Posted by Dinah on August 11, 2008, at 17:53:57
In reply to Re: everyone's different....... » Dinah, posted by Phillipa on August 11, 2008, at 17:04:38
Of course, *all* that being said, I have my doubts about therapy too. The whole structure is set up in such a way that it could cause a lot of harm, as well as being a means of accomplishing something good. I hear things about therapists that make me really wonder. A lot. I don't think anyone could read the board here regularly and not realize the potential for pain.
*But* I wouldn't blame the clients for being obsessed or for feeling attachment. *Even if* a particular client likes drama in relationships, surely that is an issue that needs to be addressed in a therapeutic and not blaming way. Moreover, I don't think it would be at all possible to say that clients in a dramatic therapy relationship like drama in their relationships, or don't want to move on, or are focusing on that instead of getting better.
I was a person who was the most pragmatic soul alive in relationships. I never fell in love with someone out of my league. I never fell in love with someone who wouldn't make an appropriate life mate. My decisions to date, my decision to marry, my decision to have a child, were all well thought out and totally rational, in their own limited way. I was also rational, limited, and totally neurotic in other ways.
It was my relationship with my therapist that threw me out of my nice sensible relationship standards. It was my relationship with my therapist that transcended my limits. Because my attachment to my therapist was irrational, totally overvalued, and in its own way unhealthy, I was able to relate to others in a way I never could have related before. Except maybe to my dogs.
It is so hard to describe. And maybe impossible to understand. And I suppose that's ok. I don't need other people to understand.
Dang. I'm making it sound like I think therapy is good again. While the truth is that I do see that it can be harmful. I wish they'd tighten those standards, although maybe the problem can also be a mismatch between client and therapist. Like with some parent/children combinations. Haven't they discovered that in addition to good parents and bad parents, there are good matches and bad matches?
Too many bad therapists and/or bad matches out there.
poster:Dinah
thread:845453
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20080810/msgs/845573.html