Comparisons

[seaturtle]

My T uses examples of others from time to time.

Her family members or other clients who were in same situation as me.

this weeks session was just plain disappointment.
I told her, how i was scared to walk outside in the dark at times, fear of being attacked and followed and i avoided it.
during this discussion, T brought up her mom, who used to work late and took the bus home at night. she continued saying how she was tiny compared to me and i had better chance than her in fighting off the attacker.
(i am big and overweight)

i felt sick to my stomach .
All i heard was you are quiet big and you can over take your attacker. no need to worry.
afterthoughts were why will anyone attack you, anyway? u aint anything .


could i have misunderstood her good intentions in saying this?

 

[UnicornSightings]

My T uses examples of others from time to time.

Her family members or other clients who were in same situation as...

I’m so sorry. Yeah, it’s possible she didn’t mean it in any bad way but that would really upset me as well. Would you be willing to try to talk to her about your thoughts and hurt feelings about it?

 

[Sandstone]

She may have had good intentions, but I certainly wouldn't have found it helpful. Did you ask her to explain at the time?

 

[UnicornSightings]

Also wtf why is she comparing??? Your life is unique to YOU. She may be trying to help but ugh.

 

[seaturtle]

exactly, her mom doesnt have same history as me.

i wont be talking about it, i dont want to come off as too sensitive.
but comparing her size to mine didnt seem necessary.

thanks for the replies, she may have meant well, it just didnt sit well with me. she shouldnt have thought out loud.
just wanted to double check by posting, if i missed her good intentions.

 

[Supervixn]

Her response SUCKED big time. But I don't see your T, who has your best interests at heart, truly wanting to say something that could be miscontrued as cruel or invalidating. I think she wanted you to feel strong and she communicated it in a really absent minded way. I don't think she meant to call you "big" or "overweight"... I would forgive her for this one for not entirely understanding your fear and taking such a careless approach. Sounds like a really inexperienced response coming from a T. It may benefit you both if you bring it up to her next session and see how she responds.

How experienced is your T with trauma related issues? Or with therapy in general? Has she been doing this a while?

 

[Deleted member 44579]

Hi @seaturtle....i think she was just trying to say you can handle this.... You would destroy anyone who comes to close. However the way she said it could use some work....

How you feel about yourself speaks volumes...I think we can be our own worst enemies. Body confidence and self esteem matter... You do matter.... Maybe as someone said above it's more about not putting yourself down.... Stop the negativity about yourself.. Stop listening to words that hurt you.. It gets you no where... Except being miserable... Why would anyone do this to themselves...Why do we do this?

 

[joeylittle]

exactly, her mom doesnt have same history as me.

i wont be talking about it, i dont want to come off as too sensiti...

I want to encourage you to bring it up. Including your concern that she would think you are too sensitive, or any other things that make it hard to bring up.

It definitely sounds like a bad choice, on her part. Therapists make mistakes, just like anyone in any profession. The important thing is for you to take the opportunity to give her feedback on how it was not helpful, and in some ways invalidating.

Early in my work with my therapist, I had to get up the courage to ask him to not use his marriage or his kids in any personal examples. I was fine with him bringing himself into the session, when he was using the parts of his life I could identify with. But marriage and kids are touchy subjects for me, and ended up being more alienating than helpful.

Eventually it wasn’t as important a boundary. But there are still times when he just makes a bad call on how to relate to something I’ve said. It’s frustrating - but there end up being really helpful conversations around the issues, when I bring them up.

It’s your therapists job to make your experience in the session the primary one. A big part of that is the validation of experiences. She was attempting to connect and validate, but it backfired. Let her know.

It’s going to help her learn who you are. And it’s going to help you do the work you want to do, with her.

 

[EveHarrington]

So sorry this happened to you!

Comparisons in general kind of stink. I suggest bringing this up with your T and letting her know that comparisons don’t work well for you.

Hugs.

 

[saraemerald]

Comparisons don't help at all because we are very different and unique and the way we each react to similar situations is different.
Just like it's not helpful for us to compare ourselves to others, it's not right for a therapist to do it either.
Also, a side note, many abusers tend to compare to threaten or intimidate their victims.