Am I Stupid For Feeling This Way Too? I feel a connection with my therapist. Yes, this is transference. I remember reading about transference when I started therapy, and laughed. I’d like to think I’m a mature, clear headed and “to the point” type person. My therapist is twenty years older than me. He is married. I’m in love with him. I hate saying this, because I fear I may be wrong, but I’d never know.. I think he has a feeling type for me too. Not as strong for me.. but I don’t know how to handle this. I’ve spent over a thousand dollars on this man in gifts. He takes them and thanks me. I brought up transference before, but he became nervous discussing a lot. He apologized if he ever made me think something would happen, but I’m telling all of you that there are times where there’s flirting, cute remarks, etc - please tell me I’m not going crazy? He is all I think about between sessions.. there was even a time I wanted to go in and ask him out. Now my feelings for him are skewed with therapy, so I find it hard to concentrate. He has my gifts hung up all over his office, and there’s just a different vibe in that room every week. Do therapists do this intentionally? I know I’m asking twenty questions now, but, I’m so all over the place. I want to know if this is normal for me to feel this way and think he feels the same. Usually I’m well at reading people, but I don’t know.
Transference is normal and should be welcomed in therapy. That said, it’s something to talk about but not act on. The therapist should not be acting on such feelings, and shouldn’t be encouraging the client to act on such feelings. The therapist should simply welcome the client’s feelings and help him work through them.
An occasional gift from a client may be OK for a therapist to receive. Different therapists have different boundaries around that. When gift giving becomes frequent and expensive, the therapist should notice this with the client and they should talk about it. Actually, that conversation should happen long before the client spends that kind of money. It’s considered unethical for a therapist to accept gifts of substantial monetary value from clients. There’s some gray area there, but I think a thousand dollars crossed that line.
Flirting is another one of those things that generally shouldn’t be part of therapy. The client is allowed to flirt with the therapist. The therapist should notice with compassion and curiosity but should not be flirting back. If it happens once (therapists are human) it’s a misstep that should be worked through. It should not be a regular thing.
You probably are experiencing transference… but your bigger problem is that due to these boundary crossings on the part of your therapist, you are not being kept safe, so your feelings can’t be truly resolved within that relationship in a way that would be healing to you.
This means you have some difficult decisions ahead of you regarding your therapy. I’m sorry you’ve been put in that position. You deserve good quality care, and I hope you will seek it and find it.
