u/AlbatrossBig2535

Hello! So my situation is a bit complicated. I am actually a licensed therapist myself (almost 2 years post grad) and my therapist is a PhD student 2 years into his program. I am also a woman and he’s a man. I’m assuming he’s probably a couple years younger than me. Not sure if those details play much of a part. It does seem to impact the dynamic a little to me. Anyway, I’ve been seeing him for about 8 months. My city has a psychological services program where it’s a sliding scale rate that doesn’t accept insurance. People can see PhD students for therapy there at a pretty reasonable rate. The private practice I work at doesn’t offer health insurance so this seemed perfect for me. My therapist has been pretty friendly and easy to talk to. I do feel comfortable opening up to him. Recently though I have just felt stifled by how structured our sessions are. It feels like I can’t get much of a word in about more weekly things impacting me without him quite abruptly sometimes bringing it back to the “big picture.” I find it frustrating because I’ve been dealing with a lot recently and have a lot to process. Right now I would benefit a lot from a more person-centered therapy approach. He seems to keep switching what we need to focus on in therapy, gives me an agenda of what he’d like to discuss before sessions, and seems flustered sometimes when I talk too long. He’ll sometimes interrupt and say “so what are you trying to tell me? What does this mean to you?” To be fair, I do kind of ramble and speak in a scattered way. Like I said, I’ve been pretty dysregulated recently and have ADHD as well as OCD. It does help me to get it all out though. I worry because I’m a therapist he feels this greater need to contribute to sessions and maybe even prove himself. I told him today when he went over his agenda before session yet again that I feel suffocated sometimes having sessions broken down so much. He said he understood but still proceeded to interrupt me a lot and try to get his points across. He even seemed a bit passive aggressive at one point when I said “I don’t feel I’m very assertive“ about something completely different, he said ”I think you can be. You were with me today.” Maybe it was well intentioned but him saying that along with his subtle pushback to what I want makes me feel otherwise. I know most people complain about talk therapy being not structured enough but I just like having a more client centered approach. I hate to say it but I’m already very self aware as a therapist myself and his continuing push to force his narrative make me feel like I’m the problem. Am I being too difficult and stubborn because I feel like I know best as a therapist myself? He seems frustrated by my lack of progress but it’s almost like he thinks I’m going to stop having self deprecating comments towards myself overnight. It feels like there’s no genuine interest in my actual experience. What do you all think?