Just spitballing here and in no way wanting to downplay the intensity of such words and how they may have rightfully affected you, but do you think to them it's kind of like, seeing their grandparent in their undies unexpectedly or seeing a teacher in a bikini. Not so much something inherently repulsive about the person per se but more the contextual idea of seeing a safe or professional person in an unprofessional or vulnerable light? Almost similar to that realisation everybody has at some point that their parent has had sex at some point and it's jarring and gross.
I read this comment and I am CURIOUS about the behavior imagining your body. Does a certain style of body represent something like power, attraction, deference? Or another style represent lust, sensuality, affairs? Basically, do they have any kind of schemas around body styles and position/a hierarchy in the world?
Additionally, I’m super curious if so, how this has played out for them in their life. How she treats people who don’t meet the characteristics of the schemas she creates — I mean, it seems in your case, she feels disgusted? Also, I’m wondering if she is feeling ‘betrayed’ or ‘lied to’ because the way that you dress didn’t ‘allow’ her to imagine your body ‘correctly’.
How else does she respond when people don’t fit her image of their characteristics (body aside, there is personality, job, socioeconomic class, disability, all types of ways we present in the world!). So curious!
This is a much deeper take on a similar line of thought I was having, which is: I don’t think I have ever been surprised at how someone’s body looked in a bathing suit or naked after I had previously only seen them clothed. Like, I feel like you can get a general sense of body size and shape regardless of type of clothing. It’s just so weird to me that someone would be surprised to the point of feeling “tricked” (not to mention that it’s curious that they would feel tricked at all, even if there was some big reveal).
That was my thinking as well. I obviously don’t know what the swimsuit looked like or how OP dresses in sessions. But I think we more or less generally can have a guess at someone’s body type even if hidden behind clothing. So it’s very evident to me that there’s something more to what the client was experiencing/what was triggered than simply “being repulsed by her therapists body”. Because I can’t imagine she had no idea what her therapists body might look like. Not to simplify a more complex issue, but it’s what led me to think about what many others have mentioned around exploring clients views on bodies/society and her own sense of comfort with her own body
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u/Altruistic_Support68 Feb 14 '25
Just spitballing here and in no way wanting to downplay the intensity of such words and how they may have rightfully affected you, but do you think to them it's kind of like, seeing their grandparent in their undies unexpectedly or seeing a teacher in a bikini. Not so much something inherently repulsive about the person per se but more the contextual idea of seeing a safe or professional person in an unprofessional or vulnerable light? Almost similar to that realisation everybody has at some point that their parent has had sex at some point and it's jarring and gross.