Embarrassed and ashamed to admit this publicly

[Angela]

I've heard often that patients "fall in love" with their therapists and i know that's called erotic transference. But i guess i blew that because, while i think highly of and admire my T, i don't want him for a lover, i want him for a "pseudo-surrogate"father figure who will counteract the injury from my father by giving my little parts nurturing pats on the shoulder or hugs. My 10 yr-old little craves to have wholesome father-daughter experiences and camaraderie that doesn't turn into an ambush for torture and forced sexual interaction.

i KNOW that in many states that could cause a T to lose his/her license and my T says it would interfere with my accepting him as my doctor and thus impair his ability to be therapeutic.

i can understand all that and could almost "buy "it but somewhere deeply in the core of me i KNOW ABSOLUTELY that therapy cannot and is not and will not "work" without those elements.

i want/need those experiences ,via my littles, so intensely that I'm greatly tempted to go to an unethical T and let myself be exploited in exchange for getting what we need. Even knowing the damage re-exploitation and "re-enacting" the initial abusive situation will cause, usually it seems the lesser of two unviable options. But T is adamant and nothing i say moves him.

I'm red-faced ashamed to admit such intimate feelings "out loud" but everything else seems hopeless, so i figure, what the heck, what's more shame matter.

Angela

 

[Cat Dancer]

Re: about the mst embarrassed and ashamed i've been lately--- to admit this publicly.

Are you saying you want hugs and pats?

 

[Angela]

Re: about the mst embarrassed and ashamed i've been lately--- to admit this publicly.

yup,we is

 

[Daniel E.]

Re: about the mst embarrassed and ashamed i've been lately--- to admit this publicly.

As they say, be careful for what you wish for. Getting your haptic needs fulfilled by your therapist could easily be more of a problem than a solution, such as by demotivating you from seeking a long-term, helpful solution involving self-acceptance. A primary goal of self-acceptance is to accept yourself regardless of what other people in your life may think about you, including your therapist. And, of course, haptic needs (the need to feel touched that humans have in common with other primates) can be fulfilled by petting a dog or a cat, by doing yoga, by hugging someone other than your therapist, etc.

And you can nurture yourself in other ways as well, like working with a cognitive therapist on any distorted thoughts that make self-acceptance more difficult.

So, in a nutshell, one way of looking at progress:

Needs people to believe they are all right --> Glimpses of self-acceptance and fun without others --> Feels authentic and connected, whole

http://forum.psychlinks.ca/adult-survivors/21348-adult-survivors-of-abuse.html#post159732

 

[Angela]

Thanks, Daniel; you sound quite knowledgeable. I daily pat Wonderful, my GermanShepherd, and my three cats.

The touches i want from T are as T being a safe father figure who does not betray apparent nurturing by changing it into dirty assault and terrorizing.
My thought is that with those T experiences to counter the perverted dirty ones from my father, along with CBT learning to exchange old self-toxic thinking to new habits of positive thinking (e.g., let go of catstrophic thing) will be therapeutic. i assume this is possible although science states that early and/or severe abuse physiologically changes brain structure and physiology in infant/toddler so that there are fewer neurons formed and neurons don't work normally (e.g., serotonin release and reuptake). I wish the brain could be openly accessed,like in deep brain stimulation for treatment of severe clinical depressiono, to be able to know where in the amygdala. or other spots, pieces of memories are stored and walled off. To the nurse me, it sound sounds like the way absesses form, not to suggest these are brain absesses. How simple treatment would be then, just a few days of IV antibiotics to cure the injury.i use the word injury because persons become injured;objects become damaged. Pet peave of mine. My T says on occasion, "That trauma damaged you so complexly," i ask him, "If your little grandson was riding his bike on a walk with you and got hit by a car, would you exclaim 'Oh no my grandson has been damaged!'" No the kid got injured; the bike got damaged.

Thanks, again, Daniel, for the thought you put into your response

Angela