Fear of T not believing me.

[grit]

Yep. Yep and yep. I've told my T many, many times over the years that she doesn't know what she is talking about and that I suffer from an unknown mental illness that makes me create huge nightmare scenarios staring me and that I'm really delusional and should be locked up. I've done it for so long its became kind of a joke/early warning system that I'm getting in to some bad memories

projecting? maybe. It makes sense that you want her to believe you -- because it validates that it happened. I've done the "you don't really believe me, you just believe I believe it" thing to my T lots of times. She just rolls with it (yep - I'm a total pain in the ass client?!) For me it came down to the physical reactions - which are very, very hard to fake. So she had me watching for those when I was talking about bad stuff and noting when it happened. Which she says is how she know that I'm telling the truth. It's still hard because I don't want to believe it. But that's on me - not her

Hope that helps!

wow! you have a great therapist if they let you comment on their body and eye language in real live moment. I asked mine one time why he was rolling his eyes and he said he was thinking sternly! and I said, I think you should be conscious of your body language because you looked like you were rolling your eyes at me and also (I did not think at the time) but how thinks when one is talking in therapy. Is not the whole thing is emotional attunment not thinking your next question or defense? you have a good therapist Frieda!

 

[grit]

Hi Nightsky,

I am sorry you are feeling this way about your therapist. I have my own stories of feeling stuck and not trusting my therapist but for me at least, by the time I can write about it like this it means, I made sense of it.

To me I find when I give a feeling to the therapist like I feel he is angry at me, I investigate my own anger from today or from my trauma and my past...and boom I am in that rabbit hole of my anger. If I feel he hates me again. I start to investigate that I probably hate myself for not taking care of my trauma for a long time or my mother who did this to me and again...I go in that rabbit hole and come out the otherside exhausted but having a much better idea.

I think (and this my take on reading your post), someone convinced you that you are a liar or will be a liar at very early time in your life. That person who convinced you that you are a liar or will be liar is a person who is truly close to you maybe even still in your life and you somewhat disconnected so much and so far that you cannot believe this can be!

But one thing is certain you can feel anyone will think you are a liar but does that matter at the end of the day? if at work a coworker says yeah Nightsky you did this and you did not, will you have hives or panic or cry? I do not know you but I would think at work, especially knowing this is not true, you would be like wow! this woman is f--ked by saying this and would correct and move on.

But now, because of therapy and you are sharing real stuff with this person, you are feeling exposed. That exposure is from your past and has no relation to the therapist any shape or form. She is your target, your mirror, but she has not given you a reason to believe you are a liar. What she did, is she gave you a way a feeling that you can trust her just like the person (in the past) who also give you that feeling of trust and then betray you. So you trust the therapist and that person and only one of them convinced you that you are a liar or will be a liar. I think on a good day, you will know for sure who that person is.

I am sorry if my description is triggering or crossing boundaries. I am trying to reach you from far away via by writing and trying not to write too ambiguous or allegorical.

Please tell your therapist you feel this way and let it out so you can focus the source of this issue. You are safe with your therapist and you are safe now because you are here now not there anymore.

All the best.

 

[mylunareclipse]

wow every time I read your posts it really mirrors my own experience. I had my memories resurface three years ago when I was 28 completely out of the blue. I too find it hard to have compassion for myself if I start thinking I made these things up.
I will share my experience with you. In the beginning when I got these memories my T was present and encouraging but I would get angry if she ever mentioned them and get very defensive and be like they ar won't true there's nothing wrong with me. Etc . Then she stopped talking about them pushing me and then all of a sudden I started feeling like oh she doesn't believe me? I have read somewhere that this is a way to fight the resistance, by going along with it. As long as my therapist talked about the memories as though they were real I would fight her and deny them, but once she stopped all of a sudden I felt invalidated which in some way then pushed myself to validate myself. Does this make any sense?
Unfortunately I still don't know if my memories are real or not. But I know my flashbacks have been real because I couldn't have made up so much stuff. I had to leave my therapist after three years because she changed jobs so I will have to wait if and when I am in the position to discover this again.

 

[NightSky]

wow every time I read your posts it really mirrors my own experience. I had my memories resurface three years ago when I was 28 completely out of the blue. I too find it hard to have compassion for myself if I start thinking I made these things up.
I will share my experience with you. In the beginning when I got these memories my T was present and encouraging but I would get angry if she ever mentioned them and get very defensive and be like they ar won't true there's nothing wrong with me. Etc . Then she stopped talking about them pushing me and then all of a sudden I started feeling like oh she doesn't believe me? I have read somewhere that this is a way to fight the resistance, by going along with it. As long as my therapist talked about the memories as though they were real I would fight her and deny them, but once she stopped all of a sudden I felt invalidated which in some way then pushed myself to validate myself. Does this make any sense?
Unfortunately I still don't know if my memories are real or not. But I know my flashbacks have been real because I couldn't have made up so much stuff. I had to leave my therapist after three years because she changed jobs so I will have to wait if and when I am in the position to discover this again.

Ohhhh Interesting. Reverse psychology. I used to say to my T I don’t even want to get into this ever. If you tell me they’re real, I’ll fight you. If you tell me you don’t think they’re real I’ll be crushed and won’t be able to come back.

 

[mylunareclipse]

Ohhhh Interesting. Reverse psychology. I used to say to my T I don’t even want to get into this ever. If you tell me they’re real, I’ll fight you. If you tell me you don’t think they’re real I’ll be crushed and won’t be able to come back.

Don't get me wrong I don't think she is trying to get you in any shape or form. My therapist never even said that this is what she was doing, but I read somewhere that going with the resistance rather than against it, can help a therapist resolve the same resistance.

 

[NightSky]

Hi Nightsky,

I am sorry you are feeling this way about your therapist. I have my own stories of feeling stuck and not trusting my therapist but for me at least, by the time I can write about it like this it means, I made sense of it.

To me I find when I give a feeling to the therapist like I feel he is angry at me, I investigate my own anger from today or from my trauma and my past...and boom I am in that rabbit hole of my anger. If I feel he hates me again. I start to investigate that I probably hate myself for not taking care of my trauma for a long time or my mother who did this to me and again...I go in that rabbit hole and come out the otherside exhausted but having a much better idea.

I think (and this my take on reading your post), someone convinced you that you are a liar or will be a liar at very early time in your life. That person who convinced you that you are a liar or will be liar is a person who is truly close to you maybe even still in your life and you somewhat disconnected so much and so far that you cannot believe this can be!

But one thing is certain you can feel anyone will think you are a liar but does that matter at the end of the day? if at work a coworker says yeah Nightsky you did this and you did not, will you have hives or panic or cry? I do not know you but I would think at work, especially knowing this is not true, you would be like wow! this woman is f--ked by saying this and would correct and move on.

But now, because of therapy and you are sharing real stuff with this person, you are feeling exposed. That exposure is from your past and has no relation to the therapist any shape or form. She is your target, your mirror, but she has not given you a reason to believe you are a liar. What she did, is she gave you a way a feeling that you can trust her just like the person (in the past) who also give you that feeling of trust and then betray you. So you trust the therapist and that person and only one of them convinced you that you are a liar or will be a liar. I think on a good day, you will know for sure who that person is.

I am sorry if my description is triggering or crossing boundaries. I am trying to reach you from far away via by writing and trying not to write too ambiguous or allegorical.

Please tell your therapist you feel this way and let it out so you can focus the source of this issue. You are safe with your therapist and you are safe now because you are here now not there anymore.

All the best.

@grit thank you. This makes SO much sense. I do believe you’re right. But having almost no memories from ages 0-10 means I can’t trace these things back to their source. It’s so frustrating. But you explained it in a really clear way that makes sense to me, so thank you!

 

[Freida]

Yes I have a good therapist, but I think I missed telling you I've been with her for several years. At the beginning it was very important to me that she NOT react in any way. Because if she did I would automatically assume she was getting ready to tell me either that i was full of crap and needed to get out of her office, or she would make a big deal about what I said and I would know that she couldn't handle the truth. So she had to literally sit on her hands. It took a long time for me to become ok with her "reacting like a normal person would". As in -- someone who heard parts of my story might be upset because ..well..it was bad. She had to slowly work into showing emotions so I could start to understand how people should have responded to my dramas.

I think telling your T that he needs to watch his body language is fine - but I think its more important to tell him WHY. How does it make you feel when he rolls his eyes? As mine points out all the time, she's not a mind reader. She can't look inside my head and know that I think shes making fun of me because she miss worded something. Therapy is about communication --- which sometimes means telling them how you don't want them to communicate.

 

[MyWillow]

Therapy is about communication --- which sometimes means telling them how you don't want them to communicate.

Yes, great point. I am only just learning this. I do NOT like my team using the "t" word. Not even "t" sensitive yoga. It's just damned yoga. My psydoc pointed out that I needed to communicate those sorts of things so I felt safe in the room.

 

[lux.]

@NightSky , I totally understand this. The trauma that I do remember, I always think that it's not really trauma, and that the worst of it was my fault anyway. So I am very ashamed to tell therapists about it. I have been labeled with PTSD and a dissociative disorder by many shrinks, but I still feel like I am blowing everything out of proportion and they will think that I'm just "being a baby."

But when I was a kid, my family always told me I was "being a baby." When I was 8, I told my mother that I wanted to go to my teacher or guidance counselor and tell them what my dad was doing to me. My mother told me that they would just laugh at me because nothing wrong was happening to me. So I can see where some of these things come from--she helped sow doubt in my head that would touch all things, and made me think that everyone would doubt and look down on me just the same.

I also have had a few different therapists and psychiatrists tell me that they think I may have been sexually abused in childhood (I only remember physical and emotional) and have just dissociated it out, based on some of my symptoms. I've never had flashes of that, though, it's just a clinical "guess," of sorts. I don't like to think about that--it's a really scary thought--but I do wish that I could know for sure. And I feel extremely ashamed telling anybody about these professionals telling me this (even now), because I think anyone would think I'm making it up, that I'm trying to get pity or attention or something. Even though I am not saying that I think it happened, just that based on some personal evidence and the advice of 3 people, it could have.

 

[recoveringfromptsd]

Therapist - Client relationships are complex, trust is essential, and it works both ways, the T can't come across as threatening in any way or relationship can work due to trust, the T has to trust in what you say and disclose. Its your time anyway. I recently had a major trust issue with my last T where she violated my boundaries several times. When she did it the first time, I immediately found I could not share my thoughts with her.

I am lucky now, I have a wonderful therapist, who herself is a trauma survivor who also spent time on the Psych unit for suicide before she became a therapist. For me this is perfect, her personal experience gives her a perspective I can't get from most therapists. It also gives her cause to go the extra mile with me. Most therapists won't take the time to read anything pertaining to you beyond a page or few paragraphs.

My therapist has read my trauma account (37 pages), as well as hospital and other records (hundreds of pages) to understand where I have been and what struggles I have been through, and my trauma suffering, the fact that she has done this has given her insight and understanding into my trauma when we talk about it.

There are some things so bad I have never been able to disclose, not even on paper (hard to disclose verbally if at all, often able to put on paper because I can do it in small pieces with shutting down in between. For the first time I am just beginning to disclose the unspeakable trauma I have that was so bad I could not even put in down on paper. For my T it gives her a window on the depth of my thoughts when I am dealing with intrusive trauma related thoughts and memories.

You may want to confront this issue you have with your T directly. Put it to rest, even if that means you change therapists.

I hope you end up with a T as wonderful as mine.

 

[NightSky]

Therapist - Client relationships are complex, trust is essential, and it works both ways, the T can't come across as threatening in any way or relationship can work due to trust, the T has to trust in what you say and disclose. Its your time anyway. I recently had a major trust issue with my last T where she violated my boundaries several times. When she did it the first time, I immediately found I could not share my thoughts with her.

I am lucky now, I have a wonderful therapist, who herself is a trauma survivor who also spent time on the Psych unit for suicide before she became a therapist. For me this is perfect, her personal experience gives her a perspective I can't get from most therapists. It also gives her cause to go the extra mile with me. Most therapists won't take the time to read anything pertaining to you beyond a page or few paragraphs.

My therapist has read my trauma account (37 pages), as well as hospital and other records (hundreds of pages) to understand where I have been and what struggles I have been through, and my trauma suffering, the fact that she has done this has given her insight and understanding into my trauma when we talk about it.

There are some things so bad I have never been able to disclose, not even on paper (hard to disclose verbally if at all, often able to put on paper because I can do it in small pieces with shutting down in between. For the first time I am just beginning to disclose the unspeakable trauma I have that was so bad I could not even put in down on paper. For my T it gives her a window on the depth of my thoughts when I am dealing with intrusive trauma related thoughts and memories.

You may want to confront this issue you have with your T directly. Put it to rest, even if that means you change therapists.

I hope you end up with a T as wonderful as mine.

I’m glad you have a good T. Mine is also very good, also has a trauma history, and goes way out of her way for me. This is my issue. She has been nothing but validating and supportive. I just have some sort of complex or block or wall going on.

 

[MyWillow]

Sometimes a T can be TOO close and supportive. It can terrify some part of you if you have a history of relational trauma. My psydoc seems to know just how much support I can handle before she backs off. It’s not a “block” so much as it’s protective. It’s ok.