Warning: LONG

MC today. We were talking with a friend we knew in waiting room when MC came out. As H was walking back, MC stepped back in the hallway and shook his hand, which he hadn't been doing since we moved to the new office (leading to me wondering why the change happened and worrying, then being sad about it when MC explained it's because the door shuts on its own, and he'd have to block the hallway to shake hands. So he didn't anymore.) He held out his hand to me, too, and it was nice to shake hands at the start again, because, as I'd explained to him before, it helped ground and calm me.

Sat and made some small talk about how we were doing. Then MC was like, pointing to me, "We exchanged some e-mails over the past week," and I was like, "I'm sorry about all those." To which MC sort of smiled and shook his head in a way that conveyed it was OK, that it didn't bother him.

I said I ended up sending so many because when I didn't hear back, I started rethinking what I said and feeling like maybe I shouldn't have talked about the stuff with his wife. I said for some reason I just felt like I had to tell him I understood now why he wasn't going to tell us. He said it was OK. I said I was sorry for not understanding then, and he said he wouldn't have expected me to. That he learned back in grad school why you shouldn't share things like that with clients and what the repercussions can be. I said I should have just accepted it when he explained why though, but he said he was learning it from the other side, while I was a "normal person" (I was like, "If you say so!") or "a civilian," so he wouldn't expect me to understand. That made me feel better.

I said I appreciated his response to the e-mails and noted that I'd shown them all to H. (H commented how I always show them to him when we're out at a bar and was kinda joking about it.) I said how two things in MC's response especially struck me. The thing about how stuff I bring up isn't going to lead to him, or T, or H leaving me. But that was obvious because it tied into my abandonment issues. The other part was about how he said if something was affecting me, then it was important. I said maybe this struck me because sometimes as a kid, I didn't feel like it was OK to bring up things that were affecting me. Like anxieties. That they might just get dismissed. Or even now with H, if I say too many times that I'm stressed or anxious, he might be like, "Ugh, there she is being anxious again."

H said he wouldn't be like that. I said how at one point, he said I kept saying how I was stressed, like I always was. And H said that was true. MC compared it to his college roommate, where anytime he asked him how he was doing, he'd say he was worried about chemistry. So after a while, it wasn't like, "How are you doing?" but "How's chemistry?" I said I didn't want to seem like I was crying wolf. I forget what was said after that.

MC said he was mainly bringing the e-mails up because I implied at the end that I had a bunch more stuff to bring up today. I said I realized after I sent it that it probably sounded that way. That it wasn't really that much stuff. It was really just about the comment I'd tossed out at the end of last session, when MC had made some joke about us not getting too excited about next time we see him, and I replied, "Well, I always assume you'll cancel, so..." and he said, "I might be 5 minutes late, but I won't cancel." Today I said I was sorry for tossing that out there like that, and he said, "Oh I figured you were just ribbing me, like I was joking, so you were joking back." H seemed to agree. I was like, "Well, the thing is, I feel bad about saying this, but I wasn't really joking. It is still something that I worry about for every appointment." I started crying as I said that.

MC looked a bit stricken and said, "Well, yes, I did have to cancel a lot at one point, and I'm sorry about that." I said, "I know you had very good reason to cancel, and I'm sorry for bringing it up." He said it was OK. I said, "And it's been a while since you've canceled--aside from one last-minute time change recently. I feel like I should be over that by now."

He said he wanted to make sure we weren't putting too much focus on me and then asked if it was OK if he said one thing. I thought he was asking H, but he was actually asking me. I said yes. He said that I was doing the "should" thing. The "I should be over it by now." I said I knew, that I do that (we've discussed in there before). He said he understood if it still bothered me, that there's no set timeline.

I said how I do the "should" thing in other parts of life, how it affects our marriage too. MC said I helped him out there, by bringing it back to the marriage. Talked about "shoulds" like doing the dishes while H was out, getting other things done. How I"ll apologize to H for just getting the dishes done when he's home. H said it didn't matter, that they were done. I said but the times I didn't do things he wanted me to around the house, that he got upset before if I said I'd do something but didn't do it. H said it was when I said I'd do something, but didn't do it. I said, well, what if I said I'd do the dishes? He said if I had some reason why I didn't do them, was OK.

Switched to topic of medical tests. I said how I'd gotten the mammogram results and everything was OK. MC said that was good. I thanked him and said the one I was really worried about was tomorrow, because it's basically to screen for ovarian cancer, which my mom had at my age. Then I was talking really fast and crying about my fears related to that. MC and H just listened. I talked about how I'd always had health anxiety, like my mom had to hide a family medical guide with diagnostic stuff in it from me as a kid.

Then I said how I wondered if maybe part of why I'd e-mailed him last week was to have something to be anxious about instead of the tests. Because I assumed he'd write back, so it was something "safe" to worry about. He said it was possible. But then I said I didn't want him to think that every time I e-mailed him, it was to avoid something else. He was like, "But this is cancer. This is a big thing that people worry about." I said how H had said something similar, which I found to be supportive and validating. Though he also said "It will be OK," and I said that isn't helpful when you have anxiety, because he doesn't really know it will be OK.

We switched to topic of anxiety in general. MC has disclosed before that he also has an anxiety disorder. He said today how it sounds like I have to come up with an explanation for when I'm feeling anxious. I said it seemed that way as a kid. And how even now, I often will (I turned to H)--it's like I have to come up with reasons why I'm anxious or stressed. So I'll just keep throwing things out there like, maybe it's x...or maybe y. How about z? MC said that he's learned that sometimes it's like in a car, where a warning light is coming on not because something is actually wrong, but because of faulty wiring. I said, "Like the Check Engine light is on because of a faulty sensor?" He said yes. I said how maybe I just had to accept that the anxiety is there for no reason then. He agreed, saying how that helped him, knowing that maybe he's just anxious because he's anxious.

We ended session joking about him using mechanic's tools to fix things. And I said I wished he could just plug in that thing that they use to diagnose the check engine light and figure out what's wrong.

He confirmed for next Monday, then did the usual handshake "It was good to see you" to each of us. I said that back and sorta mumbled "thanks" at the end.