Posted by cricket on September 7, 2005, at 13:11:36
Difficult times right now.
I tried assuming that my T cares about me. It did work a little bit.
A couple of weeks ago in therapy, I started to talk about a dream I had a lot as a kid. My therapist immediately said, “You don’t have to talk about this.” We have never really discussed my childhood.
Under my old assumption of he doesn’t care about me, I would have immediately thought he was saying, “I don’t want to hear it.” Under my new assumption, I thought that he was simply being protective of me, respectful, letting me be in control. And that was nice. I didn’t even think about what the old assumption would have said until long after I had left his office.
And I did tell him the dream. And he even said at the end, this is good. Something he almost never says.
But then this past week has been rough in general. Losing time, lots of conflict with parts. A couple of times on the train, I started to panic because I had no idea where I was going, why I was on the train, who were the people around me, even who I was.
I went to therapy this week wanting support, perhaps even a little sympathy. And I went with the same new assumption that he cares.
But something went awfully awry. I’m not even sure what it was. But he was Mr. Defensive again. Arms crossed on chest. His body turned away from me. Giving me a lecture about my job and telling me to take more control there. Defending a part that I don’t particularly like. “She’s a narcissist like your mother. So don’t hate her. She can’t help it.” Asking me when I am going to make up my mind to rely on him.
And on top of everything his phone was ringing like crazy, maybe half a dozen times. And each time, he’d pick it up and look at the number.
So what happened? Another bad day for him?
I can’t imagine it was anything I said. I didn’t really say much at all. I told him about the train incidents, and then he started in lecturing. Did they scare him?
I could almost feel the anger rolling off of him. And of course, I turned it inward. At one point, he said, “So what are you feeling right now?” I struggled for words. He said, in a cold voice, “So do you feel anything at all?”
Finally, I said “I feel angry at myself for being such a mess.”
“And who do you think is to blame for that?”
“Myself, I guess.”
“No. How about those people, your so-called parents?”
“I think it’s a little late for any good to come out of blaming them”
“Oh so you’re supposed just to be fine, huh? All by yourself, huh? With no help from anyone, huh?”
I just shrugged. He was on a roll and it almost felt like I wasn’t in the room.
So can anyone read between the lines? What happened? What is going on with this therapy?
He did say he thought the train incidents happened because I told him the dream. So did he think I was blaming him? Did he blame himself?
But he also said something about relying on him or something like that. It was actually a complaint. I got the complaint tone but I missed the message.
Any thoughts anyone?
poster:cricket
thread:551911
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050901/msgs/551911.html