Judgement in psychotherapy

jungatheart

I would be interested in people's views of judgement in psychotherapy - does it happen much ? I've been seeing a therapist for a while & we hsve a really good connection and I need to tell him something that happened a few years ago but the fear of judgement is really holding me back. I have put myself on a timeline now of if I don't tell next week, just finish therapy as you are wasting time and I'm hoping this might make me just cough it up. Being judged is terrifying isn't it ?

JuliusCaesar

I'm presuming you are afraid of being judged negatively and then rejected or condemned by the therapist.

I think you'll find that you recieve understanding and empathy. I've no idea what it was you did/what happened, but generally your therapist will see where you were coming from at the time. Sometimes you might want to either try to make things right, or forgive yourself for your actions/lack of action/ignorance/whatever. A therapist will help you overcome shame or guilt, but can't help unless you tell them.

jungatheart

thanks so much, that helps a lot - it's funny as I've had a break of about a month from therapy as our holidays overlapped and it was the longest break in about two years and i don't know if this would have come up so clearly in my mind if we hadn't had such a break as we'd be working through a lot of other stuff. I'm married and eight years ago, I slept with a friend of mine - once, bad idea and i take responsibility for it, marriage was bad then and i was in a horrible place, we've had some problems since but things are actually improving at the moment. so i realise i've held on to this and it's taken up space in my head where it has bored a hole into my self-worth - i think i'm a terrible person because of this, bad things will happen etc. it takes a lot of trust to believe that a failure like this will be treated with kindness and my therapist is amazing, i have such trust and we've worked through stuff like abuse and violence and right now he is been fantastic about some life changes i'm making. so it's ironic, the trusting with this horrible thing i did is difficult but it feels like precisely what i need to do to progress. i emailed him after my last session and i said i really needed to tell him something and the fear of judgement was holding me back and i really felt like i needed his help to work through the feelings that have come up. so at least i've put it out there and i'm seeing him tomorrow and plan to talk to him about it and my fear of judgement and whatever else that might be about. fingers crossed !!