Thank you all for your replies. They have given me much to think about and have taken me many places.

My conclusion is that T's big presence in the room is very grounding. And when I state so emphatically that I accept separateness, I think I struggle a lot with it. I think I resent it on many levels.

T and I have talked about dependency.
Several sessions ago I began thinking about how I assign 'authority' to relationships, creating authority figures to fill my dependency need/desire. I began seeing it here and there, but fleetingly because I am so good and denying what is in front of me. Really really good censor. I didn't share this with her. My journal sat in the passenger seat of my car for 2 weeks with this in it that I intended to share in session but censored by leaving it in the car and not referring to it in session.

Last session was a struggle and a big question from T was what would comfort be like/feel like?

Then I had a dream that was just what I would call one long "still photo". It was simply a large black billboard with bright pink and green letters, surrounded by zig-zagged yellow, like a cartoon almost. It just said NOTICE!! Nothing else, just that.
T thought it was humorous in that it is a joke also: A notice stating, 'notice!'

So then last session was one of those totally closed off, speechless, thought deprived sessions. I was really tired and had come home from work and laid down and really didn't want to go to T. Driving allll the way across town was exhausting to think about. But, not going and all the explaining and exploring next time sounded even more exhausting so off I went, hoping the mood would pass. It didn't.

When talking about the dream, which I thought had little significance other than being odd and too brief to have any meaning, she remarked that I seemed to want her to tell me what it meant. Yeah.. but only today did I realize she was referring to my being passive. That I seemed to want that but I wasn't asking. She later asked what it would take for me to participate [in this session].

So today I'm thinking about passiveness. I'm not at all always like that, but sometimes I am. Totally closed off and obviously passive, and sometimes quietly passive. And how that takes me back to wishing wishing wishing a teacher would notice me, adopt me. Be quiet, be the best, nicest, smilingest. Good things come to those who wait, and all that. Not only was there hope in that, but there was comfort. Comfort that it might just come true if I think it hard enough. Magical thinking.

So, perhaps the NOTICE!! was to notice this. Written on a black billboard, like a blackboard, in bright letters like colored chalk. Notice! There was comfort in these fantasies.

Notice! and stop judging. They filled a need at that time, for that little girl.

Notice! that fantasies of being dependent and that being passive don't fill the adult needs, they interfere and prevent the adult relationships that could provide comfort.

T's big, grounding presence in the room prevents me from slipping away to where I can't be available for present possibilities, including comfort.