Posted by Dinah on December 21, 2007, at 23:15:59
He said that I and my Babble friends have been really helpful in showing him how deeply a therapist's actions can affect a client. I'm not saying that quite right. But he said that he appreciated how I was able to explain things to him that he hadn't really thought about, even with his training, and having been on both sides of the therapeutic relationship.
The really great thing was that he *got* what I was trying to say. I didn't really think he would, or if he did I didn't think he'd be very sympathetic. But he did understand. Even though I had my head turned I saw the "ah-hah" moment clearly.
He didn't dismiss it either. He thought about it a while before responding. He knows that I know that he really isn't doing anything wrong. In fact he's really doing everything right. But the fact is that boundaries were by necessity a bit bent during Katrina, and now they're back in place, it can hurt a bit. Because he was so much more real then. And even if he's perfect and understanding and attentive and empathetic, he's the same way with the clients who come before me and the ones that he sees after me that day. And altogether I'd rather he yell at me than be so darned perfectly professional.
And he understood. While he knows that some of it is inevitable, he did understand. He framed it as my wanting to see XXX the therapist, and not Therapist XXX.
And today he was XXX the therapist. It was so much nicer than last session even though in both sessions he was attentive, warm, and empathetic. I guess the important part was that he said he didn't need to be Therapist XXXX, and that if I felt in any session that he was, I shouldn't think that that was the way it was supposed to be or the natural conclusion of things getting back to normal. In fact he said that ideally therapy really should be with XXX the therapist rather than Therapist XXX.
So I don't have to run away from therapy because I want more than I really am entitled to have. Because I want what I shouldn't want. He said that even if what I wanted was more than I could have, it wouldn't be wrong to want it. But that it wasn't more than I could have, and wasn't more than I should want.
And he also said that he didn't literally mean that he was surprised I stayed during that year. He said he wasn't actually surprised, and he knew why I stayed. He did too.
Now I'm not so angry, and I feel like I can really feel at peace this Christmas, so I'm very glad I went.
poster:Dinah
thread:802002
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20071215/msgs/802002.html