Erotic transference
What is erotic transference?
For me, this became painfully real with someone I encountered in a professional setting a person whose presence seemed to ignite a whole inner world I didn’t realise I was carrying. It began as a simple attraction, but it grew into an ache that never really left, even when contact was reduced, even when boundaries were reinforced, even when I told myself it was over. The feelings didn’t obey logic; they didn’t disappear just because the external circumstances changed. Seen through a psychodynamic lens, I can understand how this person became a powerful screen for older longings: to be seen as special, to be chosen, to be held in mind in a way I had not felt for a long time. The intensity was never just about them; it was about unfinished stories inside me finally finding somewhere to land. The truth is, the feeling has not gone, and a part of me suspects it may never completely vanish. What has changed is that I have internalised both the person and the feelings in such detail that they have become part of an inner construct, an internal figure I can relate to, think about, and learn from. Part of my work now, as a trainee therapist, is to hold that truth gently and to honour the depth of what I felt without letting it govern my choices, and to recognise that what lingers is not just longing for another person, but a living symbol of my own history, my needs, and my capacity for attachment.
The therapist’s task with erotic transference
Erotic transference itself is not “wrong” or something to be stamped out. My task is to notice it, hold it, and help give it symbolic meaning rather than acting it out or trying to shut it down. When desire and longing enter the room, I find that a clear, consistent frame becomes even more important; reliability, timing and firm boundaries become the container that allows these intense feelings to be thought about, felt and worked with safely.
As a therapist in training, my task is to move away from the literal and stay with the meaning. Rather than getting caught in the question of whether I “really” reciprocate a client’s feelings, I try to stay curious about what those feelings might represent and where they might come from in their history. At the same time, I see it as my responsibility to protect the client from shame by staying grounded and non-reactive, and by signalling that this, too, can be spoken about. In this way, erotic transference doesn’t become an embarrassing side-plot we both avoid, but part of the core work. The hope is that, over time, the client discovers that even their most charged, exposing feelings can be held in the room without punishment, seduction or retreat.
What is counter-erotic transference?
When I think about countertransference now, it feels much less abstract than it did in textbooks. It’s my emotional response to the person in front of me the whole mix of warmth, irritation, protectiveness, boredom, fascination. Counter-erotic transference is the part of that which carries a sexual or romantic charge: feeling oddly flattered or lit up with a particular client, noticing a pull to share more of myself than usual, a wish to bend the rules “just this once,” or even a quiet preference for one client’s sessions over others. Sometimes it is not obviously sexual at all; it hides in subtle idealisation, a soft spot that makes me less boundaried, or in avoidance and discomfort that feels out of proportion to what is happening in the room.
I am learning that the presence of counter-erotic transference does not automatically mean I am a bad therapist or a bad person. What it does tell me is that powerful unconscious dynamics are active in the space between us. The real ethical question is not “Do I feel this?” but “What do I do with what I feel?” My responsibility is to notice my responses, take them seriously, and not act them out. Instead, I try to treat them as clinical data to be taken to supervision and personal reflection, rather than as a compass for how I behave with the client. In that sense, my own feelings become part of the material I work with not something to indulge or to deny, but something to think about carefully in service of the therapy.
The risks of acting out (on either side)
When erotic and counter-erotic transference are not recognised and held in mind, they tend to drift towards enactment. This may be as blatant as sexual contact, but more often it appears in smaller erosions of the frame: extending sessions, allowing extra contact, making special exceptions, or indulging in a kind of unspoken, collusive romance within the therapeutic space. The relationship then begins to mirror old scripts, often repeating patterns of seduction, betrayal, or objectification that the client came to therapy to understand and transform.
The consequences can be profound. The client may be left feeling used, confused, or retraumatised, with their capacity to trust professionals and intimate partners seriously damaged. The therapist, in turn, risks clinical blind spots, disciplinary action, and long-lasting guilt and shame. Even without overt sexual contact, blurred boundaries around erotic dynamics can distort the client’s experience of themselves and of therapy. The central danger is that the therapist stops thinking therapeutically and becomes another actor within the client’s unresolved story.
Working ethically with erotic transference
For me, working ethically with erotic transference doesn’t mean making the therapy cold or mechanical; it means holding feeling and meaning together while protecting the client and the frame. Inside myself, I need to be able to name what is happening: “There is erotic transference here.” That inner naming gives me space to think, to take it to supervision, to reflect on my own responses, and to choose when and how to address it. I’m also aware that if I label it too bluntly or too soon with the client, it can feel shaming or defensive, so I try to move carefully and with sensitivity.
In the room, my aim is to stay curious rather than reactive. If a client brings attraction or longing, I try to treat it like any other important feeling, asking what it is like to say this to me, what they imagine I feel in response, and where they have known this pattern before. Over time, I hope to help gently separate fantasy from reality: I want to acknowledge the depth and importance of the feelings while still being clear about my role and the limits of the relationship. My hope is that the client can discover that even intense desire does not automatically lead to rejection, exploitation or engulfment, but can be thought about and held safely.
Managing counter-erotic transference
For therapists, the inner work of managing counter-erotic transference is equally vital. Denial is risky; the first ethical step is to be honest with oneself about any pull, fantasy, or bodily response. Once acknowledged, these feelings can be taken to supervision, where they can be thought about in a non-shaming, professional context. Supervision helps the therapist to see the wider pattern, understand why this particular client evokes such a response, and plan how to maintain the frame.
Re-anchoring in professional role and ethics is another key step. Remembering that the task is to be a therapist, not a friend or lover, helps to resist the seductive pull of feeling “chosen” by the client. Sometimes counter-erotic transference exposes the therapist’s own loneliness, unmet needs, or unresolved history; these belong in the therapist’s personal therapy and life, not in the consulting room. By attending to their own vulnerabilities, therapists reduce the risk of unconsciously using the client to meet their needs.
Transforming heat into meaning
At their most destructive, I know that erotic and counter-erotic transferences can derail or even destroy a therapeutic process. But I am also learning that when they are recognised, contained and explored with care, they can open a powerful doorway into a client’s deepest relational questions. A client may discover that desire can be spoken about without everything collapsing, that boundaries can sit alongside genuine closeness, and that they can remain a whole person rather than becoming an object for someone else’s needs.
For me as a trainee therapist, trying to stay ethically grounded in the middle of that intensity stretches my capacity to hold complexity, ambiguity and emotional heat. It teaches me that erotic and counter-erotic transferences are not peripheral complications, but one of the ways the psyche tests whether this particular relationship can hold what others could not. When I manage to work with these dynamics thoughtfully, I can see how the heat gradually turns into light: more self-understanding for the client, clearer and healthier boundaries, and a more integrated sense of self taking shape.
Can a therapist ever love again?
Sitting in the middle of erotic and counter-erotic transference can, at times, make it feel as if love has become contaminated territory. When you’ve fallen for someone in a professional context, or had your heart pulled into a space where you must not act, it can leave a kind of burn: a sense that desire is dangerous, that your feelings can’t be trusted, or that the only way to stay safe is to shut down that part of yourself. In those moments, it’s easy to quietly believe that the cost of being a therapist is to never really love freely again.
But therapists are not meant to be empty vessels; we are human beings who happen to work in a very particular frame. The work is not to stop loving, but to differentiate: to mourn what cannot be lived out with a client, to understand what that love is made of (old longings, attachment wounds, archetypal patterns), and to relocate that capacity into our personal lives where reciprocity is actually possible. That usually means supervision, personal therapy, honest reflection and time allowing the internal figure that formed around a client or a professional encounter to be integrated, rather than secretly carried like a forbidden shrine.
Loving again, for a therapist, doesn’t mean forgetting what happened; it means loving with more awareness. It might look like recognising familiar pulls earlier, respecting your own vulnerability, and choosing partners and relationships outside the consulting room where your heart is allowed to arrive fully. In that sense, the question isn’t “Can a therapist ever love again?” but “Can this experience deepen my capacity to love with clearer boundaries, more honesty, and less confusion between my role and my humanity?” My hope is that the answer to that is yes.