Comment by PKM MD on 02 May 2009 at 2:15 pm

Hello Karen,

I respect and admire your decision to share your story. As a psychiatrist I would like to know what you believe to be the greatest misconception of the therapy you have received? What would you like others to know? Besides the obvious positives what was one downfall? Would you suggest therapy to another? What if you need more help? Would you re-consider starting therapy again?

Thank you.

P.K.M. MD

Dear Dr PKM,

Thank you for your compliment about me sharing my story. There are many misconceptions about the therapeutic relationship. Too many to write here on my blog. However, one of the greatest misconceptions that can eventually hurt the patient is to let the patient believe they are loved by you.  It’s such a risk for a patient to pour out their heart and soul to a therapist while building trust.  When a broken person, like me, enters into a therapeutic relationship, it takes all the strength they have to let go of the boundaries and walls they’ve built to contain their pain. For me, trust was such a big issue to overcome.  I could not trust until I felt loved. My healing started when I felt Dr. Baer loved me.  I healed out of love, nothing else.

I made Dr. Baer my family.  I could not change the way I felt at the end of the therapeutic relationship.  I couldn’t accept that he didn’t feel the same way after all that we had gone though.  The misconception was that I thought of the therapy more as a friendship than as professional. Dr. Baer was trained to work therapeutically with the relationship, I was not.  I developed feelings. He did not. I felt cared for, and it was his job to care for me, and he did.  But I took my healing personally.  He felt he did his best job, but I was left feeling alone.

Although therapy saved my life and healed me, it can be painful in the end.  It took me so many years to build a good, sound relationship, only to have it end and realize that it wasn’t a real relationship in the first place.  It’s been a hard thing for me to overcome.

Hope my answer helps you.

Karen

Comment by Ron on 03 May 2009 at 8:48 am

Karen,

Read your story and most of your answers on this page. You may have answered this question before. If it’s a repeat apologies sent your way. As a man trying to understand the depth of your suffering my hearts aches with a difficult to explain pain. I haven’t treated my ex-wife well after learning that she was sexually abused. I can’t say what drew me to read your book. It’s not something I would buy. But I did. I not only learned what pain is but what being hurt by ignorance can lead to. Are you able to love anyone after all your suffering? Has there ever been a man who accepted you for who you are and loved you despite what happened in your past? My ex-wife eventually committed suicide. In her last letter she mentioned her past pain and how the hurt of men like me caused her to grieve in a way that led to her own death. Are you feeling the same? Has your pain subsided? Are you dating? Maybe my writing is more for me than you. I know I caused her death. I was the first to love her and let her go. I will never get over it. My apologies to all women who have been sexually abused and not wanted by the men they loved.

Dear Ron,

Thank you for your heartfelt thoughts and comments. I’m glad you came to a better understanding of how a woman who had been abused can hurt when not supported by the man closest to her. My ex-husband’s lack of empathy and understanding devastated me, too. I wanted to end my life because I felt cheap, dirty, and worthless. My ex repeatedly stated that I was “A waste of human flesh.”  I never fully recovered from those painful words.

What’s most in important for you is to change for the better in your present and future relationships.  It may be too late for your wife, but it’s never too late to start over and make a difference in someone’s else’s life.  Forgive yourself.  Now that you know the cause and effect of your actions, you have learned one of life’s most important lessons.  We all learn from the mistakes we make.  No one is perfect.

I’m not sure if at this time if I am capable of trusting and sharing with another man. My fear is that I will be hurt again, and lose the ability to move forward because he will destroy my emotional well being.  My pain has not fully subsided. However, I do my best to make it through each day, one day at a time. I try my best to push away my dark thoughts that come from being hurt and redirecting them.

Even though you may have abused your ex, she ended her life for more reasons than you shared above.  It’s not completely your fault.  I thank you for admitting your wrongdoing.  However, unless you pulled the trigger, she herself chose to leave this world.  I understand why she did.  I know that feeling, because I’ve been there too.  The difference is, I  had a relationship with Dr. Baer that prevented me from leaving this world.

Please learn from your experience and never, ever, act towards any woman, whether an acquaintance or intimate friend, as if you don’t respect her.

Karen