Earlier in the week I had planned to transcribe Monday’s session with Em and put it in the blog but given how things are now, how the week has evolved, how my feelings have intensified, I can’t even bring myself to listen to the recording and be reminded of what’s happened. I can only summarise and paraphrase was said because I can’t even bear to hear her voice – it hurts too much.
I suppose it doesn’t really matter what was said now, because somehow or other it is now Sunday and we are no longer working together. I am beyond devastated. As the week has gone on I have gone through so many waves of this torturing grief interspersed with periods of denial and anger, and yet last night something shifted and the reality probably hit for the first time.
Suddenly, I feel like my whole life has been thrown into chaos. I feel like I am breaking in two. I am fearful of everything. Like I honestly feel like I can’t fucking cope with anything. I’m scared of what’s to come. I feel like I don’t want to be here anymore.
I know these must be the feelings of the young parts because I feel so powerless and small but my god it feels real and huge right now.
I am also feeling stupid and embarrassed and so much shame about how badly this ending has affected me. I am heartbroken and yet how am I meant to tell anyone about this because it’s clearly fucking mental to most people in the real world. She is/was just my therapist…but she was important to me. And as my therapist, if she is only someone to work out transference with, whoever she represents from my past – clearly my mother (#motherwound) – I am now feeling the full force of what it is to be rejected and abandoned by someone you love.
It’s no wonder I couldn’t withstand these feelings as a kid and dissociated them because feeling this, fully, in the here and now, is enough to make me want to die… this is annihilation.
I’m trying to keep one foot in adult but it’s hard. I need to process this. I need to write. But also, putting this down on the page must mean it’s real. I can’t try and pretend that it’s actually going to be ok, now. That it’s just a rupture and we’ll repair it and things will be better.
It’s over.
I guess, you’re all wondering what happened? Well, it’s been a cumulative process over months but it all sort of came to a head on Monday. Em had read the email where I had laid myself bare where I had explained how it feels to be ignored when I reach out, to have the Christmas gift rejected, and how hard it is to feel like there is a wall between us. The email ended by telling her:
It feels like we are on completely different pages right now. It feels like all the things I have worried about, about being too much is exactly right. It feels like you have taken a big step back from me when actually that’s opposite of what I needed. I can’t seem to fully explain what I mean but what seems really complex is actually really simple.
I need you to help me hold the feelings I have and normalise them and actually accept them. I need you to help me break through the shame I feel about needing connection to you and work with me to find workable solutions to the problems I have with outside contact when things get bad because it’s not going away. I need help to make breaks feel better. I need to feel like I am in a relationship with you and not in an observation tank. It just feels like we are perpetually re-enacting what happened when I was little. My mum and wider family were so emotionally and physically withholding that just being in the room with you feels traumatic because you feel so distant and even though you say that you aren’t, it’s still my experience.
I understand why you think that by trying to ‘think’ about where all this is coming from in the past might make it feel less horrendous with you in the present but so much of the time I am not able to access that ‘thinking’ brain and am caught up completely in my emotions. I can see where this stems from, I know why it gets triggered, but this doesn’t actually process the emotion in the moment. If it was about the logical, intellectual stuff I’d be fine…but it’s not.
I’ve read so much about this but it just isn’t moving because until I feel like the young parts are held safely and contained with you I think I’m going to be stuck in limbo.
I need you to know that despite how ‘much’ there is in those notebooks and here, and how intense my feelings seem I am not suddenly going to start texting you all the time, ringing you, turning up on your doorstep or whatever else it is that you think might happen because I would hope by now you would see that whilst there is a lot of trauma and the attachment stuff is massive, I’m not that crazy and I don’t want you to be anything but my therapist.
I have no idea what I am going to do on Monday and wonder if I am actually just beyond help…some reassurance would go a really long way right now because it’s a complete disaster inside.
Anyway, I walked in on Monday and I really hoped that things would be ok but I could tell that they weren’t, not really. Em had a huge clipboard and notes she had written with reference to the email. She asked me if there was anything I wanted to talk about or whether we should discuss the email. I agreed it made sense to talk about the email.
She started talking about it in a paragraph by paragraph way – well, picking out bits from the areas she thought were important. It was very factual and I felt really distant from her.
It wasn’t too bad until after about ten minutes she basically said that she feels like my young parts are ‘demanding’ and she feels like they are ‘adhesive’ (see adhesive attachment in psychoanalytical theory), that it feels like I ‘want to get inside her’, that I am ‘intruding’ when I contact her, ‘pushing the boundaries’, and that it feels like my need for her is ‘all the time’ … ‘like a tick needing a constant supply of whatever it wants’.
My brain got wedged on ‘like a tick’ but there was more, about if she were to give reassurance (which she ackowledged she doesn’t) it would be like ‘feeding an addiction’… ummm it just went on and on. She said the stuff about politics before Christmas (because I had written about it in the email) was actually her talking how the election was about democracy… I have the recording…that is not how it was. She made no mention of how I felt about the rejection of the gifts even though I’d written quite a bit about it, and flat out avoided talking about the bit I have added above about trying to find strategies that work for both of us to not keep getting in this mess.
I could barely talk once she’d compared my child parts to adhesive ticks – she said as much, ‘it feels like I have talked at you and you haven’t replied’…which is when with five minutes to go I managed to say, ‘how would you feel if someone you cared about likened you to a tick?’ She apologised, sort of, but said that I am very sensitive and get defensive, and it was just a metaphor. I said that it was a ‘shit metaphor’ and she apologised and said that perhaps she should have stuck with the word ‘adhesive’ as if that’s any fucking better!!
She said she was sorry if she had offended me and that she wasn’t talking about me as a person, or who I am but it’s how she sees the young parts… which is even fucking worse. The young parts that have been so terrified to trust, to open up, to let the feelings out – and when I finally do the kick back was spectacular.
She has retreated from me in the biggest way – I have felt it and yet she’s made out like it’s me and my attachment picking up stuff that’s not there…but it is!
She said that we can concertedly work with these parts but that it’s going to take hard work and maybe I just want to act out this stuff and not work out why this is happening. I felt devastated by what she was saying. Of course I want to work on myself…but I just don’t feel safe in the room. Surely there are ways of talking about this stuff without crushing someone’s sense of self.
I was clearly not in a great place when the session came to an end and to add insult to injury as I got up to leave she said, ‘that took me about an hour to read’. When I had sent the email I had said to let me know how long it took and to bill me for the time, but to be honest her telling me at that point wasn’t great timing. It just felt, yet again, that this is all about a transaction to her. I was breaking my heart and she was telling me I owe her and extra £60.
I left that last session in a complete mess. I burst into tears the moment I got in the car and cried all the way home. When I got near to home I pulled over into a layby on the single track lane and I spoke to my friend on the phone and cried at her, broken, desperate, and the child parts wailing. Then I sat and cried some more in the layby and waited for the tears to subside before driving home. My wife was working from home and the last thing I wanted was to have to explain why I was so late back and also why I had rivers of mascara running down my face.
Just to clarify – I am not a crier; I have found it impossible to let anything out in years… but the fucking dam is broken now and I have been bursting into tears IN FRONT OF PEOPLE! IN PUBLIC PLACES! WITH NO CONTROL! I am soooooooooo upset.
On the positive side of this, if there is one, is that this rupture/ending has tapped into my core wound in the biggest way and all the grief is flooding out now. I know this is not just about Em but right now it is and right now she is not helping me process any of my feelings or grief so if feels like this loss is just going to go on the pile of other rejections…which is not really what I had wanted from this therapy!
I had really struggled to stay present during the session because all I could hear in my head repeating over and over was, ‘she thinks you’re like a tick’. It was hideous. A tick? A fucking parasite? I mean why would you ever make that analogy about anyone, let alone someone you’ve known intimately for eight years in a therapeutic relationship? At a time when I really needed to be adult in the room and fight my corner I was gone and deep in the trauma and she just kept talking. It felt like every sentence confirmed that she has had enough of me and feels like I am too needy and demanding.
I felt like I wanted to die. The child parts were reexperiencing the feelings that are so familiar and were so devastated that it was Em that had made them feel this way. I was in a relationship with her to try and rewrite the narrative and yet somehow here I was being pushed away again for being too much. I felt unseen. Or maybe I was seen but now she’d seen me, as I am, with all my need, and was disgusted by me and wanted to get away from me. Maybe I have to accept that the person I think I am (trying to believe I’m not a needy freak) is actually not what everyone else sees and maybe they are correct after all.
I think maybe if I listened back to the session it mightn’t have been as bad as it felt in the moment, but the problem is, spouting theory at me is one thing (like perhaps it is adhesive attachment) but my feelings are still involved and how this is talked about is important. Somehow Em doesn’t frame things in way that doesn’t make me feel ashamed. I do understand that so much of what happens is down to my attachment problems and the parts but there surely are ways of saying things that don’t make the client feel worthless and crap. Like, surely she must’ve known I was struggling to be there and hear what she was saying?
I know at the end she tried to apologise but the thing is, the damage was already done. I was so far out of my window of tolerance that I couldn’t hear her…
Having spoken to my friend after the session and feeling so unbelievably hurt, I had resolved to take a break from therapy with Em for a while because it’s just getting worse and worse with every session. Something big is playing out and I don’t seem to have the capacity to side step it and look at it objectively when I am in the room with her. I basically walk in, look at her, and bam it’s trauma time.
As I pulled up on my drive I looked at my phone and an email from Anita had come in replying to the email I had sent her before the weekend:
Recap of my message:
Hi Anita,
Thanks for getting back to me and thinking about this. I suspected this is what your supervisor might say and do understand. It’s a complex dynamic.
I need time to think about what to do next. There are so many competing parts inside right now and it feels overwhelming. I really want to move forward and away from this horrible place of feeling rubbish all the time but the fear of the vulnerable parts losing Em is enormous – like annihilation and it’s not going to be a simple transition to another therapist after eight years with all that’s been triggered in the relationship.
The reality is that I don’t trust people easily and so it is a real barrier to leaving. I guess it’s something about better the devil you know and whilst I sense that you would be a good fit for me from what you have said there is definitely a voice that is saying, ‘what if she’s just the same and you get hurt again – at least Em knows you’.
I know, ultimately, it’s going to take a leap of faith now but any change is unsettling for me. I understand, too, that there’s a possibility that by the time I have managed to leave Em you mightn’t actually have availability or capacity to see me…which makes the whole process feel daunting. I guess I’ll just have to trust the universe on this one.
I don’t really know what else to say but I am grateful to you for trying to help find a way forward.
I’ll be in touch…soon… I hope.
RBCG
Anita said:
I really do understand RBCG and feel you need to look after the vulnerable parts of you.
My sense is you have done some really valuable & positive work with your current therapist and now ready for the next part of your journey and it’s hard to let go of one and to continue with someone else you don’t yet know.
I can also hear your concern regarding my availability which is also a valid concern but I will add Mondays & Fridays are usually my quietest days so I should be able to fit you in as and when you feel ready.
With very best wishes,
Anita
It felt a bit like the universe was aligning in that moment. On the Friday session with Em I had driven home and driven past Anita driving the other way. I would never usually notice oncoming vehicles or cars and yet I looked up and there she was and now, on Monday after the shit had hit the fan in came a message from her again. I jumped on the opportunity and emailed her immediately to see if I could arrange a second session:
Hi Anita,
Thanks for this. It couldn’t have been better timed, actually, as I have left therapy today in tears – the last two sessions have been hell (on top of the stuff that happened before) but even my really damaged, vulnerable parts that will tolerate almost anything can’t cope with my child parts being called ‘intrusive’, ‘adhesive’, and… ‘tick like’. Needless to say I feel like I want crawl into a hole and die right now but it’s given me the push I needed.
So, when can we arrange to meet?…and I honestly don’t think I am any of those things Em said.
RBCG
She responded and we scheduled an appointment for Friday.
I spent a lot of the day crying and speaking with my wife, which is unheard of, but I couldn’t hide how bad I was feeling. And even, she, as an unfeeling ‘man brain’ could see how the ‘tick’ reference would hurt.
Later that day (Monday) I drafted and email to Em, typing through my tears knowing that this was looking very much like the end of the road. I was in such a state.
Em,
I need a break from therapy with you for a while. Whilst I understand some of what you have been saying lately from an intellectual perspective – I get the theory – my feelings are still wrapped up in all this. I am not just some kind of case study to be analysed and hypothesised about. I can’t just absorb the stuff you’re saying and it not have an impact on me. To hear, today, that you feel that I am ‘intruding’, ‘demanding’, ‘trying to get inside you’, ‘pushing boundaries’ and that my wanting to be close to you or asking for occasional reassurance is me behaving like I have an unhealthy ‘addiction’ that shouldn’t be encouraged, and that I am ‘like a tick’ well, it really, really hurts.
I don’t ever really cry and yet today I spent an hour crying in a layby after the session because what you said hurt me so much. Saying that it’s not about me as a person but how you see the young parts doesn’t really make it feel any better because it’s the youngest most vulnerable parts that are tied up in this, it’s them that need to feel like they aren’t too much. I get how uncomfortable I have been making you feel and I am sorry that it’s feels so negative. Being thought of as adhesive is bad enough but parasitic is a whole other level of pain for me. I feel so stupid for letting you in and allowing myself to be vulnerable with you…to love you.
I know you can’t keep my session times free and until I can step outside my relationship with you and look at things without feeling anything there’s no point in doing this week in week out. So I guess we’ll just have to see what your schedule looks like in the future.
I am so sad that it’s got to this point.
Take care
On Tuesday evening at 7pm I received this reply:
Dear RBCG,
Thank you for letting me know about your decision and I am sorry that I was not able to help you. I wish you well for the future.
Em
And just like that my world fell apart. I had been crying on and off since the session but stupidly still held out some hope that she might read that email, see how hurt I was (even if she didn’t mean to hurt me) and meet me where I was at, in all the messy, confused, young, hurt feelings. But instead I got this. I’ve known this woman eight years and worked together with her for five of those…and this is how she ends it?? Two sentences? I was pretty much hysterical all night. Sobbing my heart out. I fell asleep crying and woke the next day with the sorest head. My body was killing me…and all I wanted to do was hurt myself.
Clearly, I was right. She really doesn’t care about me and there never was a relationship. I mean…wtaf? What should I be thinking here? That’s it? No termination sessions, no goodbye? She knows me. She knows how big a deal rejection and abandonment are and yet how could I possibly see that email as anything else but rejecting and abandoning?
I managed to formulate some thoughts in an email even though internally I was freaking out and again sat at my laptop crying my eyes out as I typed. I sent this on Wednesday evening:
Em,
I’m really confused and panicked by your email. Am I meant to read it as we’re actually done forever and not having a break/leaving door open so I can regroup and get myself together? And if this is the case (this is termination) that we are not going to have any time to create a reasonable ending to this therapy? I really wasn’t expecting to terminate via a two sentence email after all this time – it’s not what I want. I’m shit at endings anyway but this is not how I would choose to mark the ending of a significant relationship….which is what it is to me.
I know things are in a complete mess, hence wanting to take some breathing space but it seems like you’re finis hed. I know there’s a lot of negative countertransference here but I don’t think it’s ideal if this is how this ends.
Of course, only you can make a decision for you and if you’ve had enough you’ve had enough.
As for not being able to help me – that just isn’t the case at all. You’ve helped me with so much in the time that I’ve been seeing you. I am not the same person as I was when I saw you in the NHS or even a few years ago. I actually feel things now when I never could access my emotions at all before. I am actually making choices in my life that work for me rather running myself into the ground (ok this is new for 2020). I am still so grateful to you for being alongside me on my journey so far and whilst things are really hard right now I don’t think that the whole therapy has been useless or unhelpful.
Getting this email last night felt like I had suffered another bereavement – I can’t just have you gone with no chance to say goodbye.
x
By this point I wasn’t even sure if she would respond or not…I mean that last email felt pretty final.
But she did reply with this on Friday (talk about dragging this agony out all week!):
Dear RBCG,
Having thought a lot about the therapy with you, I have sadly come to the conclusion that we need to end the therapy, because, in my clinical view, I have come to the limit of my competence in my work with you. I would very much prefer to end in person and, would therefore suggest that we meet for between one and six weekly sessions at your old Monday time and starting at your earliest convenience. Please let me know whether you would like to have these sessions.
Em
More tears came. All I have fucking done this week is cried. And this just felt cold again…and perhaps like she was covering her back since it’s kind of protocol to offer termination sessions with clients to try and have a decent enough ending. Had I not emailed her querying what was going on, whether we had terminated, and if so what was happening, I think I would never have heard from her again. I had always hoped that my therapy would end positively and it would be a relationship that I would be able to return to periodically in the future.
I suspect I will always dip in and out of personal therapy throughout my life – almost like a car needs servicing. It might not be regular, and it might not be many sessions, but I had hoped that if any significant life events happened that caught me off guard or I had the occasional wobble in the future I would always have that door open to be able to return to Em. This is how I imagined I would get and exercise that earned secure attachment we are all seeking. The relationship can still exist years later even if we don’t see each other much at all.
But here I am staring down the barrel of another shut door.
I literally do not know what to do.
Should I go back and have a termination session or a few sessions? Or is it likely just to be more of the same?
Any ideas would be great because I have no fucking idea.
I don’t want to go in, cry like a baby and have her sit there and watch me in all my pain and go, broken again but equally if I don’t go and say goodbye will this just be another ending where I am left holding all the feelings and never getting any closure.
Thank you everyone for your support through this. It’s funny, I was reading my year ahead horoscope at the beginning of January and it said something about internet friends being massively important in the coming year… looks like that’s right! x
Rubber Bands and Chewing Gum 
Wow RBCG, what a read.
First of all thank you for sharing this, it is evidently painful for you to have written. I found myself feeling angry in your behalf.
I don’t think Em is behaving in the way a therapist should and I found myself hoping you didn’t pay for that email. Tell her to learn to read better and not take the piss, is how I felt! But then, I realise I know very little about counter-transference. And perhaps it’s not something therapist’s always deal with, though I think if they can’t deal with it they should take it to supervision and deal with it. Em evidently can’t or won’t.
But your emails are so beautifully written and even with the way you’ve been treated, you’ve held on in your commitment to the relationship, holding on to the good she has undeniably brought you as her therapist in the past 8 years. That is such a testament to you! One person out of this whole interaction stands out as shining bright and true, and it’s not the therapist, though it should be. You’ve shown yourself to be stronger than her through your honest vulnerability. I’m so sorry it didn’t pay off the way you deserved.
I have to say it’s striking the difference in the emails from the two therapists. I think Anita is going to really roll her sleeves up and get right in there alongside you, it sounds like she’s paved the way with her invitation, and like you rightly said, it really was such good timing! I’m so hopeful for you yet I really do offer my most sincere commiserations for the pain you are in right now.
As for doing the ending sessions? I know some people wouldn’t, but I am the kind of person who would always wonder ‘what if’, if I didn’t. But it is that part of me that stays far too long in bad relationships so I’m probably not the best to give advice on this one. I wonder if Anita would see you already if you’re doing a few ending sessions? That’s a lot different to having two therapists on the go at the same time, so she might, for at least a few weeks. But perhaps it’s not fair to suggest that because the last thing you need right now is another refusal even if it’s from a lovely therapist in the waiting who seems to offer everything you need.
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Thank you so much for that lovely comment. I feel so broken right now that I am wondering whether I am just a complete fruitcake who clearly just can’t accept boundaries and was bound to drive a therapist mad.
I saw Anita on Friday and will see her again on Monday. She has been very understanding and actually is concerned by a lot of what I have told her. She’s kind and warm but I don’t know her yet. I feel like this poor woman is going to get tested like crazy because as she says ‘my rejection antennas are working overtime’ now.
Like you I am of the mindset that if I don’t go I won’t have any chance of getting the ending I want. BUT at the same time I don’t think there is any chance of a meeting going well. It’s got so messy. Em said the other day it’s like I ‘keep going to an empty cupboard hoping for something different’… I really don’t think your therapist should feel like an empty cupboard. Ok they’re not an all you can eat buffet but surely there might be a couple of crackers in there and maybe a drink?!
xxx
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RBCG please believe you are absolutely NOT a fruitcake. If you are then I, and the rest of us here on WordPress are too. If I told you I was worried I’m a fruitcake I think you’d say the same to me. You didn’t drive your therapist mad, she obviously has some serious limitations as a therapist. I really hope she doesn’t advertise herself as an attachment specialist. It doesn’t surprise me to hear you say Anita is actually concerned by a lot of what you have told her. Concerned for good reason! She can see how damaging it is for a therapist to behave this way, especially to someone with younger rejection wounds like this. It’s like someone with a burn on the arm, nothing wrong in using a blood pressure cuff to take their vital signs, but don’t put it on the injured arm cuz it’s gonna hurt like hell and make things worse! To do anything other than treat that burns with gentle respect would be clinical incompetence.
As for Em saying the cupboard is bare, I say this to her… if you know the cupboard is empty, you bloody get a tesco delivery! (Trust me, that was the censored version!)
Grrrr to your ex therapist 🤬
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Good. Because I hate fruitcake and see myself far more of a carrot cake 🤣! Thank you for your understanding, thoughtful comments. Maybe I should go to my termination session with a bag of snacks? ‘Here, I brought these for your empty cupboard!’ 🙄🤪
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Haha, love it!
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You’ve got a lot of spirit 😉
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That’s so awful of her. I feel like she is only going to be cold and clinical with you from now on, and I don’t think she’s likely to give you the closure you crave judging from the tone of her email replies. I feel you, I really do. Only having gone through a fraction of what you have myself was painful enough, but for her to be that cold and clinical about it, I just can’t imagine the gut-wrenching pain that must have caused you. My heart goes out to you it really does.
Looking at your blog as an observer, she sounds as though she’s way off the mark and needs more training to fill the gaps in her “therapeutic expertise”.
Take care. You deserve healing. X
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It’s crap and painful. I had a good session with Anita today but it’ll be a week until I see her now and that feels quite a long time given all that’s happened. I agree I’m unlikely to get the kind of closure I’d like. It’s so sad. I am doubting absolutely everything that was the relationship now. Can she ever have cared to be like this now?
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I know what you mean. You wonder why they suddenly changed.
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Yes. Just in a clinical way. She’s worked, as you’ve said, with logic only. Which isn’t what you need. And she keeps it to logic and clinical only because those are her boundaries for her safety. Which again I think she should have responded differently. You deserve more. But it doesn’t mean that she never cared about you.
Sending virtual hugs…
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Fuck me.
I got dumped by a therapist by email after two years of working. She simply said she can’t help anymore and that’s it. This reminds me of that.
It sounds to me like maybe you’ve hit some of ems personal wounds. The image of her with a clipboard is immensely defensive. Like a barrier between you and her. I think she’s needing to be this intellectual because of her own stuff. Personally.
The therapist I spoke of above, being dumped by email? I’d just got through a patch of feeling really suicidal. I gather that therapist had lost a friend by suicide not too long ago. It was her shit that made her drop me like hot coal and I really feel it’s likely the same here.
It’s not you, I think it’s her. I really really think it’s her.
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Sorry, I haven’t responded til now. I put my phone away yesterday and tried to get away from the pain of what’s going on. I’m amazed by all the support that’s flooding in but also makes me so sad that there seems to be unanimous agreement that this is a shit show! It’s difficult. Whatever has gone on both mine and Em’s part it is still devastating that we’re in this place. I doubt she’d agree. Still no idea what to do about a termination session. xx
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The utter raw pain & confusion you are feeling shines through this post. It’s completely horrific; just keep taking one breath after another-it’s the only way to survive such deep & awful pain.
YOU ARE NOT TO BLAME FOR ANY OF THIS!!!!!! When you can, look up janina Fisher’s work on complex trauma and working with child parts. Em sounds old style psychodynamic, and while there is a lot to said for that approach, it doesn’t work with complex trauma. It really doesn’t, and it sounds as though em has recognised that she is at the limits of her competency. The most ethical thing she can do in that situation is end with you; she can’t keep taking your money once she has recognised that she cannot help you. I bet she is devastated, after 8 years of working with someone to end this way would be incredibly painful for a therapist. I think she won’t show you any of that and so you will interpret her trying hard to maintain neutrality as cold, but I imagine she is trying to protect you from her own sense of failure to hold the space for you to express your legitimate anger and grief. I don’t doubt she’s seeking supervision.
In the meantime, what you are experiencing is utterly horrific and I am so so sorry for you. I was there 5 years ago when are therapists I’ve been working with for 5-years dumped me by email; for very similar reasons. It was completely shattering for me but that led to me working with my current therapist and he has really changed my life. Find someone who is a real specialist in complex trauma and attachment difficulties. Take lots of care and be so gentle with yourself. It is utterly horrific but you will survive and heal. Pink
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Thank you 🙂 it is excruciating going through this. I would like to think Em cared about what’s going on but her emails don’t seem to demonstrate that. I do definitely agree that some of this will be down to her psychodynamic leaning. I know I need a different way of working to hold this better. When I feel contained in sessions I don’t get the need to reach out between them because I am ok and safe…it’s when the sessions aren’t holding that the whole thing tumbles into shit. So I need to work in a way that is more demonstrative in session. My new T is very nice. We’ve had three sessions now – and I like her…but I am also terrified that she’ll freak out and run when she sees the needy parts…although suspect it may be a long while til they feel safe enough to come out after what’s happened with Em. I’ve read Janina Fisher’s, ‘Healing The Fragmented Selves Of Trauma Survivors’ and it changed my life. It was then that I realised I had structural dissociation. I should look and see what else she’s done.
I’m sorry you went through this yourself….bloody therapists eh?!
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Wow…just WOW! I can’t actually believe she would do that via email. Me, I don’t know if I would ever want to give her the time of day to talk anymore. And to have to pay her for what feels like torture…no way.
I think if you can wait a few days before responding to her and talk it over with Anita maybe things will feel a bit clearer…and if not at least Anita sounds a lot better equipped to hold her own shit…and yours for that matter.
And to actually refer to your client out loud that you liken her to a tick….fuck me…that’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard. And even if it was just a metaphor, considering what you’re trying to work through, how could she not find that comment damaging?? She clearly has some work to do on her own.
I don’t know love…it all sounds devastating. I’m so glad you have Anita in your corner and I feel like she is not going to be impressed by what’s transpired.
Keep hanging in there. We’re here…xx
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I know. Thanks Kerry. It’s almost unbelievable what’s happened. I keep having to really take a step back and go, ‘how the fuck did we end up here?’ And the tick thing is something I don’t think I’ll ever get over. I know she shouldn’t have said it but because she did and she matters to me it’s got embedded in that really sore place where I already feel so much pain of being inadequate and unlovable. It was a truly horrible thing to say. I am glad I have found Anita, but it’s gonna be a long hard slog to trust anyone after what’s just happened. I am so aware that I could end up in the same place again. Thank you for your support. Thank god for WordPress!! x
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There is absolutely nothing wrong with you, and your attachment behavior is not parasitic in the least. What a cold and pathologizing thing for her to say. I feel very defensive on your behalf right now. I’m so sorry she talked to you that way….
You’re so right that it will not feel the same with Anita, after coming from an 8 year relationship with Em, but if Anita comes through with a trauma-informed approach to attachment work and really tries to meet your needs, I think it’s very probable that you could develop a closeness with her sooner than you might think.
❤️
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Thank you. I hope that is the case. Either way, the one thing I will say is I haven’t felt shit leaving Anita’s the last three sessions and I feel safe enough with her at the moment. Obviously it’s early days and things may change once the attachment stuff kicks in… fffuuuuucccckkkk!!! I’m so sad about how this has happened. I felt very let down….but even still, part of me still wonders if it’s my fault. Nightmare!
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I am so very sorry for the way that this has turned out for you. That this woman could devote eight years of work to you and then just completely drop out of your life like that speaks to her own issues, it is nothing (I repeat NOTHING) on you. You are not too much, you are not a tick, you are a human being with needs and past trauma and guess what…that’s all completely okay! That is what therapy is all about!! Please hear everyone who is telling you this, because we know what we’re talking about. M had her own shit, and for whatever reason she let it come out in the worst possible way with you, and that is so not okay. I’m glad Anita is concerned about her actions, I hope that’s a bit of validation for you. And I agree with those who said it appears she’s ready to jump right in; I hope she can make you feel more contained and safe than M did. I know that there’s absolutely nothing any one of us can say that will strip you of this pain, which is so unfair. It’s heartbreaking that our relationships with our therapists can do this to us, but it comes from the intimate nature of what you shared with her and is not shameful. It’s normal grief. Allow yourself to feel it and tell any thoughts that let M off the hook for her toxic behavior to kindly STFU. I am thinking of you xx
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Hey darling. Thank you for this, and for your email. I will get round to replying to that a little later. Right now I am taking a running jump at trying to respond to the waves of supportive comments from team wordpress!
I am so upset by what’s happened. I am staggered that it’s got to this seemingly out of nowhere. I mean I know it’s not felt great for a long while but I didn’t honestly believe she would essentially terminate me via a two sentence email and then actually confirm the termination in another email. It’s terrible really. Especially for someone with the wounds we have. I feel stupid for caring about her and letting her see my vulnerability. It’s crushing to have this happen and unfortunately it’s tapped into so many other losses that right now I feel completely at sea. Anyway, I’ll email when I can. Thank you for cheerleading xxx
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Two words: Holy fuck.
It’s NOT you. You and your young parts are NOT ticks. RBCG, you deserve better, and we are here as you cry and grieve. I believe Em has serious countertransference issues going on and that is NOT your fault. You are NOT too much at all. I think you are touching on one of her own wounds, but she shouldn’t be “splashing” all over you but seek therapy and supervision.
Witholding therapists re-enact the deprivation of our childhoods, and that’s in the clinical literature as well. I honestly think the attachment will develop with Anita AND it won’t be so painful because your young parts will get some of what they need.
My T and I do schema therapy which prizes therapist flexibility and “limited reparenting” and I haven’t turned into a gaping maw of need either, even when she has said Yes to some things, and No to others.
It is NOT your fault even though I can imagine the utter pain you’re in. It is not you or your younger parts that are the problem. Hugs to them and you if wanted.
You deserve better, I really think Anita is willing to roll up her sleeves and wade in with you. ❤
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Thank you. Yes. This is it. She seems unable to see that when she has reached out in the past it hasn’t escalated the behaviour – it’s settled it. It’s been the withholding nature of the relationship that has really caused so many issues. It’s so retraumatising to my young parts. I know she can’t be my mum and available 24/7 but some flexibility surely isn’t too much. I know everyone here gets it! I’m glad I have found Anita but it’s gonna take a while to let her in….especially after what’s just happened with Em. I’m utterly exhausted by this. The saddest thing is, she couldn’t care less. Take care x
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Hugs hugs Hugs ❤
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So so sorry, be very gentle with yourself, you didn’t deserve that gentle 🤗 ❤️
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Thank you. I’m trying to be gentle with myself…which is ok when I don’t have too much to do. Tomorrow I have a full day teaching and evening tuition…I can’t even see how I’ll manage. Ugh. I want to hide in bed!
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That sounds so painful RB.
My experience of switching therapists was that at the end of the day, do I want what this therapist is selling? That sounds cold, and it was more complicated of course, but I found I had to ask myself whether what this therapist wanted to do was what I needed. In my case, it wasn’t, even though we’d spent years together. Being attached by itself wasn’t helpful without other progress.
I was thinking about your question of whether to go to closure sessions with Em. I could be totally wrong, but my opinion is that more sessions would only be helpful if you could stay regulated. Going in for more of the same drama sounds destructive. If you think you could remain in a ‘window of tolerance’ and just stay in the sorrow of an ending, maybe it would be a positive thing.
You know Em very well at this point. Would she be able to help you have a good ending? Would it help to wait some weeks before you tried for a closure session?
I personally didn’t want to pay for closure sessions, and that worked OK for me, but it was a different type of situation as well, where I wasn’t angry so much as done.
Take care
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Hey Ellen, thanks for this. Yes, you are right. I can’t keep spending £450 a month to feel like shit! I agree, the main issue is going to be whether or not I can stay regulated if I see her for a termination session. I’d like to think I could…but I also know how much grief I’m feeling right now and I imagine it may be the day I just fall apart in from of her. And that’s not going to be helpful. I think whatever I do I’m not going to get the outcome I want. Seeing her will confirm that there was nothing between us, not going will probably make me always live with ‘what if’. Both are painful. I dunno. It’s all crap really. x
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RBCG I am shocked and horrified by what Em put you through. Part of me wants to reassure you that it’s likely more about her countertransference in response to your very legit and reasonable assessment of your need – but no need to focus on what’s wrong with her anymore. I think she is telling you the truth, and that your adult should try to take it in – she is at the limit of her skills and can no longer help. That’s her challenge- not yours, though your littles will pay the price for her poor management of it. Anita sounds great – and moreover, she seems to get it all: that you and Em did amazing work, that you got really far with it, that it’s time to move on, that you need and deserve more, AND ALSO that it’s incredibly painful, a transferential reenactment, and heartbreaking. That said, you’ve healed some of that wound – she sounds safe to attach to, and like there is more healing to be done. I think it’ll be a hard beginning but a great time of learning and healing as you work with someone who can give you the containment you deserve. If it were me, I’d leave it with Em- I don’t think anything good can come until you know exactly what you want out of it. She also seems more caught up in her own struggle than in yours. I don’t like the way she talked to you, the recourse to really outdated and rethought take on adhesive identification (like, decades or psychoanalysts & trauma therapist) have totally rethought that Concept so it can’t be lobbed against clients FFS!)
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Oops pressed send early… I don’t think she’ll give you the closure you need unless you ask for it specifically. I’m so sorry this happened to you.
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I don’t think she’ll give it even if I asked for it. 😦
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I fear that too. I’m so sorry.
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Thank you. Yes. It’s one thing to have a theory (even if it is outdated) but to actually use it against me in a session in the way that she did feels cruel. I mean the ‘tick’ thing is by far the worst of it, but ‘adhesive’ isn’t great. Why couldn’t she have said, ‘sometimes it feels like your young parts need to be really close to me – and I understand it’s because they are scared and want to be held but it can feel quite overwhelming for me at times’… I dunno. Whatever, I’ve been dumped by email so that’s a first! haha. I am optimistic that Anita and I will work well together. I am just scared stiff of attaching to her at all and even letting out the smallest bit of need. I’m so tired from all this and part of me is still in denial. x
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I can totally understand your fear of attaching to Anita. Go as slow as you need to.
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“Why couldn’t she have said, ‘sometimes it feels like your young parts need to be really close to me – and I understand it’s because they are scared and want to be held but it can feel quite overwhelming for me at times’…”
Sounds like you’d make a better therapist than M!
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Ha! It’s called being ‘human’ 🤣
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Oh lordy 😢 my heart was breaking for you reading this. Talk about worst nightmare scenario. I’m furious with Em and think that she would have a hard time defending her actions if you were to make an official complaint about her. My gut reaction is don’t go back. Or go back but take someone for support. And only go so that you can have closure. To tell her how utterly unacceptable it is to say the things she has said and behave the way she’s behaved. And then not pay her for that session. You pay her for therapy. THERAPY. What part of all of this has been therapeutic for you? How can she ethically fake money for that!? (Okay I’m clearly raging). Not sure how useful my rage is… but I am so fucking on your side right now and so absolutely appalled with Em.
There is NOTHING wrong with you or the way you’ve behaved or the needs you have. I really think Anita will be good for you 💕
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Hey L. Yes, it’s been a spectacular descent into a shitstorm. I can’t even really believe it. I am devastated. It’s almost comical…if you aren’t caught up in it. The idea of paying £50 for her to sit there and basically tell me I’m too much and not even care that I am in pain will be hard. Though, not going, I have absolutely no chance of closure and can only read negatives into her emails…although how else would anyone read them? The thing I hate about this is that it’s made me really doubt myself again. Is it me? Did I do something wrong? If she’s confirming the lifelong narrative then perhaps I really am too much. It’s so hard to bear that even with a cacophony of voices saying ‘hell no! it’s not you!’ My young parts are sobbing and exhausted. xx
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I’m sorry it took so long to come back to you. I did read this but I have found it hard to focus my brain on anything atm. Very easily triggered and just so busy with work.
I really hope you’re doubting yourself less now. I hope that in a few months you’ll look back at this and see that you’re better off away from Em. She may have been able to support you at one point but for reasons unknown she is now being very toxic and harmful. You deserve so much better. 💙💚💛🧡❤️
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Thanks Hun. Really hope things are settling a bit for you this week. Soon be half term (praise the lord!) xx😆🙄
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Yeah thank goodness. Long weekend coming up! Things are kinda okay atm. I’ve been thinking about you 💕
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Hugs. Honestly? I wouldn’t go. At least, not for several months until your young parts have some stabilization. Maybe at *that* point you’ll feel safe enough to go exactly one time, and be present, and be able to confirm that you made the right call and walk out with your head held high feeling like the final thing she taught you was that in the end you deserve to put yourselves first. But, until then I worry you’ll lose that beautiful strength you have shown in advocating for yourselves so far. And, your parts are parts of *you* not parasites. The lack of knowledge about dissociation in acting like they are anything else from her is mind boggling. Your emails are respectful, safe and very professional. I’m seriously impressed by how you have handled this. What Em said is *not* okay. Your parts are not ticks. And, also, they are not some strange, alien beings that she has to tolerate to talk to the “real” you. They are part of you, and they have played critical roles in holding things you should never have had to experience so that “adult” you that is all Em wants to deal with *can* be so mature and poised. They deserve thanks and kindness for what they’ve endured to offer you a chance at a future, not scorn. Everything about this has been unprofessional on Em’s part. I am completely with those who want to rip her a new one for so many of the things she has said. But, most of all, I want to rip her a new one for not honoring the sacrifices those child parts made on your behalf and helping them finally be able to rest from constant vigilance. For their sake…I wouldn’t expose them to her again right now.
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I agree with all you’ve said. Although I doubt she’d let me come back for a session in a few months once I have some distance. I think she only agreed to termination sessions is because I put her in a difficult position. She was happy to walk away via two sentences. I kind of want to get closure on this sooner rather than later, but know I am likely to be a mess and so not get anything I need in a termination session. It’s hard. Thank you for saying I have handled it well. I have tried really hard to not be too reactive. I have wanted to scream and cry and call her and sob…but I haven’t. I don’t do that. And that’s why this is so hard. I behave pretty well given what I struggle with and yet she still things I am a tick. Ugh Jeez!
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I mean…she’s a Brexiteer. Is it awful if I say she’s probably more of a drain on societal progress for those horrible beliefs than anyone? That’s…super mean, I know. But, kind of not really because her viewing others as without compassion alongside all those other voters is why the vulnerable in Britain are about to go through Hell. I…just genuinely do not get how someone in a “helping profession” can hold those kinds of views about the people they are trying to “help” – or anyone. But, well, I’ve seen it far too often to be even remotely shocked. I’m just sorry you had to be on the receiving end of it. You have absolutely impressed me with how you are handling it, though. Give all your parts internet hugs.
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Thanks Hun. I’m trying hard to remain philosophical about all this even though it’s ridiculously painful. I hate that I’m in this situation but part of me feels a bit of relief not to have had to go for twice weekly dysregulation. I’m surprised how well I’ve coped not going !
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I’m so so sorry that things have ended up so badly with Em, but I echo everyone here in that it is absolutely not your fault; this is all her own stuff spilling out. I can see how heartbreaking it is, no one deserves to be treated like that but especially someone with the wounds that you have. You need a better therapist, she was not good enough. I know that you had to prompt her for it, but I actually read her email to you about termination sessions a little differently. I got a sense that she was sad she couldn’t help you and that she was being honest about her lack of competency. For what it’s worth I would set a boundary of one closing session so that you can say anything you feel like saying to her. If you get in there and change your mind you can leave, but you won’t then be left wondering or wishing you had said goodbye in person. (This comes from personal experience). Take care and please know that we all care about you. X
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Thank you IM. I’m glad you can see something positive in that email because I am struggling to, but it’s probably off the back of a further email where she responded with ‘best wishes’ after years of not doing that because I told her I didn’t like it and it felt formal and like there wasn’t a close relationship….so for her to have started to use it again feels like she’s telling me she’s vacated emotionally. I hear what you’re saying about the one closing session. That is where I have been leaning…although also being realistic that it is unlikely to give me the closure or ending I actually would like. I am likely to walk into more pain but at least it’ll be done and I can have maybe had my say about how painful this has been. What a nightmare. I am sorry you experienced this kind of thing too. xxx
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I want to write something encouraging and helpful for you but this has triggered what happened with my therapist, so I’m writing from my own experience. I’m not sure if you’ve read my blog but what happened with my T is in there.
Anyway, if you feel like a last session would be beneficial to you to end the therapy with Em then go for it. I wouldn’t advise going more than once though, Em is never going to meet your needs and is still going to hold the same opinions and potentially hurt you again in the “goodbye” session. I think you are incredibly brave to even consider going back to Em for a last session. I didn’t bother with my T. She also terminated via email and hurt me so much that she has put me off therapy for life!
Anita sounds lovely, she appears to be willing to meet your needs or at least have a plan in place so you feel more held and supported. I really hope you can move forward with Anita and come to terms with the trauma that Em has just put you through and also from your past. Trauma that you did not deserve, in the past or from Em. Sending love and a hug if that’s ok with you ❤
By the way, none of this is your fault!!!
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Ah thank you! Love and a hug most welcome right now! I’m sorry that you have experienced similar to this. It’s not great is it? I’m so sad that we are in this place – I really don’t know how we’ve gone from one week her saying she’s willing to work with this and try and help the young parts to calling me an adhesive tick. It’s horrid. Anita is nice – very very different. Em is an academic and Anita is a human. I’ve read all the theory now I need a relationship! I just wish it could have been with Em. I feel so frightened of opening up properly now in case the same thing happens again. x
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My heart truly is breaking for you. I was in this same ending 9 months ago and let me tell you, I am still in pain, even though I’ve found a new, loving and caring therapist, the love I had for my previous therapist still exists. My attachment to her is what yours is to Em. I would suggest at least seeing her once more to say goodbye and have at least some form of closure. Then if you need another session or another, take it. I want to encourage you to keep seeing Anita. Being held in your attachment, though a slow process, is very healing. Listen to your heart about seeing Em, and whatever you need- do it. Sending so much love.
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Oh Kelley, I remember you were going through the wringer a while back. I am so glad you have found a better fit with your new T, but I know the old stuff will always be there. It’s so hard. I am optimistic that it will be ok with Anita but it seems like such a lot of time, energy, and love that I have lost with Em all the whilst reinforcing my trauma. Ugh. Take care x
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That sound you heard just now? That was my jaw hitting the floor halfway around the world.
A tick?! That’s beyond the pale. Metaphor my a**. I’m not sure what the actual options for this are, but I would consider this valid grounds for an official complaint. In case you can’t tell, I’m really angry right now, which may not be helpful because you are probably not only grieving the end of therapy with M, but perhaps also questioning the entire relationship you (thought you) had with her.
I hadn’t heard of adhesive attachment, so I poked around the internet, and from what I could find, I did not see evidence of adhesive attachment in what you have shared at all. Your emails are incredibly eloquent and insightful, and your awareness of the needs of the young parts vs the adult you seems like clear evidence to me that this is not a case of adhesive attachment.
I feel like M has completely and utterly failed in her duty of care for you. Whatever the reason may be for her behavior, you deserve so much better than this. To re-traumatize someone like that and set them adrift without a referral/follow-up seems incredibly irresponsible.
Along with the others here, I do get why you would feel devastated and in incredible pain. I hear you and I’ll be listening by coming to read your blog. You are not alone.
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Yeah, I heard that clunk all the way here in the UK! It is a terrible analogy to use with someone like me. I am questioning everything. The fact she’s been so ready to drop me via email has me reeling. I’m not sure what I am, but the thing is even if I am adhesive there are ways and means of delivering that without hurting a client. I agree to have let me go without referral or follow up seems remiss especially as she said last session there have been times when she’s thought I am at risk. I disagree but if that’s what she’s thought, knowing how dependent I seem to be on therapy it would probably stand to reason that a termination like this might cause me a few issues. She just doesn’t care. Thank you for reaching out. It means a lot x
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I had a thought re: a closing session: Perhaps you could write down what you want to say, take it to the session and have her read it, at least as back-up if you went and found yourself unable to talk. Not to repair the relationship or make her care or get anything from her, but to get the opportunity to tell her what effect her actions and choices have had on you. She may not get it right away, she may not let it into her mind at that time, but you will have given her at least some of your anger, sadness, disappointment etc and it’ll be up to her to figure out what to do with it. You shouldn’t have to carry this burden alone.
I’m not trying to convince you to have a closing session, just offering a perspective/approach that you may not have considered yet.
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Yeah I think that’s a good idea. As things stand I’m meant to go on Monday to say goodbye but tbh right now I don’t want to. I’m skint and the idea of paying to get more upset seems daft. I will go, though, so I can draw a line under it and move on… or at least that’s the plan!
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Em has been entirely unethical for a very long time and completely ineffectual. She has been neglectful, dehumanising, and unprofessional AF! She disgusts me.
To be honest she needs a huge re-think about the job she does, because she really isn’t good at it. She has chosen not to keep up with current research on attachment theory, on developmental trauma, on how to work with fragmentation and dissociative disorders, on how to work somatically with complex trauma, she has chosen to opt out of basic caring and of her own professions ethical standards and worse – she’s decided to play at “Pyschoanalyst” which isn’t what she’s trained in (clearly, since she’s using outdated pychoanalytic terms) and is certainly is NOT what you paid for. Freud she aint’ so she needs to give up trying. She’s also negated her duty by the sounds of things to take adequate supervision to get her own countertransference under control. She is one damaged and dangerous human. I wouldn’t trust her with my goldfish, let alone another human soul.
I am livid! And as for reminding you of the £60 you owe her for reading your books? Most decent therapists would have done that for free. Because they REALLY care and are genuinely interested. £60?????? I’d find the biggest Doberman and package up 60LBS worth of excrement and put it through her window. Absolute cunt of a woman! ( I jest, but the idea of it is satisying).
Ultimately though, she’d done you a favour because now you can get the warmth and care from a professional who is actually interested in you and in their own professional development. You deserve it RBCG, honestly, you will be amazing for any therapist to work with because of your hard-work, determination and self-awareness. Big huge hugs x
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I LOVE YOU! (You knew that anyway). All I can say is thank you so much for putting up with me spouting this at you for the best part of 2.5 years…or is it longer? I have no idea. Feel like I’ve known you a lifetime….a lifetime of trauma! haha. I know it’s been hard watching this play out and your help and support has been absolutely vital – I never could have got to where I am right now without your friendship. Thank you for your rage on my behalf – and keep reminding me of it when I am going soft please. Loads of love xxx
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Will deffo be reminding you!! You’re welcome, you’ve done the same for me many times 💗
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Is this some sort of awful fking flu that’s going around?! Like, some sort of international corona virus only affecting therapists, who suddenly forget all their trauma training and dump their longtime clients by email?! (#me too.)
RBCG, I’m so so sorry you know this hurt. It is beyond awful. They have a professional obligation to take care of their shit and it seems like so so many of them don’t. It’s wrong and dangerous and infuriating and excruciating in equal measure. Just wanted to send care from afar. And hope for all of us with these reopened wounds, that we will pull through. 🌈
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PS, mine is charging me sixty bucks for the time it took her to copy my notes. MY notes. On top of what it cost to photocopy them.
I’m *so* not paying that. Nor should you for her ‘reading’ charge. Pretty sure it’s called, “doing your job”?! Soon enough they’ll be charging us for having breathed the same air or some other ridiculous thing.
Still sending care.
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I’m so so so sorry to hear this is happening to you too. It seems surprisingly common when you dog around a bit doesn’t it? Awful. Traumatising. Cruel. How can she possibly be charging you to copy notes?? It makes you think they’re just in it for the money … and therefore actually be doubts we’ve had before now about the relationship get confirmed. How long can it take to make photocopies?! I’m so sad for you and all of us that have gone through this kind of thing. It’s not good enough.
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