Posted by Dinah on August 17, 2011, at 9:46:00
In reply to The unraveling of a long term relationship, posted by annierose on August 16, 2011, at 16:01:40
I think this sounds similar to what went on in my last session with my therapist. We talked about his interpretation and how it made me feel like after all these years he had no clue who I was.
The part of the conversation I think he got right was that I tend to think in extremes. I think "He doesn't understand me at all." instead of perhaps "Boy, he got this one wrong. What a clunker given that he knows who I am." I expect, after all these years, that he'll know me. I expect him not to mess up something so fundamental to who I am.
He also said when his therapist said something he doesn't agree with, he trusted his therapist enough to consider the possibility. And that even if he eventually decided it was incorrect, to not consider his therapist stupid for suggesting it and not to assume his therapist meant anything but the best. Ok, I am not known as the most trusting of individuals.
I think the point he was trying to make was that whatever I feel in that moment makes me forget or doubt every other moment in the relationship. He's good at holding onto all his various experiences of me at once. I'm more likely to say that this one moment means all the other moments were false, and (being me) that I was stupid to think otherwise.
Could that be part of what's going on? She's wanting you to hold onto your knowledge of her in a larger sense, and you're feeling like the entire relationship is being judged by this one incident? (And possibly remembering other incidents that were similar to this one?)
I have to grant my therapist that point. I think it does likely lead to smoother relationships if we're able to keep the big picture in mind when specific incidents come up.
Of course, the flip side of this is that she's responding to the wrong issue at the moment. You want to feel heard and understood. You don't need her to defend herself, you've already put the issue behind you. But she's still stuck on defending her point, and isn't listening to your need for her to hear.
Have you baldly told her that what you need at this very moment is for her to acknowledge that you felt hurt. It isn't important *at this moment* whether the hurt was justified or not. My therapist sometimes sitting back and saying "What do you need from me right now." I sometimes ask my therapist to use that therapeutic technique of reflecting back to me what I'm saying. Something like "When I told you I had given away the time I had offered you, you felt hurt. You felt like I had favored another client over you, as you have felt many times in your life. I understand how painful that was for you."
*Then*, at the point where you feel understood, she could have continued on to point out that this type of situation might pop up in life, and it might be a good idea to learn other ways to react.
Would that have helped?
If I understand correctly, it's not really that you want her to admit to error or say that you're justified in feeling hurt. You just want her to acknowledge that you did feel hurt, and perhaps to say that she didn't mean to hurt you. Then at that point, once you understand that she really understands, she can move on to the lesson part of the incident?
It's not unraveled unless one or the other want it to be. It's just a tangled up knot of misunderstandings and expectations.
Now mind you, sometimes those knots add up. Or change the tenor of therapy from what it was. Eventually altogether it might lead to a dissolution of the relationship. But dissolution usually takes a long while.
poster:Dinah
thread:994034
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20110706/msgs/994094.html