bad dreams about your therapist?

[ImSad]

I had a dream about my therapist the other night. In the dream she set up an appointment at a random location and didn’t show up, and didn’t respond to my inquiries as to why. Later in the dream I found out that she contacted all of my colleagues and told them about my diagnoses and medications. I got very mad at her and sent her a ton of messages yelling at her for sabotaging me/my life.

Anyone have experiences with dreams like this of your t treating you badly? It just confuses me a little. I obviously know she would never do anything like that. I am starting to trust her more and more in the past month or 2, so this dream doesn’t really make much sense to me.

 

[Skywatcher]

I have had a huge amount of dreams like this. She has been slowly evolving into less of a bitch. Both my therapist and I have a list of names for her. My T rarely uses bad words, it really cracked me up one day when she referred to Dream T as a “real Cruella De Ville” when the only word I could think of was “c*nt.” And sometimes my t will sign her email as “Not Dream T”
—Real T

 

[ImSad]

I have had a huge amount of dreams like this. She has been slowly evolving into less of a bitch. Both my therapist and I have a list of names for her. My T rarely uses bad words, it really cracked me up one day when she referred to Dream T as a “real Cruella De Ville” when the only word I could think of was “c*nt.” And sometimes my t will sign her email as “Not Dream T”
—Real T

Ha, that makes me feel better I’m not the only one! I feel so embarrassed to tell my t about this dream. I know it would be good to bring it to her and talk about it, but...I don’t know. I just feel so weird about it.

 

[Skywatcher]

Eventually, it will become a fun and entertaining topic of conversation.

 

[Kubash16]

I dream about him probably once a week and they are never good. He always asks what he did this week lol and then we might dissect it a bit.

 

[Kubash16]

A common theme when we dissect mine tends to surround trust. Like consciously I’m starting to really trust him but my subconscious is like umm no.

 

[Tinyflame]

Funny, I can't recall every having a 'bad' dream or dreaming of bad actions from a person who has not treated me badly. But I do have nightmares of people who have done bad things doing more bad things. :( And I am really poor and slow at trusting, I mean like what takes people weeks or months takes me years. Or, well, maybe on rare occasion I have trusted right away despite myself, but I am bad at (cognitively) doubting the trustworthiness, or doubting myself why I should trust. :confused:

 

[barefoot]

Yes, I have had similar dreams about my T. I don’t dream about her very often but most of the dreams I have had about her involve roughly the same theme...that I have turned up for my session and, either she is there with someone else or, more often, I am having to meet her somewhere really inappropriate (somewhere really public like a coffee shop or a hotel lobby or in the middle of a big, busy department store) and she seems to think that’s perfectly normal and fine but I feel really awkward about having a session in such a public place and I also feel really shocked and confused that she thinks it’s an ok place for us to be having a session...she just doesn’t get why having a session in the middle of a packed shopping centre is a problem for me!

I actually had one a few nights ago...for once, I was actually in a private room for the session, not in a public place. But, early on, someone I went to primary school with (and I couldn’t tell you the last time I saw or thought about her - probably 25+ years ago!) entree the room and sat down next to me and started chatting with us. And I was sitting there feeling baffled and confused - as usual, because I was feeling astonished that my T had let someone else into my session and didn’t see that as problematic in any way.

I like my T. We get on. We’ve a few ruptures along the way but have always come out of things in a better place. I would say that I trust her...but I think there is ,abbé a part of me that doesn’t...or that wants to but is wary...

I have talked to her a bit about this, which were interesting conversations for both of us, I think. Ultimately, I do think the dreams are about trust and boundaries, for me.

Is it something you could mention to your T?

 

[ImSad]

Thanks for all of your replies!

That’s funny, @barefoot, in my dream I was meeting my T in a hotel lobby!

Seeing that everyone here has talked to their T about this has eased my mind a little bit. I’m sure I could bring it to her, but it feels very embarrassing. Just gonna go with the flow and see if it’s one of the things I end up blurting out in our next session.

 

[NightSky]

Absolutely. I’ve had these dreams so often. Meeting in public places or people coming in and out of sessions is a very common theme. I’m always super frustrated with all of the people but it never seems to phase her. I usually tell her about them. Some of them we’ve laughed really hard about. I think identifying the themes can be important.

 

[Sandstone]

I don't think I've ever had dream directly about a T. I tend to encode them a bit more, and dream a metaphor of detectives, but knowing that I can read my dream meanings.

It's strange that so many dreams are about meeting in public places or people walking in on sessions. I used to experience both in real life, and found they made me feel safer. We met for a year in a room in a Community Centre, and people would often walk in. I liked the sense of being part of a living building and not being isolated from life.

 

[Skywatcher]

I don't think I've ever had dream directly about a T. I tend to encode them a bit more, and dream a metaphor of detectives, but knowing that I can read my dream meanings.

It's strange that so many dreams are about meeting in public places or people walking in on sessions. I used to experience both in real life, and found they made me feel safer. We met for a year in a room in a Community Centre, and people would often walk in. I liked the sense of being part of a living building and not being isolated from life.

I find that really interesting, maybe you feel no shame in your mental illness?