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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 6 of 6. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Nadezda on October 27, 2008, at 15:56:40
I'm having a really bad day. I really can't figure out what's the matter with me. My T seems to think I'm one of these people who gets a lot out of having problems. And maybe I am. I really don't know. I sort of think it's not that-- but he keeps hammering away at it, relentlessly. I can't say that I'm not sort of argumentative and d on't stick to the rules well. I don't live a very regimented life, or handle lots of situations well.
but I also find this endless stream of invective sort of wearing. I really do'nt feel like going in for a while. I imagine he has my best interests at heart and knows what he's doing. If I suggest anything else, it's even more evidence that I have contempt for people and feel as if I know more than they do, so I suppose I really shouldn't have this thought, but it seems he's miscarrying a bit by going on and on without any pause in between. We do have some good days, but they're just better than the bad days-- I'm still really lost and don't know what he wants me to say-- it feels as if all I can say if, I'm awful, I have contempt for everyone, and think I know it all, and am ruthless and lawless and won't reform. But if that's all true, then admitting everything doesn't get me anywhere, since the only conclusion is that I just don't feel like it and since I don't, I might as well give up. It's not as if therapy will make me "feel like" doing things, if I'm lazy or obstinate, or self-indulgent-- or just love negativity,
I really feel rather dragged down by the whole thing. Maybe I should stop therapy. He seems to think that I"m wasting his time, and is always threatening to end appointments early. Sometimes I just give in-- and decide I don't want to argue with him about it, and leave. He pages through his appointment book, or looks at his blackberry ostentatiously, I guess to show me that he has no more respect for me than I have for him, or -- like, "see, this is what you do to people. So how do you like it"-- or some such thing. On days when I'm already not feeling so great, I just don't have the energy not to fall into feeling quite hopeless.
I really think I need better anti-depressants, but I also think I've got about the best mix I possibly could-- under the circumstances.
I'd say my self-esteem is really bad today. Of course he thinks it's all some manipulation to avoid having to take responsibility, I really don't know what it is. But I kind of doubt that it's just that.
Nadezda
Posted by Sigismund on October 27, 2008, at 18:43:56
In reply to Bad day, posted by Nadezda on October 27, 2008, at 15:56:40
Look, here's my 2 bob's worth.
I have a much bigger dose of this
>it's even more evidence that I have contempt for people and feel as if I know more than they do
>I have contempt for everyone, and think I know it all, and am ruthless and lawless and won't reform
>I'm lazy or obstinate, or self-indulgent-- or just love negativity,than you do.
Now once my T said to me words to the effect that the worst (almost the only bad thing????) about me was my contempt. That was just once in 14 years, going 5 times a week. Not the sort of thing I'd like to hear more than once.
Posted by Nadezda on November 17, 2008, at 18:55:00
In reply to Bad day, posted by Nadezda on October 27, 2008, at 14:56:40
This protracted not-connecting or arguing between my T and myself is beginning to pull me into depression.
I honestly don't know what to do. I don't want to leave the relationship, because it's been one of the foundations of everything I've done for the last eight or so years. But it seems hopeless.
I tend to be late for things, including my appointments with him. I used to be much later than I am now. Now I'm often 5 or 6 minutes late. I used to be often 10-15 minutes late. A lot of it is due to my problems sleeping-- I often would get little or poor sleep and wake up feeling exhausted or barely awake. and I would sit at the computer barely feeling able to get up, much less go out. I know this isn't a good thing-- my sense that I don't want to go anywhere and that nothing is really that important. But it's how I feel. It could be a side-effect of the anti-depressants. It started when I first started parnate, which made me overwhelmingly tired, and caused me to sleep off and on all day. But I'm taking different ones now-- and this sense of indifference remains. Possibly, it's a new manifestation of the depression I've felt for these last years-- before I started seeing him. And it hasn't gone away. Life out there just doesn't seem worth it-- even if I wish it did. So I would sit there sort of in a dazed exhausted way. And I would be late.
He says now that this is to prove that he's useless-- that it's all some sort of ruthless tactic to prove that no one can help me-- and that I have no respect for anyone. He's been saying this over and over and over for months. I've been much more on time for the last few weeks, but even if I'm five minutes late, he gets angry, and I myself feel that it's such a failure and such a sign of my ineptitude and uselessness that I get depressed before I reach his door. then we have a fight, in which he says again how rude and arrogant and contemptuous I am, and I feel desperate and say things that apparently seem argumentative or insulting-- while I, in my own mind, am mostly trying to defend myself. When I say I'm sorry to be late, or try to explain various specific things that get in the way, he says I'm taunting or mocking him. If I say I'm not, he gets angrier. If I say I'm trying, he says he doesn't care. And that he has no proof that I"m trying, so that my saying this doesn't mean anything--and even that it doesn't matter that I'm doing better. The only thing that matters is if I come on time.
And yet somehow I can't mobilized myself to be on time. I guess it--or I-- really am hopeless. I really don't know. I don't know how many times he's said--in response to my trying to tell him how I feel about the things he says, or the situations I'm having trouble with-- that he doesn't care how I feel, or, if I get visibly upset, that "now you're feeling sorry for yourself,"
He tells me to "get out" and that "the appointment is over"-- frequently-- because I don't know what he wants me to say-- and he takes that as disagreeable-- or because I say I don't agree with something he's said-- and that I"m just argumentative-- he says that all the time.
It doesn't make sense to me, really. I know I can be difficult, and sometimes I am argumentative-- but most of this doesn't feel as if it's really about me. I can't make sense of what he says--about me-- or what he wants me to accept-- that I'm mean-spirited, and hateful and that these descriptions aren't judgments, but just "statements of fact." Yet I don't feel as if I"m a mean-spirited person. I feel often afraid of people, and fearful that they won't like me, or will judge or otherwise not think well of me. He says this is another sign of my mean-spiritedness, and that my fear is a "lie" or just a pretext to justify my not treating people well-- and not letting them help me.
I really don't know why I"m writing this, except as some sort of record, but I have no one to talk to. When I tell my boyfriend, he gets annoyed with me-- because he wants this relationship (with my T) to work out, and he's busy with his own work and projects and doesn't have time to discuss things with me. Mostly, my bf and I get along well-- it's this, mostly, that's a source of friction-- but I often am so upset by the appointments that I do need to talk to someone. And it's been getting worse in the last month or two. I guess it doesn't sound as bad as it is, when it's happening. But it is really awful, at least it feels that way to me. That's all I'm actually sure of.
Nadezda
Posted by Nadezda on November 18, 2008, at 16:20:21
In reply to Re: Bad day, posted by Nadezda on November 17, 2008, at 18:55:00
Maybe it doesn't matter what he thinks, in the sense that that he thinks it doesn't make it true. If I try to understand where he's coming from and what he's reacting to, but also feel that my judgment is responsible and as honest as possible, then I don't have to feel that I'm wrong and horrible.
I 've looked up mean-spirited and it isn't how I am.. Sometimes I feel hurt or disappointed too easily, or don't have faith in other people-- or that I can do the right thing, or that I'll get too caught up in my own bad feelings (of depression or hopelessness), but I'm not ever intentionally mean or malicious, petty or vindictive. I've also asked my bf, and he says that's not how he experiences me-- at all. I have to respect and believe in my sense of myself, or not my fears, or self-doubts, or sense that there's something horribly wrong with me-- which cause me to be extra-vulnerable to criticsm and to be fearful of others.
Nadezda
Posted by Nadezda on November 20, 2008, at 13:32:15
In reply to Re: Bad day, posted by Nadezda on November 18, 2008, at 16:20:21
I'm thinking today that I'm going to stop seeing my T. I think he's wasting valuable time telling me how awful I am, when it doesn't move things forward, and only undermines whatever progress I feel I'm making. Plus it's disappointing and hurtful.
Nadezda
Posted by Sigismund on November 23, 2008, at 19:02:33
In reply to Re: Bad day, posted by Nadezda on November 17, 2008, at 18:55:00
Well, your trouble with sleeping is likely to be related to Emsam, which you need.
And so you are late, although after this performance I can't imagine you will be late too often.
>It doesn't make sense to me, really.
Me neither.
>I know I can be difficult, and sometimes I am argumentative-- but most of this doesn't feel as if it's really about me. I can't make sense of what he says--about me-- or what he wants me to accept-- that I'm mean-spirited, and hateful and that these descriptions aren't judgments, but just "statements of fact."That's a bit much
>Yet I don't feel as if I"m a mean-spirited person. I feel often afraid of people, and fearful that they won't like me, or will judge or otherwise not think well of me. He says this is another sign of my mean-spiritedness, and that my fear is a "lie" or just a pretext to justify my not treating people well-- and not letting them help me.
This is not my experience of you. You are just not like that, IMO.All I can judge you by is your behaviour here. Sometimes you are (a little) argumentative (maybe)?
I have never seen you be mean-spirited (a little terse once or twice? and who isn't?)
This is the end of the thread.
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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
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