I desperately want to know things about T

I have moments when I desperately want to know things about my T. Like my desire to get info is insatiable and almost crazy-making. I’ve googled him, of course, but he has very little online presence. He is also the type of therapist that doesn’t disclose much. I’ve told him about the Google searches more than once (and my intense shame/embarrassment about it) and he has been incredibly, surprisingly understanding about it, saying that he fully understands my curiosity and is willing to talk about anything I find that I want to discuss.

I just wish I could put my finger on why this is something I crave yet feel ashamed about at the same time. I think I just want to know who he is in his life outside of therapy. Maybe I want to make him more 3-dimensional. I can’t thjnk of a specific piece of information that would be satisfying for me though. I’m not jealous of him or his life. I don’t want to be a part of his life. I just want a glimpse into his real life. I want to know who he is. I know I’m not the only one who does this. Why do we do it? And how do we get past it? There must be some explanation. What is it?

When I've done this, it generally means I want to feel more connected to T, and that I'm in a depressed state of mind at the time. The more I fill my life with good things, the less I want to know about T. This is, of course, easier said than done.

I agree. I do it to feel connected to T or L. I have problems with object consistency, so I really need things like transitional objects, emails, phone calls, etc. to help feel connected in between sessions. But it also happens when I'm more depressed and am seeking comfort or support. Just seeing them helps me.

I agree with Coolibrarian and ScarletPimpernel: when I am thinking of T a lot or searching out their psychology today page, it's because I want to feel close to them. Connected. When I had to stop seeing former T because she got sick, I gave her a matching stuffed animal to one I have and had brought to therapy on occasion. When I really miss her, I get that stuffed animal and hug it knowing that she has one too and I like to think she's thinking of me when she looks at it. Maybe even cuddles with it. I've found that helps when I'm in that mindset of wanting to know more about them. I don't have anything like this with current T but I have googled her and not found much. Just places she's worked at before and a couple of reviews. Nothing helpful.

My experience with my ex-T (to whom I was / still am strongly attached), that while I never seriously wanted to be part of her life, I often wished that I could somehow belong there. If that makes sense. I rarely got to the 'desperately curious' stage, though, not about personal details ... to me it was things that are relevant to my problem somehow, like when I'm about to say "you don't know what it is like ...!" and then I go "wait, how do I know?" and then it turns into a question ... or when we were talking about my mother and I was wondering how she would've handled such a situation with her own child, or when I wondered about a reaction she had - how much of what I see is her / how much of her do I see?

Anyhow, Ts are important parts of our lives (for many of us anyway), I think it's only natural to be curious.

ETA: spelling, and also previous posters make a good point about wanting to be connected. I think the times I googled her I wasn't even looking for anything (apart from the one time for her professional background), it was just satisfying to see that she exists. I guess that is a little embarrassing

kinda actually sounds like you do want to be part of his life. must be a reason you feel this way for sure. did you ever ask him why he thinks you do this?

I'm just nosy in general.

Consciously, at least, I do not feel like I do it because I want to be a part of his life. He has said, “of course you are curious,” and has implied that it’s about trust and wanting to know that he’s the same type of person outside of session as he is in session.

Me too! It is therapy, though, so every thought and action gets picked apart.

I think it comes from a very young feeling. Like when a toddler follows (m)other from room to room. Needing to know where she is at all times. Separate physically but still not emotionally.

Learning as much about the therapist helps balance out the power in my mind. He knows EVERYTHING about me and I know a crumb about him. Sometimes he will throw me a bone about him and then weirdly he will throw me a steak on occasions.

When he talks about himself oddly it puts me at ease, grounds me and brings around my best adult self. It makes me feel respected that he trusts me with his personal information.

Yes! Exactly this! Even though I feel ashamed for snooping, I also feel empowered. It balances things out a bit.

My T is very open and has let me know that I can ask about him/his life outside the office but I didn’t have and real questions. Then one session we agreed to keep things low key as he was going out of town the following week. So he asked if I wanted to see pictures of his hobby (a shared interest). We actually ended up going through a bunch of pictures on his phone... his wife, grandkids, the hobby... he kept going because he was watching me relax, open up, and feel safer with him because of it. For us it helped to build trust knowing he was just a normal guy outside the office. It also brought up some super important things for us to work on in therapy.

I desperately wanted to understand what was supposed to be happening at a therapy appointment and how it was supposed to be useful to me for what I wanted help with. The therapist was no more interesting to me than hammer. A hammer actually might have been more interesting to me. The therapist as a person never mattered to me really.

Yes, this--I want to balance out the power. It's partly about feeling connected at times. But I think in general, it's more to even out the power imbalance, at least with my current T, because he doesn't disclose much.

I have done this with almost every professional I've met within the last 5 years or so. For me I want to feel that they're a real person outside of their professional lives and maybe as a way of trusting them. I feel the relationships are so one-sided, so I think it's natural to want to know some information about them when you're disclosing your most intimate thoughts and behaviors with them.
One previous T I had found out that I found her on Facebook because I must have shown up on her persons you may know list. She just asked if I found anything interesting other than pictures of her cats.

I probably can't offer my "solution" to everyone but that's how I've solved the situation:

First of all, I've googled my T very thoroughly and as a result, I know quite a bit about him. It was a no-brainer to figure out that he is married and who is his wife because they work in the same practice. But I don't think he would never tell me that this was his n-th marriage and altogether he has m children. Of course this information just does not lie there in the internet but by carefully tying together the hints all over different places I was able to infer this information. Also where and when he studied, where he lives, where is his country house etc. Some things he has revealed to me also in person but then these have been questions driven by the information that I already know.

I must admit that this extensive googling probably is a sign of my desire to know things about him but I actually do prefer to find things out on my own and I would not like him to do a lot of self-disclosure in session. I still google him regularly, I suppose to keep myself up do date, to make sure that he isn't doing anything that to my mind doesn't fit in the whole picture and thus would make me doubt in him. But it rarely comes up in sessions because although it probably is a background I need, it's nothing to be worked with.

Secondly, I don't really tell him much about my life. I don't tell stories in session. We don't ever have any recap of the week, or previous day or weekend or holiday or whatever. I don't see my therapy being about me telling him what is happening in my life. That makes things pretty much equal. We are together in the session, two people trying to be in relationship and we work with what comes up in that relationship in the moment. Thus, all the stories that come up are in the context in our relationship - something that happened last session or months ago or whatever. I am emotionally involved, he is emotionally involved - there is no hiding from either side (although I still habitually try to hide). So I feel we are pretty much in an equal position.

I think this is a big part for me too.

FWIW - I don’t think you can show up on someone’s “people you may know” list on FB just by searching them. That’s my understanding at least.

I guess I feel simultaneously glad that my T’s life isn’t splattered all over the internet, but also frustrated that I can’t find much. I like that he’s a private person and that his family seems “normal.” I think I might doubt him a bit if his vacation photos and family outing photos were easy to find. I’m sort of glad he doesn’t disclose much in session, but wish I could find out just a little bit more about him on my own. Maybe that’s a contradiction. I’m curious why you say, “although it probably is a background I need, it’s nothing to be worked with.” It certainly seems to me (at least in my case) that it’s something to be worked with.

Yeah, in your case it probably is something to work with because you seem conflicted about this topic. Although I do regularly google my T, I feel no conflicts about it and I very rarely recall it on session. Sometimes it does come up, especially when I've put together a new piece of information. Maybe I do it in order to amuse him because I bet he has absolutely no idea how I've found out all this information since it's not that this information is just easily found by anyone in the internet. I also know that he would not ask me how I figured these things out because he knows I would not tell him (he has tried), so that's my small victory. But no, I don't feel conflicted about it.