Today's joint session with MC went much better than I expected to. Just the way he looked at me and asked how I was doing after we sat down almost immediately made me feel better and comforted. I could tell he still cared and that the connection was still there.

I said a bunch of stuff about how I was feeling, then he tried to explain what he'd meant during the conversation (he admitted that he'd messed up on the delivery in the phone call). Basically, because I'm feeling paternal transference and part of that is needing reassurance from him that he's not rejecting or abandoning me, meeting with him individually will be like getting that reassurance (even if we don't discuss reassurance). So then it will be harder for me to learn from it. So it's better if I work with individual T on why I need that reassurance, what stuff from childhood contributes to that need, etc. Which generally made sense to me (even though part of me wanted to be like, "But I want to meet with youuuuuu!") He clarified that doesn't mean he doesn't want to work with me or talk to me. (Still good to continue marriage counseling).

He realized a parallel between my issue and something with his daughter from when she was around 10 (she's a teenager now). She kept wanting his reassurance, like if she was at school or an extracurricular activity, either to talk to him or for him to come and get her. He said if he did what she wanted, then she wouldn't learn that she could handle the anxiety she was feeling. So she did learn to handle the anxiety and be OK. This comparison, along with some other stuff he's said, has made me wonder if there's some paternal countertransference going on... (even though I'm much older than his daughter--I get the sense age doesn't really matter with that sort of thing).

He asked if I experienced any anger toward him along with the sadness. I said I did, felt like, "Screw him! I'm not coming back" at one point. He asked if it felt better than the sadness, and I said it did. He was like, "Good!" Said you could do something with anger (less so sadness). We talked about how some of the sadness was likely tied to childhood stuff, and I said how I didn't feel like I could/should get angry at my parents when I was a kid. He was like, "Exactly!" He said I might need to work on getting angry now at some stuff from back then, to see it differently and process it. Which makes sense--gonna talk about that with T tomorrow.

He also noted that when he didn't give me what I wanted in the phone call, I could have just caved and apologized. But instead I fought back, which he said was good and showed that I was strong enough to do that. He said with some of his patients, he knew if a similar thing had happened with him and them, they wouldn't be ready the next week to have a conversation like we did today. But he said he had no doubt that I would be ready, that he knows I'm not frail and fragile. Then he was like, "But it seems like you think otherwise about yourself, that you are frail and fragile." When I nodded, he was like, "Well, you're wrong!" That made me feel kind of good (and also I guess gives me another area to work on with T.)

Some other stuff was discussed, too (including with my H), but won't go into all that. I came out of there feeling much better about things with me and him. I'm not gonna lie--I'd still love to meet with him individually to talk about some stuff, but I'm going to table that for a month or two and see how things go. (And then maybe I would be able to have a more reasoned argument for it than just "But I want to work with youuuuuu!")