What do you open with, or how do you start your sessions, especially that works and gets you off on the right foot to have a good session? I keep messing up right at the beginning, and then I end up feeling picked on for the whole time, because after I get tired of the staring match, I blurt out what I have done wrong over the last week or two, and how I am repeating the same old patterns that I still haven't changed.

A typical session starts with the dreaded "How are you?" question. I hate that question, because most people ask that just to be polite, and they couldn't care less, so I just automatically say "OK" without thinking about it. Of course T knows that, and won't settle for the automatic reply, but I generally don't know the real answer to that question and I am afraid of getting it wrong (because my family of origin always corrected me if I ever said I was not fine, and maybe because T doesn't let me just say fine). Once (actually several times) I told her that I don't like that question. So she asked what question I would prefer, and if multiple choice would be easier. I said that multiple choice would be great, and she came up with a few options for questions. I wish that I could have remembered all of them. One was "progress that you have made," and another one was "confessions you would like to make." Out of those two, progress seems to be a much better choice, as confessions lead to being in hot water fast.

Particularly, do you have any ideas for starting a session if you don't feel like you made progress since the last time, or may even be backsliding? That's when it is hardest.