Another fish in the sea

[Fish_In_The_Sea]

Hey all, I found this forum about a week ago and decided to join. I relate pretty much to "Madeline Aimes," the disgruntled ex-therapy client who spoke her piece in Mentalhealth.net, reposted here by David Baxter on November 4th. I'm the only child of a sort-of codependent single mother who needed me to keep on needing her even as an adult, so I idealized her a lot growing up and it took me a very long while to realize what I was capable of on my own. But I have yet to learn how to connect with people and develop healthy and satisfying grown-up relationships that have nothing to do with fixing problems.

After being involved (and left unhelped) with 6 different types of therapists during more than 10 years and doing lots of reading during the past 20 years, I realize that I'm also one of those clients who needed her therapist(s) to "avoid all paternalism, regression, contrived sympathy and learned-dependence in favor of an adult-adult dynamic". My last therapy, a one-year relationship consisting of twice-weekly sessions with a well-intentioned, intelligent and seemingly balanced but deeply misguided psychoanalyst who, I realized only later, based his work on Heinz Kohut's self psychology, seemed to have the most potential but ended up being the most expensive and least helpful of all. Thankfully he finally ended up voicing a profoundly incorrect perception of the therapeutic dynamic, otherwise I'd probably still be seeing him, pleased about what I perceived as an unconventional and innovative approach. What a huge disappointment, though.

Anyway, I think I'm done with therapy now. The biggest help I've had so far was in 1999, from a very disturbed, codependent individual who had similar characteristics to my mother and involuntarily allowed me to realize the unhealthy dynamic I had had with her all along. Hopefully I will come across other people like this in my life who will help me continue to grow, at least better than therapy has done so far. Not that I'm criticizing therapy and therapists per se, but I would say that in my case, the therapeutic structure of transference is exactly what has never worked for me and has sometimes even made things worse. I'd be happy to know if there are other options that might help (by the way, I found that client-centered therapy was somewhat helpful but didn't deal with my resistances properly.) I'm also looking forward to chatting with you all and bringing my own perspective and insight on things.

 

[Jackie]

Welcome Fish in the sea

 

[Cat Dancer]

Welcome!

 

[Yuray]

Welcome
Do you feel you are 'therapy resistant'? Some clients expect a therapist to 'extract' information.

Other than your inability to connect with other people, has anyone offered a diagnosis of you?

After 6 therapists in 10 years with no real satisfaction, perhaps therapy is not where you should be. What do you expect from thereapy?

 

[forgetmenot]

Just want to say Hi and to welcome you to PL

 

[Fish_In_The_Sea]

Thank you Mods and Granny MVP for your kind welcome .

Do you feel you are 'therapy resistant'? Some clients expect a therapist to 'extract' information.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'extract information'. Like wanting a therapist to figure me out and reflect my image and/or emotional needs back to me without my having to say anything? That would be frustrating for me because then I'd want them to meet those needs, not just reflect them back. I think that I may have some preverbal, primary-narcissism type abandonment issues going on but I'm now too aware of reality and other people's individuality and needs to be able to work through them. Emotionally, I view the whole transference-type therapeutic process as "forced individuation" and this is what I resist.

Other than your inability to connect with other people, has anyone offered a diagnosis of you?

To use my first therapist's words to my mother in 1984, I was "very inhibited" and hardly spoke at all during my sessions with him, couldn't understand why I was being asked how I felt and was usually unable to answer. Between 1987 and 1994, I was in ongoing psychodynamic therapy and had been diagnosed with depressive personality disorder (which I didn't know at the time). I regularly had suicidal fantasies (I couldn't handle becoming an adult, both socially and workwise) and tried to kill myself with medication in 1987, 1993 and 1994. But things changed in that regard post-1999. I also broke off ties with my mother in 2001 (I recognized that my "attachment" to her in the past had been a mix of fear, idealization and guilt and I didn't want any more of that), but since I was her main reason for living, she kept contacting me and trying to keep the unhealthy dynamic going. I felt relieved when she died of a heart attack in 2006. Other than that, my own self-diagnosis is that I'm too smart and too sensitive for my own good.

After 6 therapists in 10 years with no real satisfaction, perhaps therapy is not where you should be. What do you expect from therapy?

Good question. I mean, if there has been any repeat pattern based on unresolved issues in my life, it's my therapeutic relationship failures. In real life, I've just learned to keep my distances from people and not even try to connect or get my emotional and intellectual needs met at all. I guess I'd like some two-way connection and bonding/kinship that would allow me to acknowledge both the power and the effect that I have on other people in relationships, and then perhaps actually want to be nice and caring because it makes me happy, not to deserve other people's "love". And if that can't happen (and it never has), then let's just discuss problem solving in my real-life relationships between two adults, since that's what I'm paying a therapist to do after all.

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Have you tried otyher therapeutic approaches? besides psychodynamic therapies I mean?

 

[Fish_In_The_Sea]

Have you tried other therapeutic approaches? besides psychodynamic therapies I mean?

Yes, as mentioned above, client-centered/humanistic therapy helped a bit but didn't do enough, and when the therapist started integrating the cognitive behavioral approach in the mix and suggested that I "modulate my needs", I felt dismissed/misunderstood, became angry and left.

With psychodynamic face-to-face therapies prior to 1999 and also with the above therapist in 2003-04, I felt intimidated and unable to concentrate while I was being looked at, and very often, it's like I didn't know what to say and that it didn't really matter what I said anyway. Which made me consider the couch in psychoanalysis. But part of my frustration there was that I was doing pretty much all the talking and analyzing/introspecting. I didn't want the analyst to tell me what to do. I just wanted him to talk. Not about his problems, not to fill a void. Simply to connect. In a dynamic other than fixing problems (I've had enough of that all my life), but where I don't feel like an alien or see unhealthy patterns going on, which is often what happens with "normal" interactions.

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Alternatively, sometimes the problem is not the aproach but the specific therapist, or more accurately the match between therapist and client.

 

[Yuray]

I found that client-centered therapy was somewhat helpful but didn't deal with my resistances properly.)

This sentence is why I remarked about having the therapist 'extract' from you, because you were not having your 'resistances' dealt with properly. Were you resisting being open in therapy, requiring the therapist to dig deep to discover on his own, your problems? Please correct me (and forgive me), if I have read this wrong.

I mean, if there has been any repeat pattern based on unresolved issues in my life, it's my therapeutic relationship failures.

And unfortunatley the uresolved patterns with your mother, who may have been the entire cause for your condition in life now.

One message I am getting from your posts (in that you mentioned it more than once) is that you want someone to connect with, to trust, and to reciprocate the same. In other words, a good friend(s), to have quality one on one time with, and of course, validation from someone that your life, and you, are meaningful. Because you haven't mentioned sadness, bad medication reactions, depression, anxiety and such (which doesn't mean it's not there), your main question seems to be, given your circumstances , is 'how can I make friends when I'm too smart and too sensitive for my own good'.

I felt relieved when she died of a heart attack in 2006.

Was relief the only feeling you had?

Sometimes in these forums it takes some time to figure out whats really being said in a post. Lots of times things are misinterpreted, and points completley missed, but in time, things work themselves out, and the real work / discussion / solutions can begin.

You are quite familiar with psychology terminology. I shudder to think of the dollar amont associated with itmg:. Lets keep the dialogue going and see where it goes

 

[Fish_In_The_Sea]

Alternatively, sometimes the problem is not the aproach but the specific therapist, or more accurately the match between therapist and client.

True, but it's nice to be capable of knowing these things after a few sessions, not a year or two later.

This sentence is why I remarked about having the therapist 'extract' from you, because you were not having your 'resistances' dealt with properly. Were you resisting being open in therapy, requiring the therapist to dig deep to discover on his own, your problems? Please correct me (and forgive me), if I have read this wrong.

No, I've always been as open as I could. But I found that the client-centered attitude of authenticity and mirroring was not enough for me to connect with whatever issue(s) I really needed to address. A bit of confrontation and playing devil's advocate on his part might have helped.

And unfortunatley the uresolved patterns with your mother, who may have been the entire cause for your condition in life now.

I'm past the blame game. I knew her parents very well, and considering their dysfunctional family dynamic (my mother was basically her needy mother's mother, who kept bossing everybody around, whining and criticizing all the time, and she didn't get any support from her weak father who drank to find the 'strength' to cope with all this), it's not surprising that she never gave me the genuine caring, validation, support, and freedom that I needed. It would have been wise however, when she got pregnant from her married lover, that she not choose to keep me to hopefully receive the unconditional love and validation she had been longing for.

One message I am getting from your posts (in that you mentioned it more than once) is that you want someone to connect with, to trust, and to reciprocate the same. In other words, a good friend(s), to have quality one on one time with, and of course, validation from someone that your life, and you, are meaningful.

Yeah, pretty much. But is that even realistic? People nowadays seem to be so busy with their work, significant other and family. Does adult friendship even matter anymore? Perhaps it all depends on where one looks.

Was relief the only feeling you had?

No, when she died, I was also angry that a) she had created problems without ever acknowledging them (I had always been blamed for my dissatisfaction about anything, both in my relationship with her and with other people) and b) she left without ever doing anything to make things better.

Sometimes in these forums it takes some time to figure out whats really being said in a post. Lots of times things are misinterpreted, and points completley missed, but in time, things work themselves out, and the real work / discussion / solutions can begin.

What I've realized today is that all of my life, I've spent so much time resisting the 'obligation' to love and to give (especially with my mother) that I never really developed the desire to do so. This, I find, is not something that can be nurtured in a therapeutic alliance and doesn't easily find its way in 'normal' relationships either, especially in today's consumer and entertainment society where everything is about 'me, me, me' and what 'I' want and what 'I' need, both on a personal and professional level. Christmas is upon us. I'll see where these thoughts take me.

You are quite familiar with psychology terminology. I shudder to think of the dollar amont associated with itmg:. Lets keep the dialogue going and see where it goes

I got most of my reading from the library and, later on, the Internet, and my pre-1999 suicide/depressive personality issues were covered by healthcare. But still, insurance from work has never paid much ($600/year max) and indeed, over the years, including several attempts (i.e. seeing a psychologist only a few times), I've spent about $20,000 on therapy.