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It sounds like you’re not happy with what happened, that you think it was wrong so really whether folk here think it was normal or not is irrelevant. It would be worth exploring with your therapist.

That’s not unusual in kids either, my little boy constantly tells me he’s going to marry his sister when he’s older, that he loves her and wants to marry her. He also says he’ll marry me and his daddy when he’s a grown up. Family is where children get their first sense of how relationships...

Is part of it that you worry she’ll grow up with similar issues to your own or that her situation some way reminds you of growing up in that home? I ask because I totally get the whole no privacy thing - your description of what it’s like to have a phone conversation felt very close to my own...

I could have written this - I was scared my whole life. Once I realised that what I was feeling was fear (I thought it was everyones normal way of being and couldn’t understand why people kept doing things that scared me to death, like asking someone to go for lunch) I was able to tackle it...

You could start by talking about what’s made you decide to go back to therapy now - they’ll unpick the back story if need be but whatever’s happening that made you think therapy is what you need is usually a good starting point.

There are lots of ways to work on healing without therapy and people can and do heal. @Justmehere has given some good ideas. Others include learning distress tolerance and grounding so anything that keeps you in the here and now like breathing exercises, mindfulness, yoga, martial arts, drawing...

That no matter what I did or didn’t do, the punishment far outweighed the crime. So, if I can’t entirely accept it wasn’t my fault, it doesn’t matter, I still didn’t (and don’t) deserve to be punished any more. That anxiety is a feeling like any other, there are situation that are anxiety...

There’s no legal reason that your sister and her daughter can’t share a room, developmentally it’s not great but I doubt social services would become involved if that was the only issue. Your neice will get to the point of demanding her own space in the not too distant future because she’ll...

How lovely, I hope your day is all that you want it to be and that you both have a long and happy life together. Many congratulations!

It’s never a waste of session time to bring things that are on your mind. You could email him with your feedback between sessions with a view to being open to talking about it when you see him - which gives him the chance to respond while you’re still working together. If I didn’t want to spend...

I am very sorry for your loss. The nurses sound dismissive and neglectful of a patient post surgery. His death is not in any way your fault. In terms of bullying, decide what you are and are not prepared to accept from people in your life and behave accordingly. You aren’t a child any more...

If the feedback is negative, I’m not sure why you’ve waited until you’re ending with him - it seems unfair to hand him that in a letter that he wont be able to discuss with you and respond to. I wouldn’t do that regardless of whether I hoped to work with him again because it’s unfair to drop...

In fairness your working hours would fell most people regardless of their health. It’s no surprise you’re struggling. If it was the difference between you not working at all or still being there could you bring your working hours back to something more manageable while you decide what to do...

It was sexual assault, there’s no way to accidentally end up in a child’s pants and you saying not to should have been enough for him to stop if he was just playing, tickling or whatever excuse he wants to make. At 11 you are still very much a child no matter how much your body had started to...

You do know that not all therapy modalities work with the concepts of transference, resistance and defence? Many excellent therapists will have a very different understanding of what’s happening with their client and won’t at all attend to transference etc because it’s not the theory base they...

@grit I’m not sure if you’re aware but you’re replying to an old thread and a member who has since been banned. Given this, they’re are unlikely to read your reply, and won’t be able to respond. I didn’t want you thinking you were being ignored if you received no response.

Yep, a blurring of various clinical phenomena. Avoidance as a symptom may include avoiding relationships (eg isolation from close relationships, withdrawal, not forming close relationships) and is a symptom cluster of ptsd. Avoiding attachment is another way of saying avoiding relationships...

There is a limit to research, but research in this area is very consistent, and clear in its findings around attachment. You may have formed a secure attachment in marriage but your assertion that that means my marriage is evidence of secure attachment is a fallacy, as is the idea that avoidant...

The whole point of attachment theory relates to what happens when someone is vulnerable and stressed. The key test for attachment style in children is the “strange situation” test, not the “what do kids do when relaxed” test. Measuring someone attachment style by how they behave when calm is a...

@grit you are misunderstanding both attachment theory and my explanation - there is a school of though which says attachment style is behavioural (ie learned behaviour) however Bowlby argues attachment as an evolutionary function essential to survival. The concepts of secure base and internal...

That’s a complete lack of understanding of attachment theory - attachment theory speaks to your behaviour in attachment relationships, not your capacity to form attachment relationships. Given approximately 30% of the population have secure attachment patterns, that means approximately 70%...

The stuff you listed is that bad. Even if nothing else happened you’d be completely justified in cutting contact, being scared of him and yes it could cause very real difficulties with sex. But I’m guessing there’s been more from what you’ve said. It’s time to believe yourself at very least...

I had the same problem - I was utterly independent and self sufficient but I ran myself into the ground trying to meet all my own needs but there are some needs I just can’t meet for myself. I also honestly thought I had no needs at all beyond food and water, which I could do for myself, thanks...

Yep, I get how you feel people are using it against you - PTSD can feel like the gift that keeps on giving.

Attachment isn’t a scale where you move through attachment styles. Avoidant attachment isn’t something you move into, each attachment style is a particular way of being in their own right and only about 30% of adults have a secure attachment style. Avoidant attachment in and of itself isn’t a...