![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 22 of 22. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Tabitha on April 30, 2014, at 15:48:39
I left therapy two years ago, after, what, 19 years? I was burnt out, not even sure it was helpful, we had some serious ideological differences, and frankly I didn't have the energy or cash flow to continue.
Looking back I think the main benefit I was getting was a safe container for my desperation. I'd go in there and moan and complain and fret for up to three hours, and not really feel better afterward. But I didn't need to burden my friends or loved ones with my stuff so much, having that other outlet. I felt I was doing them a favor by purchasing that service instead of trying to get it from them.
I wonder if complaining doesn't just increase to fill the available container space. So the more I have access to a cooperative listener, the more I complain. I'm not sure the act of complaining is, in itself, good for me.
I'm as desperate as ever, if not moreso. Now my desperation gets expressed in my journaling. In a way it's less frustrating than therapy because I don't expect anyone to make it better or in any way help me. It's just that I have a compulsion to put my pain and confusion into words.
I go to a peer support group. Most weeks everyone gets 4 minutes to talk. No feedback until the end, and then it's informal. I kind of cheat and try to relate whatever I'm struggling with to the group charter issue, while suspecting I'm off-topic and just trying to use this group for general-purpose support.
It's very different to have only 4 minutes, and to be just one person in a ring of other people who all get 4 minutes. I can't really say it a worse experience than going on for hours alone with a professional listener. Most of the group also have therapists. I think oh no, there you go. Paying someone umpteen dollars an hour to make you feel like your pain is meaningful and special. What a privilege. Or what a scam.
Looking back at the experience I mostly feel angry. I feel I was financially exploited. Desperate people like to have someone listen to them. There's no end to how much they'll go on and on about their desperation. Charge by the minute, and they'll keep coming back, spending money they need for their future. Hearing their own story kindles their desperation, convincing them more and more that, even if this doesn't actually improve things, they still need this container. To avoid splashing the desperation around where it's socially inappropriate or burdensome.
What do you guys think?
Posted by baseball55 on April 30, 2014, at 19:09:17
In reply to Post therapy observations, posted by Tabitha on April 30, 2014, at 15:48:39
I sometimes worry about keeping myself unhappy in order to have something to talk about in therapy. But fortunately, my therapist is very pragmatic. If I'm unhappy, she is - how to live with it, how to counter it, how to accept it. So when I'm feeling okay, I cut back the frequency of sessions to every other week or so.
I also still see a p-doc every month with whom I did therapy for six years. Usually I see him for half-an-hour, but recently, with a lot going on in my life and separating from my husband, I've been seeing him for an hour a month. But he also is very much - what are we doing here? What are the goals? What is the endgame? He sees me monthly kind of grudgingly because he knows I am too attached to him to quit entirely.
I wonder about therapists who will see someone a few times a weeks for years on end without having clear goals or a clear endgame in mind. It seems to encourage people to cling to their problems in order to have something to talk about in therapy.
But maybe I'm being judgmental. We're all different and have different needs.
Posted by Phillipa on April 30, 2014, at 22:21:06
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by baseball55 on April 30, 2014, at 19:09:17
Whole different view from what I usually read here. For me therapy didn't work out. Therapists staring off into space, giving homework assignments they forgot they had given the next week. For me I only found therapy useful once in a group setting where we all shared with a therapist as a monitor. Taught us all to listen. Was a good experience. Phillipa
Posted by alexandra_k on May 1, 2014, at 3:39:41
In reply to Post therapy observations, posted by Tabitha on April 30, 2014, at 15:48:39
yes. i do wonder about this. sometimes i think i do benefit from a relatively objective other. but i think that those times aren't usually all that frequent... mostly... it is some kind of venting thing that i do... and i'm not sure how much it helps me vs gets me in a ruminatory mood.
Posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 17:15:27
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by baseball55 on April 30, 2014, at 19:09:17
> I wonder about therapists who will see someone a few times a weeks for years on end without having clear goals or a clear endgame in mind. It seems to encourage people to cling to their problems in order to have something to talk about in therapy.
>
> But maybe I'm being judgmental. We're all different and have different needs.I think it depends very much on the situation. To my therapist's credit, I think he was doing what he judged to be best for me. He doesn't do long term therapy as a rule. He's generally a homework handout CBT kind of therapist. He even tried, towards the beginning, to nudge me along. But he discovered that I was *extremely* sensitive to abandonment and that any slightest hint on his part would have me clinging like a barnacle. Ironically I think it was only my finally trusting him not to desert me that made it possible for me to be thinking about drastically cutting back. The last time I was at that point was right before Katrina. Then this time. I swear, it gives me an absolute terror of saying "You know, I don't really have anything to talk about. I'd like to cut back" even to myself, never mind him.
On the other hand, when I left Babble I remember wailing that now I'd have nothing to talk about in therapy. Which may have proved to be true...
But then, I have a pathological desire for sameness and stability in my life. It's very hard for me to make even the healthiest and most pleasant changes.
Posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 17:17:59
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by baseball55 on April 30, 2014, at 19:09:17
> I sometimes worry about keeping myself unhappy in order to have something to talk about in therapy. But fortunately, my therapist is very pragmatic. If I'm unhappy, she is - how to live with it, how to counter it, how to accept it. So when I'm feeling okay, I cut back the frequency of sessions to every other week or so.
Yes, I often felt this way. When I was doing well it felt there was nothing to talk about. Sometimes I'd dredge up some small annoyance, just to fill the air, then after talking about it, it became a much bigger annoyance. So was it a big annoyance all along? Or did airing it in therapy make it grow?
>
> I also still see a p-doc every month with whom I did therapy for six years. Usually I see him for half-an-hour, but recently, with a lot going on in my life and separating from my husband, I've been seeing him for an hour a month. But he also is very much - what are we doing here? What are the goals? What is the endgame? He sees me monthly kind of grudgingly because he knows I am too attached to him to quit entirely.Interesting. Mine would try to set goals for me, but I kept failing to meet them over and over, then we'd just go back into "emotional support" mode.
>
> I wonder about therapists who will see someone a few times a weeks for years on end without having clear goals or a clear endgame in mind. It seems to encourage people to cling to their problems in order to have something to talk about in therapy.
>Yes, I do think it created a rut where I was the person with problems and she was the helper. I feel more independent and capable since stopping. I do eventually move past things and sometimes even grow as a person. In therapy if that happened I felt credit had to go to therapy, and it was proof I needed continued therapy.
> But maybe I'm being judgmental. We're all different and have different needs.
Agree. If it felt good and helpful to me to be using so much therapy I'd probably still be doing it. No judgement to anyone who benefits from it and can afford it. Actually I'm in no position to judge anyone who feels stuck in a painful therapy relationship either!
Posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 17:22:01
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by Phillipa on April 30, 2014, at 22:21:06
> Whole different view from what I usually read here. For me therapy didn't work out. Therapists staring off into space, giving homework assignments they forgot they had given the next week. For me I only found therapy useful once in a group setting where we all shared with a therapist as a monitor. Taught us all to listen. Was a good experience. Phillipa
Phillipa sounds like you had some particularly bad therapists. I had a bad pdoc once who typed into a computer through every session. Also had long, brightly painted nails. I could barely focus on anything but the nails and the clacking sound.
Yes I have benefited from groups. Also had groups that felt harmful. Interestingly enough, the groups that felt harmful were my therapist's groups. Probably posted here years ago about it. I got kicked out of one of them. The other members voted me out while I was on vacation. You can't make this stuff up.
Posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 17:25:40
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by alexandra_k on May 1, 2014, at 3:39:41
> yes. i do wonder about this. sometimes i think i do benefit from a relatively objective other. but i think that those times aren't usually all that frequent... mostly... it is some kind of venting thing that i do... and i'm not sure how much it helps me vs gets me in a ruminatory mood.
>
>Right. I felt the "learning from an objective other" phase only lasted a few years. Reminds me of taking music lessons. They teach you the basics but eventually the teacher doesn't really know what to do with you. They can probably see what's not working and don't know how to get you working better.
Posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 17:29:22
In reply to Post therapy observations, posted by Tabitha on April 30, 2014, at 15:48:39
Obviously I agree to some point. And even though I recognize that I was the one pushing for forever therapy, not my therapist, one of my main feelings has been one that I totally blew enough money for an extra house.
My husband said no, that I was way better with therapy than without. And that whatever happens now, he helped me for years. When he seemed to have abandoned me entirely, it was hard for me to believe that. A really bad ending seems to negate everything that goes before.
But I don't think my therapist was much like yours. I don't recall him being overly sympathetic to complaining. He tended to be a fixer, and had to work hard at just listening. Even so, he concentrated his efforts on trying to help me view things from a different angle. I'm stubborn, so he had to do it slowly. Yet over time, I found myself saying what he had said to me as if it were my own idea. He'd tell me stories that could be used to throw light on my current situation (and I'd reject them). He'd ask questions that would lead me to think of something from another point of view (and I'd say they were totally irrelevant). He'd make me laugh at myself without ever laughing at me. I sound like an awful client don't I? I don't think I've been so contrary and disobliging in recent years. But it was hard work for many many years.
Also, like many obsessive people, I would have a tendency to get stuck in my head and twist my thoughts into a hopeless tangle. A therapist helped me keep them relatively untwisted so that I didn't end up with a huge mess I had to fix.
I think maybe I can now do that better for myself than I used to. Yet when I'm under stress, I think I may still need that in my life.
What would your therapist do?
Posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 19:22:02
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Tabitha, posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 17:29:22
> Obviously I agree to some point. And even though I recognize that I was the one pushing for forever therapy, not my therapist, one of my main feelings has been one that I totally blew enough money for an extra house.
I guess I'm moving from kicking myself over how much I spent to holding her responsible as well.
>
> My husband said no, that I was way better with therapy than without. And that whatever happens now, he helped me for years. When he seemed to have abandoned me entirely, it was hard for me to believe that. A really bad ending seems to negate everything that goes before.It's great that you got that objective feedback from your husband. The only similar feedback I got was a friend who told me I seemed happier after leaving. But I left the high-stress job at the same time as leaving therapy so it's hard to separate the two.
>
> But I don't think my therapist was much like yours. I don't recall him being overly sympathetic to complaining. He tended to be a fixer, and had to work hard at just listening. Even so, he concentrated his efforts on trying to help me view things from a different angle. I'm stubborn, so he had to do it slowly. Yet over time, I found myself saying what he had said to me as if it were my own idea. He'd tell me stories that could be used to throw light on my current situation (and I'd reject them). He'd ask questions that would lead me to think of something from another point of view (and I'd say they were totally irrelevant). He'd make me laugh at myself without ever laughing at me. I sound like an awful client don't I? I don't think I've been so contrary and disobliging in recent years. But it was hard work for many many years.It strikes me that you seem simultaneously more self-possessed and also more open to influence than I was. I suspect being so resistant to his prodding and making it take so very long to take hold was a big part of how you managed to get a good outcome from it. I think with medical treatment sometimes people just give up and pretend something is working in order to please the provider and not create a failure. You refused to pretend anything was more helpful than it really was.
>
> Also, like many obsessive people, I would have a tendency to get stuck in my head and twist my thoughts into a hopeless tangle. A therapist helped me keep them relatively untwisted so that I didn't end up with a huge mess I had to fix.
>
> I think maybe I can now do that better for myself than I used to. Yet when I'm under stress, I think I may still need that in my life.
>
> What would your therapist do?Well that's a great question. In the first few years she did a lot of basic CBT stuff, challenging distorted thoughts, and also just offering alternative interpretations of others' behavior. I had a real tendency to assume people were, well, more evil and spiteful than they probably were. So a lot of it was just educating me in how people operate. I felt that was all really valuable.
There was also a period where I'd come in, go on and on about my troubles, and she would manage to interpret it in a way that gave it meaning, and made it sound like growth. I liked that, even if I resisted thinking all the muck was valuable. Perhaps I learned something from all that. But after a while it felt like she was not teaching me to find my own meaning, but that I was trying and failing to copy her, and more and more it felt like giving up myself.
Then there was a big period where I was fighting obsessive/compulsive behavior, and I'd call her for phone sessions as an alternative to acting out. That cost a bundle but it saved me from acting on the impulses, which would have cost a lot in shame and hurt relationships. So it was worthwhile, although I wonder if other resources like peer support might have worked as well and cost a lot less.
All along there were lots of forays into new protocols like EFT, EMDR, and guided visualizations. Those things took lots of time, didn't seem to work, I didn't enjoy them. Yet I still thought the fault was mine, that if I was more "open" then this stuff would work for me. Over time as I learned that these things don't really have evidence for efficacy, and are pretty much just made up by somebody, and there are multiple reasons why something that doesn't actually work may appear to work, I got steadily angry about being pressured to go through these protocols week after week.(1)
Eventually she gave up on the protocols, and at that point it became just "supportive listening" which is where I felt I did a lot of complaining to little end. I mainly needed some advice on handling my job, which she couldn't give. She later said she had found all the talking about my job to be not valuable. It certainly wasn't. I really needed help though. Just didn't know where to get it.
It was somewhat helpful during the relationship with the spouse-- she talked me down from some cliffs, again related to me thinking people are more evil than they are. So that had value.
We ultimately fell out over my cancer treatment. Just could not even handle the suggestions she gave me on that. Finally thought I do not have time to winnow the little bit of wheat out of this chaff.
It was all sort of like leaving a cult-- the longer you stay the harder it is to leave, because you have to admit how stupid you were for believing and clinging to it and investing so much into it for so long. Although, reading this over, I see that there was a lot of good, especially at first, and it slowly got worse and worse and I did finally leave. Maybe more like a failed marriage than a cult.
Side Notes:
(1) OK this part is a tangent, but adds to my resentment and our differences. She also recommended another alternative practitioner, an MD, who had me on thyroid hormones very much against my regular doctor's guidance (his treatment made my bloodwork very abnormal). That actually seemed to help physically, but over time I realized the safety data was lacking, and he was not using sound judgement to prescribe all this stuff. If I had gone along with his all of his recommendations I would have been on a boatload of expensive supplements and hormones, not FDA approved, not covered by insurance, probably not safe or effective. Plus it was all sort of denialism, thinking I didn't really have bipolar, I had an undiagnosable thyroid disorder. Kind of nutty, and I would hope the person I trusted to help monitor my moods would have discouraged that type of thinking instead of encouraging it.
Posted by baseball55 on May 1, 2014, at 20:04:08
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 19:22:02
My p-doc really discouraged me from continuing the relationship for emotional support. He was quite harsh. Said he could keep seeing me for support indefinitely if I defined myself as chronically mentally ill who could not benefit from therapy. That the point of therapy was to end, not to continue indefinitely. He said he didm't want to play the role of a rent-a-friend. He wanted me to find a DBT therapist and move the therapy to her and just see me every few months for meds.
I pushed and pulled and pushed and pulled for a while over this. I quit for a while, mostly because I thought he wanted me to. Then I fell apart after a few months of not seeing him and begged him to see me again. He agreed, reluctantly. We finally worked out a deal where I would see him once a month for half and hour just to keep in contact because I just couldn't imagine not seeing him.
Knowing that I can check in with him is very comforting to me. Recently, I saw him twice in a month and he wasn't happy about it but agreed that, because of my problems with my husband - who he knows and my DBT therapist does not know, it would be okay for me to come in.
My DBT therapist, who, at this point, is just my therapist, is less goal-oriented and less focused on moving things to a conclusion. But she is still very pragmatic. If I come in and vent, she stops it. She is very much about - how do you learn to deal with this? How do you learn to cope with difficult emotions? When I was having a rough time several weeks ago after realizing I had to leave my husband, I actually found it difficult to see her. I would be okay and cope and get control most of the time. But when I saw her, I would lose it completely and just fall apart. I actually cut back our sessions even though I was having a hard time, because I found that the sessions made me worse. Instead, I upped my sessions with my p-doc, who doesn't let me decompensate like that.
Complicated relationship. I went my whole adult life without therapy until I was 49. Then, boom, I find a therapist and am so caught up in the experience that I can't stop.
I do think, however, that I have benefited a lot, though it's taken sooo much longer than I ever imagined it would. A few years ago, I would have stayed with my husband because I feared being alone so badly. Without therapy, I would still be addicted to drugs and alcohol, still be so guarded and defensive that I could not have had friends. I could not have coped with the depression that hit me for almost four years, but would have killed myself.
So therapy has helped. I'm able to understand my emotions and express them and control them in ways I could not have done before I started therapy.
But it's a difficult process. So fraught with intense and unrequited emotions.
Posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 22:01:21
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 19:22:02
> You refused to pretend anything was more helpful than it really was.
Boy, that's the truth. From the very first time I met him at a seminar he was holding on anxiety. He had us do some guided relaxation or positive affirmations or something like that. Then asked if we were feeling calmer. Everyone was obligingly saying yes until I answered that I really didn't. Then others said they didn't either.
Yet he still wanted to see me. :D
Some of what your therapist did sounds like what my therapist did. It sounds as if your therapist could be genuinely helpful. But that her personal beliefs were different than yours (and sound a bit flaky) and she just couldn't let it go and accept that you felt differently. And perhaps her ability to help ran out before your therapy did.
Maybe the conflicts between you settled into one of Harriet Lerner's dances. One of my therapist's better qualities was being willing to change the steps. Or maybe it was one of our therapy dyad's better qualities. I suspect either of us alone could easily got stuck in the traditional steps.
Have you been able to hold onto the good things? Like recognizing when you might be misjudging the motives of others? Do you ever find yourself doing that and needing someone to point it out to you? Or do you catch yourself and self correct?
I think ideally we're supposed to have to learn to do those things ourselves. But I suspect that under stress, I won't hold onto what I've learned very well and might need an outside point of view.
Posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 22:06:03
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by baseball55 on May 1, 2014, at 20:04:08
> I would be okay and cope and get control most of the time. But when I saw her, I would lose it completely and just fall apart. I actually cut back our sessions even though I was having a hard time, because I found that the sessions made me worse.
I actually found that to be one of the biggest values of therapy. I am so out of touch with my emotions, so dissociated from them, that I often have no idea what I feel at all until those doors are closed. It can be enlightening. So in some ways it made me worse, but in some ways it was far healthier.
> So therapy has helped. I'm able to understand my emotions and express them and control them in ways I could not have done before I started therapy.
>
> But it's a difficult process. So fraught with intense and unrequited emotions.So true.
Posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 22:09:41
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 19:22:02
> Well that's a great question. In the first few years she did a lot of basic CBT stuff, challenging distorted thoughts, and also just offering alternative interpretations of others' behavior. I had a real tendency to assume people were, well, more evil and spiteful than they probably were. So a lot of it was just educating me in how people operate. I felt that was all really valuable.
I'm not saying you aren't better off without her at this point. It does seem as if you had gotten to the point where she was no longer able to be helpful. But do you think it's possible that some of this thinking is influencing your overall view of therapy? What you described sounded as if there were some lasting positive effects.
Perhaps not worth the cost. Or may have been worth the cost if we could just figure out the ideal moment to leave.
Posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 23:10:08
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by baseball55 on May 1, 2014, at 20:04:08
baseball, the relationship with your pdoc sounds really difficult. It's like the opposite situation from me-- I was overly coddled, and you're being forced to buck up. I can understand your pdoc not wanting to do therapy, some don't, but it sounds like he's putting a value judgement on it and I wonder if that's making you feel bad about needing more support and attention.
It's interesting to hear how different the approaches are, just among the therapists and pdocs I've known, and yours. Honestly though if I had encountered one who forbid falling apart, I probably would have kept looking for one who would let me fall apart. I remember feeling like I needed coddling (or some less judgmental word for it) when I started.
Looking at your list of benefits you've gotten so far, I realize I did get similar benefits in the early years. I had close friends tell me I had changed for the better, and after all the hand-holding, my addictive behavior improved.
Maybe I need to try and separate my feelings about the past few years from my impression of the overall experience.
Thanks for your post!
Posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 23:37:10
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Tabitha, posted by Dinah on May 1, 2014, at 22:01:21
> [...] Everyone was obligingly saying yes until I answered that I really didn't. Then others said they didn't either.
:-)
> Some of what your therapist did sounds like what my therapist did. It sounds as if your therapist could be genuinely helpful. But that her personal beliefs were different than yours (and sound a bit flaky) and she just couldn't let it go and accept that you felt differently. And perhaps her ability to help ran out before your therapy did.Thanks for validating the bit about personal beliefs. Even as I complain about hers, it's still hard to really feel Ok with my different point of view.
>
> Maybe the conflicts between you settled into one of Harriet Lerner's dances. One of my therapist's better qualities was being willing to change the steps. Or maybe it was one of our therapy dyad's better qualities. I suspect either of us alone could easily got stuck in the traditional steps.I know she did change her approach, but it felt like it we were just not finding a new effective approach. It was really a long slow decline.
>
> Have you been able to hold onto the good things? Like recognizing when you might be misjudging the motives of others? Do you ever find yourself doing that and needing someone to point it out to you? Or do you catch yourself and self correct?I think I'm much better about not getting out of shape over things I assume people are feeling. I do remember I've been wrong before and it's best to get more information. I even sometimes manage to ask for clarification or tell them what I was fearing without it sounding like an attack. :-)
>
> I think ideally we're supposed to have to learn to do those things ourselves. But I suspect that under stress, I won't hold onto what I've learned very well and might need an outside point of view.
>Everyone devolves under stress, right? And I hope you can learn to draw from other outside points of view besides his.
> I'm not saying you aren't better off without her at this point. It does seem as if you had gotten to the point where she was no longer able to be helpful. But do you think it's possible that some of this thinking is influencing your overall view of therapy?
Yes it does sound like an example of that, doesn't it? I guess I was thinking I could feel exploited without really having to pin down whether I thought she was intentionally exploiting me. If I try to imagine her motive, I think she was just convinced the therapy was helpful, no matter how much I complained about it. I had been complaining all through therapy about not being comfortable with needing so much though, so maybe she didn't register a change. I guess what I really needed was just agreement that it was time to end, and she wouldn't give that, so I had to leave without her support. While facing cancer treatment.
> Perhaps not worth the cost. Or may have been worth the cost if we could just figure out the ideal moment to leave.
Nora Ephron said the last four years of therapy are wasted. That hits home, but of course it doesn't really help you figure out when you're at that point.
This has been a great discussion and I so appreciate your thoughts. We really had awful therapy terminations, didn't we?
Posted by baseball55 on May 2, 2014, at 19:59:52
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » baseball55, posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 23:10:08
> baseball, the relationship with your pdoc sounds really difficult. It's like the opposite situation from me-- I was overly coddled, and you're being forced to buck up. I can understand your pdoc not wanting to do therapy, some don't, but it sounds like he's putting a value judgement on it and I wonder if that's making you feel bad about needing more support and attention.
>
I'm probably making him sound harsher than he is. He actually loves doing therapy. He just sees therapy as a means to an end, not something that will be continued indefinitely. After five or six years, he wanted me to cut back. I was doing better, we had gone over most of the ground that needed to be covered, but I clung on because I was so attached to him. He didn't want to encourage that attachment. I got to a point where I didn't really need therapy from him on any regular basis anymore, but I didn't want to stop seeing him either. So he agreed to continue seeing me once a month and that's what we've been doing for almost three years.Occasionally something goes wrong in my life (like recently with my marriage) and we will meet more frequently. But he doesn't encourage this. He feels that the therapy I mostly need is DBT - learning to cope with depression, feelings of despair, anxiety. So I work with a DBT therapist and he checks in with her periodically.
His major concern with me has been my intense attachment to him. He wanted to cut back once I was better so that I didn't continue to feel completely dependent on him.
Posted by baseball55 on May 2, 2014, at 20:24:31
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 23:37:10
I think what my p-doc wants to avoid is precisely that line from Nora Ephron - dragging it out because there's no obvious conclusion. He wanted a conclusion. And so did I, actually. I was the one that suggested going to once a month because I saw how this could drag out in a way that wouldn't make either of us happy.
Posted by Tabitha on May 2, 2014, at 22:18:22
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations, posted by baseball55 on May 2, 2014, at 19:59:52
Baseball, that makes sense. I didn't understand that you had already been working with him for 5-6 years and had recognized that it was pretty much concluded as "therapy". It does still sound like a difficult termination process and I hope your attachment lessens with time.
Posted by baseball55 on May 3, 2014, at 19:17:06
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » baseball55, posted by Tabitha on May 2, 2014, at 22:18:22
> Baseball, that makes sense. I didn't understand that you had already been working with him for 5-6 years and had recognized that it was pretty much concluded as "therapy". It does still sound like a difficult termination process and I hope your attachment lessens with time.
It's lessening. It helps that he just turned 75 and I know he's not going to live/practice forever (though his health is good and he looks amazingly good for his age). But I know an end will come and in not too long a time. So....this getting old s***ks.
Posted by Dinah on May 10, 2014, at 13:31:33
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on May 1, 2014, at 23:37:10
> Nora Ephron said the last four years of therapy are wasted. That hits home, but of course it doesn't really help you figure out when you're at that point.
It really does hit home. Sometimes the termination can't help but affect the memory of the entire experience.
I'm no longer frantic. I'm no longer obsessively searching the internet for reasons. Sometimes something comes up and I really wish I could ask my therapist for perspective. But sometimes I'm darn glad I don't have to waste several hours going to see him. Mostly I think I'm sad. When I know what I'm feeling at all, which still isn't all that often.
Posted by Tabitha on May 18, 2014, at 17:17:07
In reply to Re: Post therapy observations » Tabitha, posted by Dinah on May 10, 2014, at 13:31:33
> It really does hit home. Sometimes the termination can't help but affect the memory of the entire experience.
>
> I'm no longer frantic. I'm no longer obsessively searching the internet for reasons. Sometimes something comes up and I really wish I could ask my therapist for perspective. But sometimes I'm darn glad I don't have to waste several hours going to see him. Mostly I think I'm sad. When I know what I'm feeling at all, which still isn't all that often.I'm glad to hear you are past the crisis phase. I have also noticed that when a difficult stuff happens, I'm relieved I don't have to spend hours telling my therapist all about it.
This is the end of the thread.
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