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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 2 to 26 of 26. Go back in thread:
Posted by canadagirl on November 10, 2006, at 19:08:07
In reply to I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 17:42:12
>>>I'm still stymied on why I need to need my therapist so much. It's not that I need my therapist so much as I need ______.<<
Comfort?Security?Acceptance?Familiarity? Any of those?
Needing to need someone...hmmm....what's that really mean?
And what would it mean to you to see yourself as "better" and "not needing to need" him?
A few profound questions for a Friday night.
Posted by annierose on November 10, 2006, at 19:37:32
In reply to I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 17:42:12
and that I won't be forgotten ---
could that be it?
Posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 19:59:08
In reply to I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 17:42:12
I have a vague inchoate impression that it has something to do with feeling safe.
That as long as I need him, I'm not alone.
But somehow tied to that is the thought that *needing him* is different somehow than *him*. Better even. More important.
That my need itself is providing something valuable. I've batted around thoughts like my need proves that I'm alive and capable of connection. But nothing has really struck me so far as being the right answer.
I have the feeling, and it may be way off base, that finding the answer to this question will be the key in moving to the next step, whatever that may be, just as finding out why I did the things I did moved me to this step.
But then, maybe I don't want to find the answer, because finding the answer will mean I move to the next step, and won't need him as much, and that would be too horrible to contemplate because I need to need him.
And so on.
Posted by Jost on November 10, 2006, at 22:37:57
In reply to Re: I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 19:59:08
Would you ask why you need your parent (assuming your parent loved you in a reasonably good way and you loved your parent)?
I know most people think they pay a therapist to help them work on their problems.
But that leaves out the existential (not the best word, but the one that comes to mind) quality of the relationship.
Therapy relationships vary much as any relationship does. Sometimes, you're close to someone for a limited purpose, or with limited connection within defined time periods. Other times, you come together with someone and it takes on a more sustained or sustaining meaning, and becomes something without those limits of defined and delineated goal, or time.
If that's the type of relationship you have with your therapist, my question is how could you not need him? why would you think you could/should end the relationship?
I know it's a weirdly constituted relationship, given how we define and create relationships in "normal" social/familial life. It's by no means right for everyone-- or even most people-- just as you rarely can create those relationships in any sphere, or under any conditions.
So I can only say, if you've managed to do it-- why would you want not to need it? or want to do without it-- if something beyond your control wasn't forcing you to?
It's like joke about the exam in philosophy, which asked the question: why? to which the only answer is "because"-- (or, if you're a skeptic, "why not").
Jost
Posted by Jost on November 10, 2006, at 22:39:19
In reply to Re: I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 19:59:08
PS, don't worry about moving to the next step-- because you'll need him as much as you need him--
which is probably about as much as, although not necessarily in the same way as, now.
Jost
Posted by Jost on November 10, 2006, at 23:04:28
In reply to Re: I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Jost on November 10, 2006, at 22:39:19
Okay, this is my third in a row-- but I wondered. Have you discussed this with your T?
Maybe he could put your mind at ease that getting better doesn't mean losing him--
even if it's hard to talk about, maybe he and you would come to realize that something in your life has made this equation between being okay, and losing your connection to the people you love (and need) the most-- If so, you'll need to know that "getting better" doesn't mean losing them (or him)--
That might be something that does keep you from moving forward-- that doesn't need to.
It's pretty important.
Jost
Posted by Poet on November 11, 2006, at 0:31:14
In reply to I'm afraid I might be getting better :(, posted by Dinah on November 10, 2006, at 17:42:12
Hi Dinah,
The sessions covered by insurance ran out, so now I'm paying my T out of pocket for the rest of the year. She said, very gently, *you might think about coming every other week...* I must have looked worried, because she went right into her *I care about you, I won't abandon you, we'll work something out* speech.
So I'm questioning do I need to see her weekly or not? Both from an economic standpoint and a maybe all those comments I made about not needing therapy once I got a job that used my brain proved to be reality, not fantasy. For me, I guess, the only way I'll know is to try not going every week and see how I feel. I am having anxiety just writing that. I don't see myself doing it, but how else would I know?
Sorry, not much help here, just empathy.
Poet
Posted by Poet on November 11, 2006, at 2:18:25
In reply to Re: I'm afraid I might be getting better :( » Dinah, posted by Poet on November 11, 2006, at 0:31:14
Granted it's 2 a.m. and I should have taken Seroquel hours ago, but maybe chronic insomnia is good for something. I just realized what I get out of seeing my therapist weekly: being with someone who understands my moods, my quirks and to use her and Dr. Clueless's polite way of saying that normal people like to be physically touched and don't hate certain sounds or smells, that I am *different.* That is what I would miss if I didn't see my T every week.
Poet
Posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 9:18:15
In reply to Just Had a Thought..., posted by Poet on November 11, 2006, at 2:18:25
It seems like it's more than just being afraid I'll drift away from therapy.
I do know, and it's long been his position, that I can come for as long as I want and for as often as I want. Even if I get better, and even if I don't need him.
This has something somehow to do with me. With a me that needs him being a different thing than a me that doesn't need him. That something in me will be different if I don't need him, and I think that I'll be losing more than I gain if I replace that something with not needing.
Does dependence itself, without regard to the results of the dependence, have a value that is usually unrecognized?
A dependent person and a not dependent person are different. Are there any ways in which a dependent person is better off?
By dependent, I don't really mean in this case interdependent. Because generally it's considered ok to want to be with someone even if you don't need to.
But dependence itself as a good thing?
I don't want to give up being dependent because _____.
My brain hurts and I feel a bit uneasy about discussing this. :(
Posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 9:28:13
In reply to I just don't know, posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 9:18:15
The consequences are too much for me.
Posted by toojane on November 11, 2006, at 14:55:49
In reply to I just don't know, posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 9:18:15
> This has something somehow to do with me. With a me that needs him being a different thing than a me that doesn't need him. That something in me will be different if I don't need him, and I think that I'll be losing more than I gain if I replace that something with not needing.
> Does dependence itself, without regard to the results of the dependence, have a value that is usually unrecognized?Is dependence the right word? Are you dependent on him...or are you connected to him? More than ten years in a relationship with anyone is a huge investment of self, don't you think? You have forged a connection with him that would have a very unique quality from any other connection you may have or create with anyone else. That connection itself has value. A lot of work went into making it (all your fighting to relationship).
Posted by Daisym on November 11, 2006, at 16:21:20
In reply to Eeek no. I just can't think about it., posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 9:28:13
I've been thinking about this concept of "needing to need" your therapist a lot lately. There are times when the intensity of need dies down for me and while it is a relief, there is anxiety surrounding it too. It feels like a loss that is hard to put words to.
I've thought about it as a developmental progression. Similar to an infant who needs her mother to meet her needs, when therapy began, I needed my therapist to help me hold and tolerate the onslaught of new and unnamed feelings. It was a very primal thing, including the development of a new vocabulary which I needed to communicate all that I was feeling. Now it is more of a toddler stage - I'm upright on my own two feet - but I still need to cling to his leg every now and then to rebalance myself. I've ventured further into the past than I ever have before and I've made huge changes in my present and for my future. He remains my "safe base" that I return to again and again. And like a toddler, I long for the complete safety of my mother, and yet I'm excited about my own autonomy. So I'm conflicted and the conflict itself feels like too much to bear. I want someone wise to tell me either "stay close to your mother, you aren't ready to leave her" or "you are so ready, go forward and the pain of leaving will lessen, swallowed by the joy of living." I remain frozen, unable to completely give into my need for safety and soothing and unable to move forward. Maybe this is where the development diverges - because with your parent you start to give something back and they appreciate it and accept it and even expect it, want it and enjoy it. In therapy, it remains one sided and you continue to pay for it. So maybe this is why I'm stuck? The process itself remains stuck.
The other thing I've thought about is a little out there and it might be a very personal thing, applying to me only. So feel free to poo poo it. I have found in my therapist and in therapy, a powerful catalyst to love. I finally know that I have the ability to love and it feels amazing. He knows I love him, in all the forms of love and he is totally OK with that. And because he is OK with that, I'm slowly learning that loving someone won't hurt them...and might not hurt me. Getting in touch with the ability to love - my own lovingness - fills up a space in me that only my children have reached before. Its almost like a deep spirituality unleashed, an ability I didn't know I had. I'm secretly proud of it. And I'm astonished how good it makes me feel. So I need therapy and my therapist as the setting for and object of, my love. I need to practice and be reassured that it is OK that I love someone like this.
I need therapy for lots of other stuff too. But when I really try to understand what goes missing when the need goes missing - it is that profound sense of love. I don't understand it more than this yet - maybe I never will.
Posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 16:52:05
In reply to Re: I just don't know » Dinah, posted by toojane on November 11, 2006, at 14:55:49
I am not sure whether dependent is the right word. At one point it definitely was, and it still might be. It's not as much as it was.
And I don't think of that as being a good thing, however much the world might. :(
Posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 17:10:05
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Dinah, posted by Daisym on November 11, 2006, at 16:21:20
I have some memory of, before everything got all messed up, discussing with my therapist the developmental phases.
And how when you're ready to explore you're both excited to leave Mom, but worried about it, so you cling sometimes. And I remember arguing vehemently that it was all downhill from toddler on. That what was gained in exploration and mastery was never as satisfying as what was lost.
I've already gone through it once, and didn't like it, and don't find any excitement in it. I don't want to do it again.
I guess there's a faint possibility that it has something to do with the fact that my mother was most loving with children young enough to merge with her. But surely that was offset by the fact that my father most appreciated children old enough to have an interesting conversation.
Or maybe it simply has to do with the fact that needing your mother is essential for that total feeling of immersed safety. That once you no longer need her, you also gain realizations that she really can't keep you safe or that you can see to your safety yourself, or... Drat. Lost it again.
I think I understand to some extent the feelings about lovingness. It's not that I haven't experienced that in other places in my life, and I don't think I'm afraid of loving (in fact it's always been the most important thing in my life). But loving in this setting is a unique experience, and I frankly treasure it.
Posted by SatinDoll on November 11, 2006, at 19:06:01
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Daisym, posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 17:10:05
Hi Dinah,
I have been following this thread, but everyone has said all I can think of. I just have a question.
Is their anyone in your life like a girlfriend that excepts your emotional self? Is your T the only one who you trust with this part of yourself?
I believe everyone needs someone for the emotional stuff, alot of times it is a spouse, (mine used to be there for me emotionally) but slowy I am replacing him with some new friendships that are starting to feel more real and where I could start to trust with some of my emotional stuff. Do you have an old friend or anything that excepts you for who you really are?If you don't have anyone, then I can see you why you need your T so much and that is okay in my book. For me I know I can't have my T forever, so it is motivating me to make some new relationships that might be able to provide me with the support I feel with my T. It is so hard at my age to do this but I am trying.
The other day at the gym this girl my age I have been talking to about parenting and stuff for maybe the last 6 mo., gave me a hug for good luck for my concert. It felt so good and it really touched me that she would offer one. I still get hugs from my kids, but this is different. Can I get a hug from my T? No! Even if I found out I was dying from cancer and had a month to live, crying my eyes out in his office, would he do it? Probably not. Even if we would, he isn't going to be around forever, heck I could lose him tonight, you never know, so I feel it is important to create some supporting relationships during therapy with other people. It is a good things all around.
Posted by canadagirl on November 11, 2006, at 21:53:15
In reply to I just don't know, posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 9:18:15
>>This has something somehow to do with me..... That something in me will be different if I don't need him, and I think that I'll be losing more than I gain if I replace that something with not needing<<
Although I haven't been in long term therapy, I think it is a relationship that changes throughout, and that we reinvent ourselves, the same as we would, say a marriage or close friendship, over the years. In a marriage, we maybe go through 2, 3, 4, 5, marriages within a marriage, to the same person! We reinvent ourselves and our marriage when something comes along to challenge status quo...a need, a thought...an event. I think it might be the same thing with therapy. We reinvent ourselves and maybe renegotiate in a sense, our relationship when something "happens" maybe consciously or subconsciously. Maybe you have made "progress" - you might have come to a new point where you don't have to replace, but maybe "reinvent" your idea of what "needing" him means in therapy and how you see it in the future. What do you think? Just an idea.
Posted by Fallsfall on November 12, 2006, at 11:10:46
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Daisym, posted by Dinah on November 11, 2006, at 17:10:05
>And how when you're ready to explore you're both excited to leave Mom, but worried about it, so you cling sometimes. And I remember arguing vehemently that it was all downhill from toddler on. That what was gained in exploration and mastery was never as satisfying as what was lost.
You need to explore whether this is really true. Was it really true for you? Is it true for your son? This is the crux of the issue, I think.
(((Dinah)))
Posted by 10derHeart on November 14, 2006, at 14:51:53
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Dinah, posted by Daisym on November 11, 2006, at 16:21:20
>>Now it is more of a toddler stage - I'm upright on my own two feet - but I still need to cling to his leg every now and then to rebalance myself. I've ventured further into the past than I ever have before and I've made huge changes in my present and for my future. He remains my "safe base" that I return to again and again.
Rapprochement. The stage of development that's always resonated with me more than anything else I ever read about children's psychological development. And the term my ex-T. used numerous times to reflect back what he heard me saying about my needing to know where he was between sessions, how he was, if he was....okay...at home in the evenings...at work when he was supposed to be...still there...thus the 'driving by' behaviors I ultimately confessed to him.
I remember reading examples and explanations of this stage in text books and other kinds of books on child development and having tears just flow down my face...and being shocked. I mean, these weren't personalized stories about certain toddlers and/or moms you would identify with, these were pretty much clinical writings, yet they did something to me to where I couldn't stand to read them any more as the longing and anxiety was too intense. Still can't. And inexplicable, for the most part, to me and two Ts. Because as far as what I know of my childhood, there's no reason whatsoever for such an over-the-top reaction. But, we understand so little, really, and remember less, so who knows?Hmmm...eeek...yuk...too scary.
Posted by Daisym on November 15, 2006, at 0:06:37
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Daisym, posted by 10derHeart on November 14, 2006, at 14:51:53
I think I'm having the same kind of intimate relationship with those kinds of tears. It just seems too sad to stand, leaving the safety of your mother.
But the thing is, my mother was never really that safe base. So I'm like you, at a loss to explain why the loss feels so huge.
I have a list of questions to ask Dan Siegel this weekend. One of them has to do with the emotional memory of rapprochement. I want to know where and how the brain records this serious of events.
Posted by 10derHeart on November 15, 2006, at 16:02:27
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » 10derHeart, posted by Daisym on November 15, 2006, at 0:06:37
I know this isn't the point of your post or anything, but the confounding thing to me (not so much for T's - they just sort of patiently accept it while I ruminate...) is...that my mother WAS all that and more. My childhood is one of those *perfect* ones - seriously I have zero, nada, zip from childhood that could explain any of this stuff.
Now things from age 19 (mom's death) and then from about then on until age 33 or so - sure. Relationships with men full of deception, distrust, dishonesty, gaslighting, infidelity, several varities of abuse....and the list could go on. Everything I feel, all the stuff clearly from a little girl perspective, with its fear and longing to be taken care of, traces back to only adult events. Which gets me to feeling like a weird, outsider within a group that society already often casts as outsiders.
I mean, the tears seem to be exactly about rapprochement, to the point I can't even speak or think it's so profound and childlike, yet why? The ugly emotional and physical things that happened in my 20's or 30's have nothing to do with toddler-hood! I don't get it. And I suppose it doesn't matter, yet it does. Maybe I'm just trying to at least fit in with common patterns within our wonderful bunch of *misfits* (anyone with mental health issues), and I'm upset I don't seem to? How dumb is that?! I loved my parents for being as wonderful as they were, and DON'T in any way wish there had been abuse or neglect - of course not.
I dunno - it gets complicated.
Posted by Daisym on November 15, 2006, at 19:43:27
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Daisym, posted by 10derHeart on November 15, 2006, at 16:02:27
But Tender - why would you think that the death of your mother wouldn't shake your foundation and "make" you feel like a toddler would? The descriptions of what happens during rapprochement may "just" happen to match how you feel so perfectly that your grief is called out at a primal level. So it feels young. I have to imagine that losing a mother that did everything right and that you were strongly attached to would create this kind of resounding whack! to your psyche. And especially at a known vulnerable time. Nineteen is another "toddler" passage. Think about how many kids try to leave home and don't make it, for one reason or another. Biologically and developmentally the risk benefit is the same as it is for a toddler, just on a larger scale. You are leaving the safe base of chilhood and moving out on your own as an adult. You might not physically move out, but you are typically, at this age, making decisions about who you are and what you believe in the world. You might be sexually active too, a whole other "private" world from the safety of mom and dad.
I would argue that your loss at this critical time, and your resulting insecure attachment pattern (if I can call it that) is completely understandable. It is hard to long for something you never had, but it must be even harder to long for safety that was once known.
(((10derHeart)))
Posted by 10derHeart on November 15, 2006, at 21:39:15
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » 10derHeart, posted by Daisym on November 15, 2006, at 19:43:27
oh Daisy, thank you! I never quite thought of the bigger picture quite like that before.
Do you really know how amazingly wise and kind and insightful you are? I mean really? I know you work in some capacity with children, families...how blessed they are to have you.
What you wrote makes more sense, rings more true, is clearer than anything either of my excellent T's ever came up with. (And you might recall how dear and esteemed both ex-T and T. were/are to me...) They've done well, danced around it, taken stabs at trying to get where you just went, but you, why you just collected the puzzle pieces and assembed the puzzle in one post! And the picture I see, well, it's a little bittersweet, with a dash of painful struggling (still), and it's a not-all-the-way-okay picture...but..it's *not* dark, sad, hopeless, or particularly dis-eased or bad at all. Just a human reacting with human emotions that perhaps *do* have a perfectly good reason for emerging how and when they do.
Thank you so much, Daisy. May I print your post to take to T. with me...please? ((Daisy)))
Posted by Daisym on November 16, 2006, at 0:24:10
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Daisym, posted by 10derHeart on November 15, 2006, at 21:39:15
I'm very glad you found my post helpful and of course you can take it and do whatever you want to with it.
Isn't it funny how we "see" each other here sometimes in a way we haven't seen ourselves? Maybe it is reading each other's posts full of intimate thoughts over the years. I still think about your post when you "found" your little girl inside yourself. You were just starting to trust this "new" therapist of yours.
I'm actually honored to have been able to provide an insight. Thank you for that feeling.
Hugs,
Daisy
Posted by 10derHeart on November 16, 2006, at 11:29:21
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » 10derHeart, posted by Daisym on November 16, 2006, at 0:24:10
>>I still think about your post when you "found" your little girl inside yourself. You were just starting to trust this "new" therapist of yours.
You remember that!?? I am so pleased :-)
I still worry a little I may have hurt your (and others' too) feelings with my strong reaction, which may have sounded like, "eeek, yuk, *I* can't have any inner kids..." Which is so NOT what I think/feel..I was just extremely caught off guard by my T's response, his easy use of terms ("well, tell little 10der for me...") and of course, realizing I *did* hear myself sound a lot like a girl of around age 5-7. He thought, still thinks, it's perfectly natural and fine and a great path to real communication in therapy. I'd have to say...the most authentic stuff, the things I'm afraid he'll find too rude, too strange, too selfish, too needy, too...well, you get the picture...all come from that little girl part....she really does know what's up if she'll just come out from behind the couch for a minute! ;-)
Yeah, that was waaay back in the beginning of the relationship. Now, I'm sooo attached, just like so many here.
Thanks, again, Daisy. It's lovely babbling with you. Baffles me why I've mostly been silent on this board for so long. Posting moods....who can understand them?
Posted by Daisym on November 21, 2006, at 11:38:49
In reply to Re: Eeek no. I just can't think about it. » Daisym, posted by 10derHeart on November 16, 2006, at 11:29:21
This is kind of a "p.s."
Dan Siegel talked this weekend about simultaneous age states being in different places of trust and arousal. Meaning, your little girl could act out but your adult self could feel perfectly fine and be observing enough to wonder where the impulse to kick something was coming from.
I asked about some of the deep attachment feelings and longings that are reactivated in therapy and he talked about the implicit memory that is embedded in the right brain. Which, btw, is where our autobiographical narrative is stored. So if we are talking about our life, it makes sense that our need for safety and all those kinds of feelings are brought out with the stories. (of course I'm paraphrasing like crazy here.) AND, he talked about a rupture of our safe place and he used the example of being 40 and having your mom die. He asked us to imagine how disruptive it would be for a young parent to lose their safe place right at the time when they where trying to be one too.
I thought of you a lot this weekend. When I have more time, I'll post about his thoughts on mindfulness and journaling.
It has been great babbling with you as well. Don't disappear completely...
Hugs,
Daisy
This is the end of the thread.
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