Posted by Dinah on August 11, 2007, at 9:39:48
In reply to Therapist is not upset with me, but (triggerlong), posted by OzLand on August 10, 2007, at 21:33:52
That sounds like a great session. Not a comfortable one perhaps. But an honest one, and one that should make you feel safe in his commitment.
I have to admit that my therapist lets me know that he thinks of me differently than his other clients. But he doesn't base it on who I am, or anything personal about me, but instead on the fact that I'm the longest term client he's ever seen, and given how long I've seen him and his current age, the longest term client he'll ever see.
Even then, he was reluctant to say so until one day when he was hedging something by saying he would feel that way about all his clients, and going out of his way to set boundaries in that direction. I told him flat out that if our relationship after all those years of hard work, including a lot of work on the therapeutic relationship, was no different than the relationship he had with a client he's been seeing for a month or two, then clearly there was something very wrong with it.
I don't really think of that as a boundary violation because it's based on what we built inside the therapy room. He's never pretended that I'd be someone he'd seek out in the real world, and I wouldn't believe it if he did. I never pretended that I wanted him as my real mom, just my therapist/mommy. I know full well that I have the better in that exchange. Real moms yell about clothes on the floor and curfews. What we have is inside that room, and that's all either of us wants. But to not acknowledge what we've built inside that room would be acknowledging that we really had no therapeutic relationship to build.
And with me, the therapeutic relationship is the key to change. Not in pressuring me using it. But in influencing me using it.
(Mind you, he also acknowledges that there's a large divide from how I care about him, and how he cares about me. That's only honest, though it hurts sometimes of course.)
poster:Dinah
thread:775400
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20070807/msgs/775470.html