MC yesterday. He apologized for having to cancel Monday, and I said it was OK. MC rolled his chair over toward me and grabbed a tissue from the table next to me. He rolled back and wiped off his glasses. Then he took them off and left them off for most of the session, which is something he hasn't done in a long time.

Then we talked about the dog we've been approved to adopt, and I showed MC a pic on my phone. He confirmed that the dog was really cute and made a joke about her name. Talked about dog stuff for a bit.

Then H said how dog stuff was one topic he expected to discuss, and another was my reaction to MC's canceling a couple hours before our appointment Monday. H told the story of how he'd gotten call, then called me, and I was initially like, "yeah, we can just wait till next Monday, that's fine." Then he said how less than 5 minutes later, I texted him saying I was a "weepy mess." I had trouble looking at MC during this. H said he then offered to call the receptionist back and did that.

Then I asked MC if T had talked to him. He said no, that she'd left a voicemail, but he hadn't listened to it. I said, OK, then I should fill you in. And I went on to describe how I'd started looking at some other T's, contacted one, he got back to me very quickly, and I'm seeing him Tuesday. MC definitely seemed surprised by this. I felt like I should explain more. So I said how I'd had some issues with T, how I'd been researching other T's off and on for a while. I briefly described how I'd told T yesterday and how she was surprised and a bit sad, but understanding. And that she seemed open to me coming back whenever, whether for regular sessions or a termination session.

MC said he knew there was lots of transference going on here, gesturing between himself and T's office. He said that he hoped I could come back and work through the stuff going on with T. I said I hoped to do that, how my intention wasn't just to ride off into the sunset and never come back to see T again. At the very least for a termination session.

I said I felt bad for blindsiding T, but it was like this was the only way I could do it. I had to find another T and make an appointment first. MC asked why I thought this was the case. I said I was afraid if I talked to T about it first, then she might convince me to stay and just work on it with her, that I'd back out. MC thought that was interesting and wondered if it was related to something with my mom. Like if my mom did some sort of pushing me away, then trying to pull me back in thing, which made me afraid T would do the same. I said I'd have to think on that a little more.

I told him that he knew the new T I'd be seeing, that T had said he actually used to work with them. I shared his name, and MC was like, "Oh yeah, T2!" and looked a bit thoughtful. He joked, "yeah, he's a total jerk!" (he used a different word though). I said, "Should I tell him you said that?" and he laughed and was like, "Sure you can tell him that!" Then he was like, "No, he's a good guy, really smart." I mentioned that transference was the main issue I wanted to address with T2, though I hadn't mentioned that in the phone call with him. I wondered if MC thought he'd be OK dealing with it. He seemed to think he would be. He said he's a good therapist, but he couldn't really predict if he'd be a good fit for me, because that can be hard to tell. I said I understood that. I was more trying to find out what he thought of transference from a therapeutic standpoint. How MC seems very comfortable addressing it, but T seemed much less comfortable with it. Both in talking about stuff with MC and also with my own negative maternal transference toward her. MC seemed a little puzzled when I said that. I said that was part of why I wanted to see someone new, that I knew he (MC) had said that I should try to address the transference stuff (with him) with T. And that I'd tried that many times, but it didn't seem to be helping. That it was like she wasn't giving me what I needed,whatever that is. And that I'd talked to her about that, and it still didn't seem to change in the way I needed it to.

I did feel a bit awkward in telling him that the main reason I'm seeing a new T is to deal with my transference for him. I did say, too, that there have been some other issues in my relationship with T, how T thought most of them were my projecting onto her, but I didn't know. That maybe some of it was our personalities. MC said that it could be projection/transference, but it could also be about goodness of fit. I said "Or maybe a mix of both?" and MC said yes.

I should note that throughout the session, MC was getting an excessive number of texts and a couple phone calls, which he had to glance at (his usual "I just have to look at the number." I wondered if any were related to his absence Monday. It was a bit disruptive, especially during the more emotional parts of the session. And he put his glasses back on during one of the checks, so he could read it, then left them on.

We were getting near the end of our allotted time. MC commented how H had said at the beginning there were three things we'd talk about. We'd talked about the dog and the potential new T. What was the third? I said it was about my reaction to him cancelling Monday. It was hard for me to look at him when I said that.

I said it may have been stuff lingering from our pre-vacation session, since we didn't talk any about that last week. And I'd considered bring some of that up Monday, but then he canceled. I said I knew we were almost out of time, and he said it was OK. So I mentioned the reassurance e-mail I'd sent him a week ago. About how I feel like for me, reassurance is helpful because it's cumulative. And he may have to reassure me about something 99 times and think it's not going to help to reassure me again, but that 100th time, it might actually click. That I think that's what happened with me believing he genuinely cares about me--that it eventually just clicked and I accepted it.

MC disagreed. He said in this situation, he doesn't want me to become dependent on him (I thought, "Too late!" but didn't say it). That it's OK to be dependent on H because that's a different kind of relationship, how when you say "I do" you kind of agree to be dependent on each other in some ways. But that his role (MC's) is to help me find the reassurance inside myself rather than from him. I said how I felt like I was making progress, but might still need reassurance from him at times. And I was afraid he was just going to take that away.

He said we did have to stop soon, but first he wanted to share a story with me. He said when he taught his son to ski, he tried using the technique where he's ahead of his son with his son holding onto the ski pole behind him. But his son was leaning too much on the ski pole, so it wasn't working. So MC came up with a technique where he'd be 10 feet (or maybe yards?) down the slope from him and tell his son to ski toward him and head-butt him in the stomach. Which ended up working. Because he was there to catch him, but it got his son to learn to do it on his own. And then he'd go, say 15 feet/yards back, then 20, etc. He asked if I understood what he meant. I said yes.

MC asked H if he was OK talking about all this stuff regarding me. H said yes, that he figured we would have, how the only thing he'd had to talk about was the dog, and we'd done that. H mentioned the skiing thing and compared it to how he got our daughter to learn to jump in the pool without holding onto him, giving some description. MC said that yes, he liked that comparison. How if H didn't move back, then she wouldn't learn to jump in the pool. I said that made sense.

MC went back to one of his favorite analogies of a zipline. How people want to wait until they're not afraid to go down it. But the only way you can realize it's safe is to actually do it yourself. I was like, "Oh great, you're making me go down a zipline?" (he knows I hate stuff like that). He said in a way, yes. I replied, "Can it be a really short zipline maybe?" And MC said that yes, it could be.

He brought up the skiing thing again, saying how he wasn't leaving his son up on the mountain alone while he skied on down. I said, through tears, "So you'll stay up on the mountain with me, then?" He said, "Yes. Not abandoning." I said, "OK."

He said he predicted that I'd say I understood, and think I did, but then go home and start to worry about what he said and have doubts. But to just try to think about what we talked about. I said OK.

We were already at an hour at that point, so MC said we did have to stop. And said we were on the schedule for Monday. He said to me that even if he did have to cancel for some reason, to remember that we were able to reschedule this time, 72 hours later. And that we would also still be on the schedule for future sessions. I said I knew, it was just still hard. So he was basically trying to reassure me. Which I guess is what he'd just said he shouldn't do...it's sort of a pattern for him, the "I can't keep reassuring you" followed not long after by reassuring me. (Or "We have to be careful to have a balance because it's marriage counseling" followed by spending most of the session talking about me--and sometimes prompted by him more than me.) Makes me wonder if maybe there's some paternal counter-transference going on there...

Usual handshakes and "good to see you." I sort of glanced back at MC as I was walking out, attempting a nonverbal "thank you." Pretty intense session, but I felt OK about it afterward. I was a bit emotional, but that was partly due to it sinking in that MC is doing this stuff because he cares and wants to help me, not because he's trying to get rid of me or something. He's trying to do what a good parent does, teach a child to be independent (which I don't think my parents, especially my mom, were so good at). Of course, this doesn't exactly help to lessen the paternal transference...