying feelings you were defending against. Now I'm feeling in your words sadness and disappointment and acceptance. I'm not feeling from you the weight of unfinished business.
But that's just my own interpretations of what you're saying, filtered through my experiences, so I could be totally wrong. Certainly I have my own issues with abandonment and loss. And you've had more loss in the last few years than anyone should have. It's entirely possible that you are defending against what could be the loss of another person you care about, and I might just be the person to collude with you on that. Plus, overreliance on my "feeling" has always been a problem with me. And I have had bad experiences with a wounded therapist not performing at a reasonably good enough level even though it was (a very long) temporary. So probably you shouldn't pay all that much mind to what I say.
And, you had been angry with him at one point for his handling of the matter with your old therapist. That could conceivably influence your perceptions in a very subtle way.
Nothing's ever easy, is it?
poster:Dinah
thread:853334
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20080920/msgs/853608.html