Posted by Jadah on July 27, 2004, at 19:56:39
In reply to Re: For Starlight, posted by steelmagnolia25 on July 24, 2004, at 16:19:26
Hi everyone, I really missed you all. Thank you so much for all of your feedback. I welcome it, whether it is agreeable or not. As ist stands, our affair continues as well as our therapeutic sessions (which, believe it or not has not been affected by our affair). Our affair is seperate issue. When I walk in his office I AM his patient. We put all else aside. I find it even easier to talk to him because we have become so much closer intimately. The level of love, trust, intimacy, openness.... has been inhanced. Your lover should be your best friend, someone who loves you for who you are unconditionally, for the good and bad. They are in essence your best friend. Although I dont necessarily think of him as my lover because of our dual relationship, it does carry all of these qualities. I am two essential people to my T (and myself), the object of affection and a patient....two people, two lives. He is human, being a therapist is his job, it does not exclude him from having feelings. In most cases I would agree that what we are doing is wrong. For many people such actions could be very hurtful and damaging. For me though, I am at a place in my life where I can handle the dual role. Both are theraputic for me. Though I know our affair will one day end, I am ok with that. What I get from him now is more than just sex. It has helped my self esteem (to know that someone could love and want me even though they know all the bad things about me, see my scars.... I believed I was untouchable. He kisses my scars, I dont feel so ashamed because of it now) This relationship has taught me to love, be loved, be vulnerable, to trust, to tolerate and challenge some of my own issues regarding relationships and men... I realize that men are not all bad and going to hurt me. I realize that my needs can get met by other people if I allow them in. I am learning to be more comfortable with my body and myself. I see him as a man in these situations, not my T. If I can learn all this from him then I could also learn to apply it to other relationships in my life. I know it will end, when I dont know, but when it does I believe I will feel good about the experience and I do believe that our relationship is strong and stable enough that we could maintain a gainful theraputic relationship. Much of this is able to be because of where I am in my own recovery. I look at this as a learning experience among other things. I know that he has never done this before. As I mentioned onece, he very much prided himself on his three major rules: no sex, no hurting yourself or others (him) during session. When we had our first night together he was very disappointed in himself for crossing his own lines and commented that he "threw those out the window, that was something I was proud of" he was also very distraught about cheating on his wife for the first time. He openly struggled with this and was not shy in letting me know where he was with it. We were both dealing with our actions. We worked through it by talking it through, and he worked on it, descretely, with his own alalyst. Obviously we both came out alright. I do not believe his marraige is strong, there are alot of problems. I let him deal with this whatever way he does, I do not put my two scents in. I feel guilty about his wife, but my love for him is stronger. He is huamn, he feels, thinks, acts, fantasizes, has beliefs, morals.....whatever, just like the next person. As a social worker I felt strong feelings for some of my clients. It is extremely difficult to ignore them as I did, but to not talk about the transference could damage the relationship....cause many secrets.... I am not saying what we are doing is right, and again I will say to you all not to do what I am doing. But I do believe that everyones threshold is different,and where I am at right now, I can handle this relationship no matter what does or does not happen. It is a learning process. Thank you all for your continued support and/or advice. I thank you for your honesty whether you see things my way or not. I hope you all are doing well. Take care of yourselves and keep writing! Susan47, I would like to talk to you. you had expressed interest in this. feel free to talk about anything or ask me questions. Welcome to the newbies.
poster:Jadah
thread:267681
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040723/msgs/371382.html