Posted by lucie lu on February 6, 2009, at 10:36:13
In reply to Testing our relationships with our Ts (long), posted by antigua3 on February 5, 2009, at 9:34:50
Antigua,
That sounds like such a painful experience! I'm so sorry you had to go through it feeling that both relationships let you down. Understandably, it led to ruptures with both your pdoc and your T. That is a lot to deal with on top of trying to take care of your own painful feelings with what you were expressing to begin with and your unsatisfied needs for support.
I think I may see this a little differently than you do. So please hear me out OK? I care a lot about you and really only want to try to raise things that I hope may be helpful to think about.
First, let me say that I can really empathize with your feelings of abandonment (given my own issues in that department). It must have been horrible to not even get a response from either of them after you had such an intensely painful emotional outpouring that was so difficult to contain afterwards. And after 18 years of therapy, this is hardly your usual modus operandi!
so no matter what their reasons, it seems like they both failed you. I wonder what is up with your T, could she be going through some personal problems IRL and her mind is not on her work? You said she has seemed distracted for a couple of weeks. And it's always hard to know about your pdoc - he seems so unpredictable and your relationship with him has a very uneven quality to it from all the things you've written about it. Clearly he knew your emotional state when you left because he expressed concern as to whether you were OK as you were leaving. And you said he did express compassion in the session. I think you are right in identifying that the past experiences you brought up, coupled with the way he relates to you in therapy, really triggered very painful transference feelings related to your father. Those are the *worst* - they add enormous emotional impact to whatever bad situations we find ourselves in, and so pack quite a whallop. But they are what they are, that's one reason you are in therapy, and you were obviously in a lot of pain when you left the session.
So it's understandable that you would ask yourself - why didn't someone extend a hand, some comfort to you? It would have been nice for them to recognize the depths of your pain and how infrequently you reach that point. So you may also feel totally overlooked, since they should have both known this about you, which contributes to the hurt. That's how I would have felt, anyway, under the same set of circumstances.
OK, I'm meandering (as usual), but I feel it's really important to look closely at your interpretation of their behavior - namely the assumption that they both just want you to suck it up, basically, and handle it on your own. That is a harsh assumption, both about them as healers and is very dismissive of you. For such an approach to be therapeutic, it would be important that it be discussed and understood, if not at the time the incident occurred then soon afterwards. Abandonment as a learning experience is pretty poor technique, if you ask me. And what conclusion would any abandonment-sensitive person come to (no matter where they are in their therapy) other than concluding their dependency needs are excessive and should not be indulged under any circumstances? How punitive and shaming - anything but therapeutic. So even if it were a deliberate intervention on their parts (and I'm not so sure you're right about that), then it has failed therapeutically and simply reinforces a long-standing inner message you have been trying to rewrite for yourself. So my guess is that this was not the message they really would have wanted you to receive, if they had been thinking clearly about it. Of course T's are human, but there is no reason for their human failings to be transferred to you.
Antigua, I know you have been thinking for a while about when the time would be right to stop your therapy. It is very tempting to use a rupture as a reason because it would allow you to avoid pain associated with the rupture as well as termination. But I think that this may be exactly the wrong way to go. I think you should perhaps start by acknowledging to yourself that all of your feelings are completely legitimate as are your needs for comfort and understanding. You are not a crybaby - these are important things from our past and they really hurt. Then the next big thing is COMMUNICATION. This experience has left a significant rupture in two important relationships. We "pros" in therapy (lol) know what to do with ruptures, right? We know we are not supposed to walk away with hurt feelings and whatever negative assumptions we are left with. We've learned to bring our feelings up honestly and engage in meaningful dialogue with the other party. And if after you've done that and you still feel they are not doing a good job of rupture repair, then let them know that too and keep trying to work toward resolution. It is a great temptation to devalue a relationship that has disappointed you. But these are both emotionally important relationships in your life and despite disappointment, they must still hold great value for you. I think it is very likely that together you can repair the rupture in a way that leaves you feeling both connected and empowered. A good thing to take away from therapy no matter when you end it.So IMO you did not deserve a "handle it on your own" response (and I'm unconvinced that was really an explicit or implicit message from either of them). This is a shaming message that leaves you feeling bad about having legitimate emotional needs. A slightly different message, which maybe your pdoc was sending, is that he recognized your pain and assumed you have the outside resources to gain the support you needed, e.g. your T or your friends. And that really might be a compliment, although he may have underestimated how hard a transference-based emotional experience can be to deal with, for anyone. (You said transference is not really his thing). So if he miscalculated on your available resources, it is not because your needs were so unreasonably large that they couldn't be met appropriately. Which of course is the very thing that we fear hearing about ourselves. I feel strongly that this was nowhere near the case for you.
And my other message is the frequent Babble mantra - talk, talk, talk, and make working the ruptures through with each of them a focus of your next sessions. At the very least, this will provide you with some template the next time you think you are getting a devaluing message from someone (unfortunately we do tend to get these a lot, sigh), that will help you gain a sense of agency. Life has a tendency to be full of "inner messages" that get activated, and it is important to have a way to deal with them that preserves your self-esteem and leaves you in an observing frame of mind so you can take appropriate action without resorting to feeling bad about yourself. And please note that for me, this is very definitely a work in progress!
Hope this helps.
(((((((((antigua))))))))))))
Lucie
poster:lucie lu
thread:878199
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20090129/msgs/878454.html