Posted by OzLand on August 4, 2007, at 12:53:57
In reply to Re: Therapist ***ttriggers*** » OzLand, posted by Honore on August 4, 2007, at 11:04:53
Honore, thanks so much for your response. I can see how one might assume my therapist is moving too fast. I know when he firt used the term "inserting himself in me," I went to the restroom and almost pucked. I could see,though, how easily I could get back into an eating disorder. So, I didn't. I think he sees I have strengths that I don't feel I have at times.
Also, my boundaries used to be practically non-existent until I went to treatment at Menninger's. 2.75 years inpatient and then 8 more years of outpatient treatment. My boundaries are fairly good now; I used to be a cutter in all sorts of area and did other stuff too. I regressed there, had so much of me split off into parts that I had no idea who I was. I was dx as BPD as well as MDD and DD at the time and later concluded that the PD (BPD) was resolved but I still had avoidant traits. I was no longer depressed, and as my therapist understood, I had buried the sexual, physical, and mental abuse so deep (not just into another compartment, but into a sealed box) that I was able to function through grad school, internship, and postdoc without too much trouble. And even went off to start working in the work world without a hitch.
So, is he moving too fast. For me probably not even though we are new working together. He is impressed that I can speak up and say something about how he is impacting on me. He wants me to get angry with him when I am angry. He knows my last therapist/pdoc did not handle my anger very well and told me I should find someone else if we could not resolve the anger. So, I drove the anger underground, got more depressed, and did the ECT for him. This is what my therapist now says about why he thinks I did ECT.
No, he's not moving too fast; my tendency is to start blabbing about nonimportant things, though even there he finds something to say what is says about me. Like when I started talking about someone I saw for a competency evaluation and my frustrations with the jail for not getting him his medications. He said that what I said was "sweet." I thought that was a weird thing to say, but he explained he meant it in terms of it showed I cared about the people I see even though some of them have done unspeakable acts like murder of infants or sexual abuse of children, etc. I find it interesting as I observe myself from a distance that I can be empathetic with someone who has done horrible things to another person. What I see, though, is a person who also has good points, etc. And, that person is not in my private life, and so I can separate "the deed from the doer" so to speak. That's a very Adlerina concept. I better be careful (my husband is Adlerian) and says my Freudian concepts are obsolete--I was trained in a psychoanalyically informed approach that is more object relations ala drive theory plus ego psychology. My therapist is trained in object relations ala self-psychology but is obviously versed in classical analysis and in other psyhchoanalytically informed theories.
I am okay with him being the way he is. I appreciate your concern, though, and I will certainly keep in mind what you say as it is my tendency to want to rush things along. Actually when I first started seeing him I thought we coule wrap things up in a year or less, and he let me know that it would be at least two years and maybe more. AGH! And that is only because I have already had good therapy and have already developed insights on my own. A big thing for him and my current depresson is for me to see there is a link between my depression and emotional upheaveal now and my past experiences. That's because I would like to avoid dealing with that crap from the past. It's the past, done, over with, etc. and of course I know that is crap, and he knows I know. He isn't going to let me get away with it.
Yes I find it very uncomfortable to have him "know" me in a way I don't know myself. That does mean getting inside a person and experiencing what the person experiences and know how that feels so that you can step back and know how to help. One has to be willing to experience or be in that person's skin, I think, in order to really have an understanding of what it must be like for that person day in and day out and what it was like for that person as a child to experience things in a certain way--the necessary but not sufficient condition of therapy.
I really appreciate your comments. They got me to thinking as this weekend has been horrible with my male cat's creatin level still rising and some of the women from my UU congregation getting literally hostile toward me because they don't see change as good. My emotional upheaval now has more to do with current events in my life and not so much therapy except to the extent that my schedule is so disprupted with him going off all the time on Fridays to do whatever he does--I think consultations or4 conferences,etc. I haven't asked as I don't have a need to know.
OzLand
poster:OzLand
thread:772451
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20070726/msgs/773935.html