I just wanted you to know I could've written this. Can't answer any questions, but I know how bad it is to feel like you're unable to somehow access the thing that's supposed to help. (I don't think this is your fault, by any means!)

The way I'm handling it at the moment is to try and seek a second opinion, maybe changing therapists. This is after months (maybe a little over a year if I'm honest) of definitely going farther and father into a swamp of confusion and nearly intolerable emotion, going back to maladaptive coping skills I had left behind *before* I entered therapy. I took some breaks in there and they were hard, too.

All in all, it is hard because...dealing with these kinds of huge life problems are hard. That said, I've come to conclude that it isn't a good sign if you feel like you're taking two steps back, and don't even see that one step forward.

At the end of the day, maybe "working through" the swampiness of it with T would help. But maybe not. I don't know that even a T would know...

It's a hard, hard place to be - especially if you want to see improvement, as I know you do.

I just wanted you to know you're not alone.

I would recommend you raise all of this with your therapist and see how he/she responds.

I asked mine why he thought therapy was failing and he just said, "You tell me."

...which, to me, sounded like he thinks its my fault. That was the last straw.

Maybe your T will have a better response.