I like the fact that I know nothing about him

[Emotional girl]

Thank you @ladee and sending you hugs back as well.
I can completely understand where you are coming from @EveHarrington and why you wouldn't want to have an attachment to a therapist.
I guess we all deal with our traumas in different ways and that includes within a therapeutic relationship.

 

[Justmehere]

Therapy is expensive in money and time and heart. I rather use it to focus on my crap, get through it, and get on with things. Way better to know less about their personal lives.

 

[Emotional girl]

I agree with you @Justmehere in that it is suppose to be about the client and their road to recovery but there can be different ways of achieving that in the therapeutic room.

 

[hithere]

What helped me the most with not feeling incredibily insecure in the relationship was when the therapist would share some from their own lives. Who they share their life with, what are some of their struggles. I don't need to know a lot, but if the therapist shares casually about their life, then my mind and fearful emotions calm down and I can get more "work" done. When nothing is shared, or I know very little about the person it causes me stress and I can't settle into the therapy.

I have no idea why, I just know that's what has worked and hasn't worked for me. I"m not talking about blurring of boundaries or lives, just enough to know this is a real person with their own real life. It helps me form trust more.

 

[Sideways]

When people paid me to be their lawyer, they weren’t paying me to be their bestie. They came to see me because they needed help with their life. And I needed to be professional about that. Never would have occurred to me to start sharing my life with a client, and if I’d been asked? No way is my private life their business. It was a professional relationship - I was being paid to provide legal advice, not good company.

People have very different views on this sort of stuff, but for me there’s a clear line in therapy about why I’m where, what I’m paying for, and what is none of my business. I handle my relationship with my T the same way I used to handle my own clients in a professional setting.

I had one T for a while who used to give me waaaaay too much information about his personal life. Which was always uncomfortable for me. He was terrible with professional boundaries generally. He got burnt out and it ended badly.

Just my experience.

 

[Chris-duck]

Yeah. I kinda think of my work boundaries and T boundaries as the same. I know she has four kids and her mum has dementia. That's just fun facts that happened to come up. Not interested in her personal life. If random stuff comes up in passing when we're just chatting at the end that's cool but if I knew too much bout her shit it'd be harder to say things.

 

[Friday]

For me personally... I get more out of people who’ve been where I’ve been, and have got their shit together (hell, even half together), than anyone I’ve worked with whose knowledge is academic and secondhand. Marrying the 2? Someone who has been & done AND has the education & training? Is something of a godsend. Only had it a couple times but it was the most useful, hands down.

That requires more shared info than is usually kosher in therapy. S’what’s worked best for me, though.

 

[Ronin]

I'm undecided on the issue, it really depends on the therapist and what are we doing / how deep I am with them and the like.

I like to know where they are coming from, life wise, because it will often affect how we communicate, or for concrete issues. Just academic, worse, bad academic, advice drives me batshit. But I don't need to know every detail about them, just enough to establish credentials.

 

[ILoveLife]

I've had closer relationships with therapists, family talks, pets talks, hobbies talks and whatnot.

I've had more luck in treatment when it's purely service/happy client business. That doesn't mean I don't get to know my therapist and connect on a personal level, doesn't mean that at all. I know my therapist is empathetic and compassionate, that she volunteers at a suicide helpline, that she does a ton of research in trauma due to personal reasons (although I don't know what those personal reasons are), and I know she is there for me if I need her to. There are certain boundaries that I don't cross.

I had one T who would talk way too much about his life, his kids' lives, his wife, his travels, and even other clients' issues. Certainly didn't work out. What did happen was that personal veil clouded both our judgements in therapy, the care trumped the professionalism. It's very difficult to separate the two.
It's not like they're waiters and do their best work with clients they prefer... deep personal connection can actually hinder the therapeutic process.

Good therapists who can healthily separate the two and have both things are extremelly hard to find. I've had a few therapists and had one who managed to keep it together.

At the same time, I know it's not impossible to have it. And we're all different, so my preferred way of therapeutic relationship can be different from others' and that's perfectly ok.

 

[Sideways]

deep personal connection can actually hinder the therapeutic process.

Exactly what I was trying to say (but did a bad job of).

Peers (like here and at my group therapy) definitely have a role in my recovery. But my T’s role is altogether different from that.

 

[Emotional girl]

Wow I went to sleep and came back to all these replies.
Thank you much for all your answers and views.It is so interesting to see how different individuals want different things from their therapeutic relationship.
For me with my ex T I guess I liked the fact that he shared some of his life with me ,I liked the fact that I could care for him and try to protect him and that we were close.I always felt safe with him because I was allowed to test boundaries but in a very safe way.
With the new T I also feel safe with him but in a different way because it is 100% about my trauma.
I guess what I am trying to say is I do feel that both methods work but in different ways.

 

[ILoveLife]

I was thinking it's an exercise in compassion, self and otherwise, to be able to care for the well being of a T without the need for a deep personal connection.
I mean, what do we get out of that connection? It can be healthy or not, depending much on our state of mind.
I don't think theres a right or wrong way, just that we need to think what's best for ourselves.