Too much laughter in sessions, how to navigate consulting with another therapist?

[blackemerald1]

@Justmehere - you mentioned earlier on that your pain and humiliation is now stretching between appointments with this T. That's just terrible.

Your emails and texts requesting help are simply a reflection of how desperate you are getting. If she baulks at your messages tell her how bad you are feeling. Getting drunk = feeling bad. Losing stuff = feeling even worse.

She sounds as though she has fallen into your well prepared avoidance technique hook line and sinker.
It should not be your responsibility to haul her out and let her know that she is not helping by joining in the avoidance but if you wish to continue seeing her you may have to.

Personally - if I asked a T (or anyone) to stop responding to my pain with laughter and they didn't - I'm out of there. Can you see that? It just isn't normal justme... it simply isn't. Nobody should be laughing at your pain even if you, yourself laugh at it.

You do not go to a T to get further humiliated and come away floundering about what is appropriate for her. It's up to her to regulate herself not for you to prompt her to think of this and then see her fail to do so. That makes it all the worse.

I think what she is doing - regardless of whether you are instigating this behaviour or not, is simply unprofessional. You do not pay to go and have a laugh with her. If you want that I am sure you can find a friend and do that for free.

 

[MyWillow]

Personally - if I asked a T (or anyone) to stop responding to my pain with laughter and they didn't - I'm out of there. Can you see that? It just isn't normal justme... it simply isn't. Nobody should be laughing at your pain even if you, yourself laugh at it.

Yes, yes and yes 1000 times over. Well said.

 

[grit]

justmehere,

Please be gentle on yourself. I am reading your post because I am finding your struggle similar to few experiences I had in the past and every time I read it again or I read another post, I start to have another feeling.

I want to throw another thing out there. I am "hearing" you clearly that you do not want to leave this therapist and I feel your strong conviction in that and I truly feel there is a good reason. Your body, mind and psychic seem to agree with that. So with that in mind, I wonder, and I am just wondering here please bear with me, I wonder if this strong feeling you have about the laugther is a new transference in your journey so in essence, it is not really about the therapist at all.

I am saying this because you brought the story about your mother in (a child in adult body) so I felt (again my feeling about your story) that perhaps you are feeling the therapist is displaying that side of your mother - a therapist but a child inside. You are annoyed, angry at your mother for asking "whys" so stupid right? and now the therapist is laughing like an idiot? Does this make sense to you? I am sorry if I am paraphrasing or using the wrong sentence structure to make it easier for understanding.

I wonder if this is just a powerful transference because your feelings are really strong about it but yet your feelings of trust to the therapist are also strong. I wonder if there is disconnection or something else or there is another way of explaining this incidents?
I think sometimes as we get closer to healing, transferences become much more sophisticated, much more closer to the truth and much harder to see.

This story is so hard to peel, I am thinking maybe all of us are not looking at it the right way because you are still trusting and generally feeling safe with the therapist (unless I missread that) and that you are not un-grounded by this but actually having healthy reaction effect like anger or sadness this is happening.

Maybe your humor is too close to you so close you cannot see it beyond and now the laughter is poking the centre of the wound of your trauma.
PS. I want to share a quick story about a woman from my group. She told us one time her ex was beating her and she was on the ground and he was kicking her and she started to laugh. This is really a sad story but yet she said she started to laugh.

I will leave you with that. I hope truly you find the answer and relief to this incident and I truly hope it is a gate to a breakthrough.

 

[Justmehere]

There’s been no response to my texts. It’s the weekend. My session is Tuesday. I’m guessing that’s where I’d get any response.

My head has fogged out so bad with dissociative symptoms today that couldn’t tell you what happened in the last session right now beyond what I’ve journaled to myself. That’s pretty severe for me to lose this time like this. When this happens about present moment stuff, it always comes back within hours, but it’s been all day.

Ugh.

 

[hithere]

I was wondering similar things like what @grit wrote--because a couple times you mentioned you mom, and that this T reaction is similar to your moms. There is really weird stuff between therapists and clients that happen that is very hard to see, and if the therapist isn't of the mind set to analyze the situation or try to interpret it, but understands it only from a position of the here and now, rather than the "back there" what was going on they won't ask the questions, are we just playing it out again in the room right now.

I need to reread your posts before I respond more, but I had a very painful situation like this happen to me where the therapist would laugh at me when I was trying to talk and couldn't and I was trying to access the actual trauma and words and emotions. He started laughing and looked all jovial. I looked at him and said , this isn't funny. Then it happened again a week later and he started to make jokes about aspects of the trauma that I had shared, and it was when I was again trying to access the actual trauma story and emotions. I sent an email saying the joking and the laughing wasn't helpful and unfortunately that email really damaged the therapy relationship and really made the therapist "walk on eggshells" and not be present with me. They then acted all afraid to say or do anything. The relationship was never fully mended from me sending the email. A couple months later the the therapist told me it was "critical" of me to send the email but that I coulnd't help being a "critical" person as it was a defense mechanism that I was using unwittingly to keep people distant. My email was really to the point and there was no accusations. It was all, "this is how I felt when you laughed and made that joke. This is causing me stress! I'm anxious now!" No where was it critical. To be honest--his take on my email and what I was feeling is total and utter bullshit. To not see how someone laughing at you while you are trying to bring up traumatic events and their emotions, to not see that making jokes about aspects of the trauma is not hurtful... No way is it critical of me to say "this hurts my feelings."

 

[MyWillow]

@Justmehere please hold onto the fact that this is likely your T holding her boundaries firm in terms of not responding. It’s not personal. And in my mind she is demonstrating how you need to hold your boundaries firm as well. Hang in there. We’ve got your back ;)

 

[Tinyflame]

Idk the whole story @Justmehere , but I remember another thread about the same topic you posted before.

Idk if you're supposed to text or e-mail? Idk if you have an agreement.

But I concur with @blackemerald1 , and would add only this: it's long since occurred to me, that trauma re-enactments are deleterious. I think that sounds like we are creating or fostering them, and it's true, we can, or do, or have.

But we can also end up suffering the same things, abuse, neglect, or repetition of the dynamic (as with your mother), not out of our choice but out of trying to overcome it. I'm not saying trying to overcome it, to make up for what came before (that would be a re-enactment), I am saying we don't do what people do without trauma- which is, to say, this is not acceptable to me, or I deserve more, or F-this, or leave. But, there's a reason people without trauma do. That is not not working through projection. That is understanding you are responsible only for yourself, not for them. And what do you want in your life?

ETA, this is not the way for her to encourage vulnerability. Vulnerability is about trust, and no defence(s). Not about an inappropriate return of emotions and then leaving you in the dark. JMHO.

:hug: 's to you.

 

[Abstract]

Hi,
Just my take but if she is isn't able to respond to the emails and texts helpfully once you see each other again then this wouldnt work anyway. Not responding now will be fine I would think as its a complex situation and not easy to do when not in person. You couldn't carry on as it was, don't you think. She wasn't listening to you. You threw your toys a bit because of that. Desperate measures for desperate situation. Either she steps up and meets you now as a result or if she doesnt then this cant continue and be good for you. From this perspective anyway. You of course are the only one there. Not us.

You have said the trauma hook is your mum and her behaviour and like the others said that makes this stuff beyond intense. When thats happened to me and the same thing played out in therapy with the same conclusion is was extremely bad for me. I can see that if the end could have been different it could have been good instead. Thats what we read of course in my experience I have seen that for me. When those old patterns were replayed it went into the very core of my self and scrambled me. Shes either up to this or she isnt. You have been changing of course and that makes this a process. But you can only put up with so much for so long. Dont for one minute blame yourself here. And there are always options even when we think there arent. One step at a time usually does it. I hope she can meet you in the way you need.
I also have the delay memory gone thing with therapy by the way. Sometimes weeks. Hate it. Self care at the mo is probably your best bet. You can't mindread how she is going to respond sadly.

 

[scout86]

Most of the time, I think it's better if i don't know what my T is doing. In a lot of cases, if I know what he's trying to do, I can't help but "defending" myself and that's not usually helpful. But that's me.

It's been mentioned that there are aspects of your T's behavior that remind you of your mother. (I missed that.) You've mentioned that your T uses transference a lot. So, is it possible that this is deliberate?

Personally, I hate that idea. Which is related to why I don't want my T doing stuff like that and, if he's going to, I'd better not able to figure it out. It comes off as "a trick" and i have a hard time forgiving stuff like that. That's MY thing though. Sometimes, I suppose, that sort of thing can be useful, maybe even ok.

All of that is to say, I have mixed feelings about even bringing this up. I think it's going to take more time, and more struggle, to sort this out. I'm hoping it turns out to be worth the effort!

 

[Justmehere]

It's been mentioned that there are aspects of your T's behavior that remind you of your mother. (I missed that.) You've mentioned that your T uses transference a lot. So, is it possible that this is deliberate?

That’s a good thought! But she would tell me and get permission first. We try to work with it with a lot of openness and purpose, no tricks.

This is accidental transference. If it was on purpose, and I knew, and agreed, I think it could handle it better? I don’t know.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes I agree with @scout , nothing good about a method that makes a bigger problem than it attempts to solve.

I think trying to give her the benefit of the doubt is trying to explain how she could possibly respond that way, and still be professional. I don't see why she could continue laughing, either.

 

[grit]

I am not an expert but I think doing transference deliberately by a therapist would constitute an abuse! Also is it even possible?
A person or an event can trigger but no one can make you "transfer" emotions from the past to the present.
I think one of the main thing about childhood trauma is the fear that a person can get inside of another and make them do things. because a child experiences that as to grow and learn, it is almost too difficult to do that with an adult unless it is torture situation by a very clinically savvy people like a nazi or KGB etc.

If a therapist is purposefully inducing transference, to me, that is unethical and illegal and constitues for an abuse of power.

I do not know why but my gut feeling says this therapist (and if we go in terms of objective reality without having both sides)is not inducing transference.

I think there is a lot of information missing and I truly hope justmehere finds her own answers in this situation. It is becoming very confusing and complex now.