I have to push myself really hard to trust, to open up, to share things with T, especially if they are negative in any way. It has been SO worth it.

I've had to push myself to talk about my issues, my fears of intimacy, my painful past...and also trust that T could hear what I had to say. I grew up thinking that my truth, if expressed, would cause relationships to ...vanish. I thought my therapist would FIRE me if I brought up issues with the therapy itself.

I did it ....whew!

Now, I'm seeing major willingness in myself, outside of therapy, to open up and even have the hard conversations with friends. Like just recently, a friend REALLY took advantage of me. I won't bore you with the details, but I noticed that the relationship was fundamentally unbalanced. One evening at a very high-end bar where I can generally afford no more than one drink. This particular friend was bragging about another person (a third party) who brought her there quite often, and always paid the tab.
It was like some sardonic joke on this third party. And I thought...wtf???

A light bulb went on, brightly! I realized how my friend basically uses people. All the time. And laughs about it to others.

I took a deep breath and I mentioned something.

I hope I was diplomatic. Maybe I wasn't. Either way, the friendship is going to change. Or end.

There is no way that I could have done this without spending time in therapy, and learning to be clearer about my needs .....which I practiced in therapy itself. What I guess I'm saying is that in therapy, I pushed myself to trust my therapist, and moreover, learned to trust myself to bring things up, even when they were painful.

Sorry for the giant long novel of a post. Trusting my t, my situation, and my instincts....a skill that I need to sharpen, no doubt, but ...well it's a beginning.

blessings, MCL