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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
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Posted by vwoolf on March 17, 2014, at 1:22:55
In reply to My therapist on extended leave, posted by Dinah Seeks Support on March 7, 2014, at 20:23:20
Dear Dinah, I don't often come to the boards any more and have only just seen your message about your therapist. I just wanted to say that I think it is intolerable that you are not being allowed to know what has become of him.
You quite clearly have a strong relationship with him. A real relationship that has lasted twenty years. I am sure it is real for him too.
I think you have a right to know, no matter how terrible the news may be. You have a right to mourn if necessary.
I would insist with the agency if I were you, press them to give you enough details. Boundaries are supposed to be there to protect the patient, not to hurt them. Trust in the relationship you know you had with him.
When people go missing, the most terrible thing for the families is that they can't grieve. They need to know what has happened, they need the 'bones' to bury.
Posted by 10derheart on March 17, 2014, at 16:45:48
In reply to My therapist on extended leave, posted by Dinah Seeks Support on March 7, 2014, at 20:23:20
I sent you an email.
I don't know what to say here.
I'm praying for you.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 17:43:34
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye. » Dinah Seeks Support, posted by baseball55 on March 16, 2014, at 20:28:05
I was feeling pretty fragile. I probably still am. I don't know really....
I understand that my issue might be triggering for a lot of people here. It's the worst nightmare. I certainly have fussed at my therapist often for what other people's therapists have done. So I really do understand.
Every therapy dyad is different. And what's "true" in your therapy relationship isn't necessarily true for others. Our boundaries weren't either better or worse than with your therapist. They were just different. Partly because of the years involved, partly because of the nature of the work (which largely involved fear of abandonment), and partly because we lived through Katrina as comrades as well as therapist/client.
What is reasonable for your response and his actions is not necessarily the same as is reasonable for my response and my therapist's actions.
I'm not entirely sure why you thought, that day, that I was primarily angry with him. I was furious with the therapist who called me in to her office merely to tell me that he actually had abandoned me, she would curl up and die if it happened to her, and that he was never coming back. I'd have been way happier if she had never contacted me after telling me he wasn't dying.
Also, to some extent the anger I felt towards my therapist was protective. You might find, if you are ever in this situation, that anger feels less horrible than terror.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 17:44:20
In reply to Re: My therapist on extended leave » Dinah Seeks Support, posted by 10derheart on March 17, 2014, at 16:45:48
Thanks, 10der.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:01:13
In reply to Re: My therapist on extended leave, posted by vwoolf on March 17, 2014, at 1:22:55
You're right. The not knowing is horrible. And even worse since that stupid therapist told me that he was never coming back. I at least held hope that one day I'd hear some sort of reason. I do appreciate her telling me he wasn't dying, and her tone implied it's nothing like that.
If you have any idea of how I can find out, please tell me. He worked alone. His phone is now disconnected (causing another evening of sobs). The stupid therapist with the agency he referred to let me know that she found out what's wrong with him from the grapevine. There's a whole grapevine out there, with people who don't give a darn about him, who know what's going on. But a client cant' find out because it's "confidential".
And there's no point trying to communicate at all with her or anyone else from there. I'm identified as the crazy client now. Nothing I say will break through their complacency.
I've googled, and will continue to google. I've found several things it *isn't*.
The irony was that if someone had just given me minimal information, I wouldn't even be looking. It's like a celebrity wedding. The best way to avoid a mob scene is to release wedding photos. I don't want or need to know details about his personal life. It may seem like I want to know the gory details, and it's hard for me to explain the difference. What I need to know is about what happened and will happen between us. Something more than "extended medical leave" "probably longer than four months" and just the vaguest hint that it might be never.
But his phone is disconnected. No one who knows him will say anything to the crazy patient. Short of contacting his wife, which will probably have the same result anyway, or hiring a private investigator, I'm at a loss.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:05:43
In reply to Dinah?, posted by alexandra_k on March 16, 2014, at 16:35:16
It depends on the type of emergency, I think. I fall apart in medical emergencies.
But yes, I did handle Katrina better than he did. But our experience in Katrina makes this even more incomprehensible. Even then, with the whole world in chaos, he never just cut me off. He might have said he couldn't handle me right now. He might have run away. But he never just disappeared. He made an effort at least to not disappear.
I know in my heart that my therapist would never do this.
Yet he did.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:08:23
In reply to Re: Support is what Dinah Seeks » Dr. Bob, posted by sleepygirl2 on March 14, 2014, at 20:36:54
Rationalizing isn't always bad. I've made up at least one scenario that makes sense to me. If I never hear anything else, I'll have to cling to that one.
I feel very detached. At least in the daytime. He almost seems like someone I used to know long ago. Perhaps. Maybe he was a dream.
But whenever I wake up, I still breathe pain.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:10:12
In reply to Re: My therapist on extended leave » Dinah Seeks Support, posted by Twinleaf on March 14, 2014, at 10:12:04
((( Twinleaf )))
Thank you. I have tried.
I hope you understand that there is a lot of caring and support here for you as well, because of how much you've given to others through the years.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:14:14
In reply to Re: He's not dying » baseball55, posted by Willful on March 13, 2014, at 23:33:52
> We need to accept the complexity of her (and our) feelings, and the primal sense of abandonment that some people particularly feel devastating-- leaving only the loved person's absence.
Willful, you have absolutely nailed it. Although I wasn't well enough to post, this resonated so much and I felt so perfectly understood that I cried.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:30:14
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye. » Dinah Seeks Support, posted by SLS on March 13, 2014, at 22:42:21
The best way I can explain it is this. You're maybe almost ready to go away to college. Then you come home after a brief absence (I had to cancel my last session) to find out that your dearly loved mother has left you a note on the kitchen table saying that something is terribly wrong with her, and she's going away and doesn't know when she'll be back.
It doesn't even matter that I had one foot out the door, metaphorically. It's terrifying. I'm terrified for him, I'm terrified for me. And I'm angry he left an impersonal note that left me thinking he might be dying. Other people - people who know him only casually - know where he is, but they won't tell me. I'm left wondering if I missed something. Was something going on that I didn't notice because I was arriving late and missing sessions?
His phone is disconnected, and that one slim hope I had that he would one day return has been dashed. That one slim connection. As long as the phone message was there, I knew he hadn't totally disappeared. He was expecting to return.
Tools. Well, despite his feelings about Babble lately, he'd probably be happy that I reached out here. He always knew I was sometimes quite unkind to him here, and he was just glad I had somewhere to process my feelings.
It occurred to me earlier today that he'd likely tell me that story about the farmer.
http://www.rainbowbody.com/newarticles/farmerson.htm
Then I'd metaphorically put my hands on my hips and tell him that's awfully *convenient* for him. And that abandoning me can never be rationalized that way. That it was good for me to see him as long as he needed the income stream, but now "may be". And he'd likely laugh and acknowledge that it could look like that. And then tell the same story next time.
I miss him. I literally can't believe I'll never see him again. I literally can't believe our twenty years of fighting to relationship can end like this.
Posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:38:20
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye. » SLS, posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:30:14
Incidentally, I hope no one tries to get me to see how the farmer story applies. I thought it was a cop-out when he used it to excuse his own actions. But it was him doing it, and it was so like him that I couldn't help but find it endearing.
There is nothing that could offset the loss of trust that abandonment by my therapist of twenty years has caused. I don't want to extend myself to anyone ever. If my therapist, who would never in a million billion years, did this, then how could I trust anyone in the entire world. Except maybe my husband and a couple of dogs.
Posted by baseball55 on March 20, 2014, at 20:14:58
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye., posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:38:20
I'm so, so sorry Dinah. It makes me cry to think of how awful this must be. I know how attached you have been to him and, really, him to you. It's so sad and so unfair.
Posted by Phillipa on March 20, 2014, at 21:23:12
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye., posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:38:20
Do you know where he lives? drive by? Phillipa
Posted by SLS on March 21, 2014, at 1:36:22
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye. » SLS, posted by Dinah on March 20, 2014, at 18:30:14
Thanks, Dinah. Your metaphor was very helpful in providing an understanding as to what you are experiencing.
The only thing I can think to say is that I'm sorry. I'm sorry for your loss, and I'm sorry that you have to experience the such hurt. Your level of anxiety must be very high. Mine would be.
- Scott
Posted by Dinah on March 21, 2014, at 19:52:29
In reply to Re: And that's it for me, guys. Bye. » Dinah, posted by SLS on March 21, 2014, at 1:36:22
I think I'm going to try to forget my therapist ever existed. And totally cut off my emotional self until it feels better.
I'm not even sure that's a bad thing. Emotions are pesky things.
Posted by Tabitha on March 27, 2014, at 15:54:00
In reply to Thanks guys., posted by Dinah on March 21, 2014, at 19:52:29
Dinah, well I'm not sure if you'll see this. I'm so sorry your therapist let you down so spectacularly. You deserve better. I hate to see such an insightful and kind-hearted person hurt so much, particularly when the hurt comes from what is supposed to be the safest, most nurturing relationship.
The further I get from my own therapy the more I think that therapy benefits the therapists more than the clients. However, I do still hope that despite this awful ending, you have benefited from the 20 year relationship. I like your phrasing, that it provided an alternative to being a "suburban hermit".
The not-knowing why someone left just absolutely makes me nuts. I just want to punch him and the referral therapist for refusing to give an outline of the reasons. I do not think secrecy is about protecting the clients or even about protecting the therapist from actual harm. To me it is about protecting the therapists' power. Oz behind the curtain and all.
Posted by Dinah on March 28, 2014, at 17:38:26
In reply to Ugh, so sorry » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on March 27, 2014, at 15:54:00
Thanks, Tabitha.
I think I hate people and will go back to being a suburban hermit. They say it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. That's crap. It's far better never to have loved and never to have felt so very very horrible.
I HATE PEOPLE!!!
Posted by Dinah on March 28, 2014, at 17:39:13
In reply to Re: Ugh, so sorry, posted by Dinah on March 28, 2014, at 17:38:26
Posted by Dinah on March 28, 2014, at 17:51:41
In reply to Ugh, so sorry » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on March 27, 2014, at 15:54:00
I think you're right. It's to protect them.
I found some papers today from the mid nineties. I was using a dot matrix printer! I've been seeing my therapist since dot matrix printers.
And he just disappears without a trace and I may never hear from him again, not even to find out what happened.
Posted by Tabitha on March 30, 2014, at 16:50:34
In reply to Re: Ugh, so sorry » Tabitha, posted by Dinah on March 28, 2014, at 17:51:41
Amazing how outdated 90s stuff seems now.
It's good to see you posting. Breakup pain is probably #1 on my list of Painful Experiences. The only good thing to say about it is that it eventually changes.
Posted by Willful on April 5, 2014, at 1:04:49
In reply to Ugh, so sorry » Dinah, posted by Tabitha on March 27, 2014, at 15:54:00
How are you doing Dinah?
Have you begun to feel even brief moments of relief-- of being out from under?
The bad feelings may come in waves and still be more than you feel you can tolerate-- but I hope some moments of feeling yourself have begun.
Have you had any word? from his fill-in therapist or anyone else?
My own psychopharmacologist, with whom I have wonderful rapport and whom I have trusted implicitly-- was forced to leave his practice because of a serious illness from which he will not recover. He and I had nothing even approaching your relationship with your therapist but he would never abandon a patient to the sort of rupture and spiritual nausea (in the existential sense)-- that your T put you through. I am still so appalled that he could suddenly and callously disappear.
But I hope time is making a small beginning of healing--- and that there is more healing to come. And I deeply hope that he is recovering and will be well-- and that he will make some attempt to redress this wrong.
Very best wishes and thoughts,
Willful
Posted by Dinah on April 7, 2014, at 3:59:03
In reply to Re: Ugh, so sorry, posted by Willful on April 5, 2014, at 1:04:49
I think much of the time I am dissociated enough from my feelings that I do ok. I was even laughing about it the other day with my boss. But dissociation from my feelings has its down side. I am suffering from so much IBS that it's just now, a month later, that I feel comfortable leaving home for more than an hour or so at a time. I still don't have much of an appetite. Or rather, I'm unaware that I'm hungry. So that maybe once a day or so I figure it out and eat a lot. The rest of the time I have to force myself to eat, and the results are often negative.
If I don't lose weight from this, I'll never lose weight. Unless the steady diet of Risperdal offsets the little food the rest of the time.
Then of course there are the hostile takeovers from my emotional self. I'll be doing just fine and then some little thing will send me right off the rails (as with the last time I posted here). That was purely my emotional self. I'm now purely my rational self. Only in therapy did the two ever come close to meeting.
I'm sorry about your psychopharmacologist. Is that recent? That is so sad.
I think I'm existing in a dialectic. I have grown to trust that my therapist actually cares for me over the last few years. I still can't accept that he did this the way he did it. It can't have happened. Yet it did. He left me waiting and wondering and agonizing. He didn't add a few personal words to the form email. He didn't contact me himself, and he didn't delegate calling me personally to someone else.
I recognize that this is something catastrophic. His wife has terminated his cell phone number (which was his listed business number), and is closing at least one of his offices. You don't do that if you expect that someone will be back in what is now three months. So on her part there is clearly no expectation that he will return in anywhere close to the near future. I don't know if he will ever call me or not. I wonder what will happen to my records.
The only possibility that makes any sense at all to me is that something happened or my therapist had some sort of breakdown and is in a rehab or mental health program. He would expect to be out in four months (since he mentioned four months a few times in his phone message and email), but isn't sure if he'll be allowed to practice. The vagueness in terms of his medical leave would be due to a fear of negative judgment. I still don't quite get why he'd be afraid (and referred therapist and wife would be pretty sure) that he's never going to return. Even if he's impaired in some way, people generally return to practice don't they? The certainty is baffling to me. Because referred therapist didn't seem to be particularly compassionate or worried about him, so I tend to believe that she really meant that he's NOT dying. Which was said in what seemed to me to be a rather emphatic and almost dry tone. I did appreciate her telling me that.
But I don't at all trust my judgment, and I'm most likely wrong. I don't want to think he's dying. Of course I also don't want to think of his life being turned upside down by mental health or addiction issues either. And I wouldn't feel nearly as abandoned under those circumstances. I think I could understand that he couldn't, wouldn't be allowed, to make contact even if he wanted to. And he might not want to if he expected negative judgment from me.
Which would be foolish of him. I may berate him from time to time for his shortcomings. But I wouldn't do so when life is already berating him. He's my therapist mommy, and you don't stop loving your therapist mommy no matter what they do to you or to anyone else. It's a matter of imprinting.
I worry that I've been so distant lately that I didn't notice something was off with him. I worry that if I hadn't cancelled that last Friday before he disappeared, I might have been spared this agony by learning or sensing something.
And I am starting to tremble convulsively as I write this, so I'd better stop now before I am victim of a hostile takeover by my emotional self.
I want to be very clear that these are just my imaginings and in no way reflect any reality of my therapist. It's not even gossip because I have no information. I know his wife is ok, and I'm pretty sure his stepdaughter is ok. That's all I really know. The rest is pure conjecture on my part and is more likely to be wrong than right. The pieces seem to fit better than anything else I can imagine, but there are still any number of pieces that won't jam themselves into that scenario.
Posted by yellowbird01 on April 7, 2014, at 18:59:31
In reply to Re: Ugh, so sorry » Willful, posted by Dinah on April 7, 2014, at 3:59:03
Dinah..
It has been literally years since I've posted here, but I do read from time to time, and remember the special relationship you had with your T. It makes me so, so sad for you that this has happened. It's unbelievable. Two years ago, my own T of 12 years terminated me very suddenly with absolutely no meaningful explanation except that "it wasnt me". The week prior, we'd been talking in depth about trust, and she'd said to me "yellowbird, I know it's hard for you to trust me, but I want you to know I'll be here with you, as long as it takes". BS. Whatever. I can so relate to the feelings of dissociation, shutting off the feelings, until they burst through occasionally. I absolutely went through that, and still do at times... although the intensity of it is much, much less, even at the worst moments. The lack of understanding is the absolute worst. I'm so sorry you're experiencing this.As I've been reading your posts over the weeks, I have to wonder if something didnt happen where his licensing board got involved. Perhaps his license is temporarily suspended? Id think (although I'm not positive) that if this happened, he'd be barred from any direct communication with clients. Sometimes those suspensions are due to terrible misbehavior on a Ts part.. sometimes due to "lesser" things like lying about completing the required continued education each year, billing issues, a confidentiality issue, etc. I dont know. The T you spoke to for "additional information", who said it was "nothing like that" re him dying.. and the fact that the phone number he used for his practice is turned off.. it all makes me wonder. From all you've said about him over the years, I KNOW he cares about you, and I'm sure he knows this hurts you. How could he not? It seems whatever has happened must be somehow out of his control. I dont know. I may be totally off base, but I just wanted to share the idea in case you hadnt considered it. Most licensing boards in most states allow you to look up providers and they will often show whether they have been actions against their license. Often it takes months to show up, so even if this is the case, it may not show right now.. but it might be worth looking if you havent already.
Again, I'm so sorry you're going through this. I wish I knew what else to say.
Posted by Dinah on April 7, 2014, at 21:10:49
In reply to Re: Ugh, so sorry, posted by yellowbird01 on April 7, 2014, at 18:59:31
That is bizarre. No explanation at all other than it wasn't you? Well of course it wasn't. It was her!
I really did get to trust that he cared about me. It's hard to shake that certainty.
It would really be my first guess that his license was in jeopardy and he wasn't able to contact clients except that it all happened so suddenly. Licensing board actions take years, not days. He didn't seem particularly worried or stressed that Tuesday and he was gone by the following Monday. Unless I totally missed his mood for once because I wasn't paying attention. But honestly, I don't think he's a good enough actor to have hidden a long term worry about licensure.
I still can't imagine how referred therapist would be so certain he wasn't returning unless it was license related though. How can you be sure, even if someone moves, that they won't skype or do phone therapy? Not that she said she was certain. She just said she didn't think he'd be back. But I darn well hope she wouldn't say that lightly. All she said was that he wasn't dying. But she did say it with enough force that I inferred that it wasn't anything like that. But then I was a total mess. I don't at all trust my inferring.
How have you dealt with the loss? Did you eventually give up trying to find out what happened? I can't see myself easily doing that. Did you find a therapist to help you get over therapy? It seems like such a similar situation.
Posted by baseball55 on April 7, 2014, at 21:12:16
In reply to Re: Ugh, so sorry, posted by yellowbird01 on April 7, 2014, at 18:59:31
So glad you're back posting Dinah. So, so sorry about what has happened. The not knowing must be the hardest - spinning scenarios in your head, then trying to shut the whole thing down.
Take care.
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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
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