|
Jul 26, 2010, 11:43 AM
|
 |
|
|
Member Since: May 2008
Posts: 3,845
|
|
Well, I “failed” my plan not to email my t. 
I sent her a message from my adult self, as well as from the child. The adult message was telling her about a repetition I see in our therapy relationship of 1. Learning to trust and open up. 2. Facing my pain and t. assisting and helping to comfort me. 3. Feeling some relief and healing, which leads to 4. Emailing and telling t. how good I feel about therapy and that I feel attached to her, followed by 5. T. doesn’t reply or says something that makes me feel like she doesn’t care, 6. I feet hurt and it “undoes” all of the good feelings/attachment, 7. I distance emotionally from her because I feel she has done that to me. 8. We talk it over and resolve it. 9. I have to start all over at step 1 developing trust in the relationship again. I told her I don’t understand why this keeps happening. . .why just when I get to the point where I feel good about therapy and that we are starting to “get somewhere,” something happens to throw a wrench in it.
The child’s message was about how I feel when she does not reply to my email. Anxiety and hurt and pains in my stomach. Followed by shutting down and going into hiding.
Well anyway, after I sent the messages, I thought about how extreme my emotional reaction is whenever T. doesn’t reply to a message. I feel that this is pushing me away, that she is angry with me or doesn’t like me anymore, and I feel shame/bad for having bothered her. All of a sudden, I could see a link with what happened with my parents as a child.
When I was in grade school, I’d come home from school and really miss my mom. So I’d call her at work. Sometimes, one call did not feel like enough, and I would need to call her two or three times. I don’t know why, but I think I just craved the connection, felt empty, and needed to know she was there. Well, my dad would get very mad at me for calling my mom too often, and he would threaten to spank me if I called her again. This really hurt me inside. I “needed” something from my mom, and I ended up feeling that I was “bad” by needing that attachment/connection to her.
In the same way, I feel this compulsion to email T. at work. It’s like I need to know she is there. I need to know she has not forgotten about me or stopped liking me. It’s like a reassurance. But I feel bad about it too. I know I am bothering her, just like I was bothering my mom. And if she does not reply, then I feel like I am being punished. I feel like she is pushing me away, and that I am a bad person for wanting that attachment/connection to her.
So anyway. That’s the insight I had. Then I felt tears starting to come, so I went into a bathroom stall and cried. I’m OK now but am feeling sad. All I really wanted as that small child was to feel attached with my mom. And I ended up feeling bad and wrong.
I kind of wonder if . . .whenever I start to feel very attached with R. . .I’m the one who throws a wrench in it. . .because deep down I feel it is wrong or bad to want that. And any failure on her part to respond feels like a “reprimand” of sorts, some kind of punishment for being bad and bothering her at work.
Weird how those connections start forming when you think about them.
Maybe i won't be able to stop emailing until i resolved this traumatic memory. Do you think?
I hate it that i gave in. . .
|