The thing with therapy

[Tipsymctipsy]

I hope it's ok to post here, mental health is quiet. If you go to therapy for childhood issues, and the therapist is supposed to take on the role of parent and give you a reparative experience, how do you then leave at the end?

It's like finding something you've been looking for all your life but you can't have it. It's kind of cruel if you think about it?

Do you mean something specific within one session or just the overall function of the relationship during the process of therapy?

Is that a specific type of therapy? It’s not a practice I’ve heard of, and it sounds dubious for exactly the reasons you’ve described.

There are a lot of therapeutic approaches that can help you safely explore your childhood.

If it is the second one, a lot of work should go into ending things.
Both parties will have difficult feelings to process.
You learn that you're capable of having a relationship that is positive etc and you know it when you see it in a non-therapeutic setting.
I hope that makes sense? My diploma was a while ago

@thelegohooverer

Is that a specific type of therapy? It’s not a practice I’ve heard of, and it sounds dubious for exactly the reasons you’ve described.

There are a lot of therapeutic approaches that can help you safely explore your childhood.

I'd agree with this. It sounds highly dubious to me, too. I've been seeing a therapist for the last five months, and while a lot of things track back to childhood, my mother's unhelpful life beliefs in particular, I think I really wouldn't be helped by my (lovely) therapist being my 'mother'.

I agree it feels cruel, and can raise up all kinds of difficult feelings. The idea though, is that you use the reparative experience to help you go on to form healthy relationships in your life outside therapy.

Wow, thank you for the replies.
Superloud, it does make sense yes, it's the overall function of the relationship I think I mean. I've been seeing her for a few months but she keeps saying reparative relationship and we get along really well but I just keep thinking that I'm going to get hurt at the end and maybe I should stop.
It's dragging up all sorts of feelings for me, making me want things I never knew I wanted if that makes sense.

What approach does your therapist use? This should have been explained to you at the beginning of your sessions.

Therapy will likely be painful and difficult at times but an experienced therapist should ensure that you are safe to leave your session and not feeling too vulnerable.

Op that feeling of wanting to pull back, before getting hurt, is that a pattern you can recognise? If so, sit with that feeling, explore how and where you are feeling what you are feeling. It won’t be easy, it might even be distressing, but ultimately if it gives you understanding and self acceptance it will be worth it.

I wonder if that sense of wanting things you never knew you wanted could be framed as a kind of grief and processed during the therapy.
I mean to say...
For example if (drawing on my own experience) you didn't have a good relationship with a parent you can grieve the loss of something you had every right to expect in life.
It sounds like in any case this would all be really good stuff to talk about with your therapist.
They can at least go over their approach to endings with you

The frame is quite important to me so everyone I work with knows how much notice to expect from me if I have to stop therapy with them, for example.

Parents are supposed to emotionally nurture their children throughout childhood so that they become emotionally self aware and learn to self regulate, be resilient and navigate and build positive relationships in the outside world with care and self confidence - which allows them to develop into emotionally intelligent, secure, social and productive adults.

Some parenting falls short of this goal (emotional neglect) and some is actively counterproductive (emotional abuse). In therapy the aim is to attend to any wounds and fill any deficits by emotionally validating the client to build their self esteem so that they feel and know that they have value, agency and purpose in life. Once the client can sense their own emotional shift and is confident in making any changes, responding differently, accepting or making their peace with situations in their life - then they are ready to graduate/fly the nest of therapy in a more rounded, robust emotional state with new skills and perspectives to help them survive and thrive in life.

Thank you all, super and DFOD really informative thank you, I think I have that now in that I can respond differently to situations, but what I also have is an attachment to this person who I will have to leave. Clearly I need more therapy

All of what has already been said above, and in addition to that, part of the process is about internalising the good 'parent' figure so that when the therapy ends, you will still have that inside you to draw upon. The ending can be difficult but it is also planned and expected, so you know from the outset it is not a case that the therapist will actually adopt you as their child, it is a process and work to be done together.

@Tipsymctipsy

Thank you all, super and DFOD really informative thank you, I think I have that now in that I can respond differently to situations, but what I also have is an attachment to this person who I will have to leave. Clearly I need more therapy

That’s great that you now have the emotional skills to respond rather than react to different and difficult situations.

Forming an attachment with your therapist is a good thing and has allowed you to develop an authentic trusting relationship which has supported you to develop these new skills - like a parent should/would have done. But the end phase of parenting is to develop emotionally independent and confident adults and as PP has said that trust and bond you take with you internally as confidence - endings are also the beginnings of new chapters and it sounds like you will be going forward positively with the ability to nurture, maintain, build and navigate/swerve both old and new relationships with others (and yourself) with much more balance, ease and fulfilment.