I worked with this amazing therapist for two years. Near the end of the time I worked with her, one session I went on this whole long rant about a bunch of minor things. Really, it was my therapist I was angry at--I envied her because she had her life together and I didn't, and I was not dealing well with losing her as my therapist. At the end of this rant, I finally recognized that it was her I was actually angry at, and I ended the rant with, "And you know what? F--- you!"

She said, "Yeah, I was getting that." Then she paused for a minute and said, "I've been trying to get you to say that for two years." She didn't get hurt or angry, and she didn't reject me. We talked about it several sessions later, and I referred to myself as having been out of control. She said that wasn't her experience of me at all--I realized, eventually, that anger was so frightening to me that letting myself express any of it at all made me feel like an out-of-control monster, but really I was much more controlled than most people. The whole incident ended up being really useful in terms of helping me realize that anger is safe and okay and normal.