I went into my session wanting help with something really specific: building coping strategies for separation anxiety before some time apart from my partner. Instead, my psychologist guided the session into deeper trauma work using imagery rescripting / containing negative memories (for our EMDR work). During that, a buried memory of self-harm from when I was a teen came up, and I left feeling emotionally flat, exhausted, and like my needs hadn’t actually been heard.
A few days later, after an argument with my partner, that memory came back involuntarily and triggered a much bigger emotional spiral than I expected.
I reached out to my psychologist for support, he offered me a last-minute session. He said (with a grin) that I tolerate ALOT. He essentially told me my relationship was “going nowhere” and suggested I consider ending it, while my partner was away… (ouch!) and even gave ideas on how to go through with that….
Since then, I’ve felt really destabilised and full of self-doubt, both about my relationship and about therapy itself. My relationship isn’t perfect, but it’s also not entirely bad, which makes his response feel extreme to me. Now I’m questioning whether to find a new therapist or stop therapy altogether, because lately it feels like it’s making things worse rather than helping.