I wanted to update everybody regarding the situation with my t. She is on her vacation now (cruise to Croatia and Italy). This is the second week I haven't had my session. One more week to go before I see her.

I haven't consulted with a different t. I thought about it, but I didn't want to do it behind my t's back and she was already on her trip.

I mentioned again to my husband my idea about going to a different t. He still doesn't think I should switch t's. He has done it before and says it was difficult and stressful. He reminded me that my t has stuck with me over 15 years and has helped me a lot, despite this one repetitive issue we keep having.

He reminded me that I'm grieving over the death of my mother-in-law recently, and if I throw away my relationship with my t now, it would be self-destructive of me.

I'm pretty sure that both my t and my husband think that the reason I'm making such a huge deal over what happened with my t when she was in Portland is because my MIL's decline and death was already a huge trigger for my issues with loss. So any misstep by my t feels like a huge betrayal. I'm not sure what I think. I guess it's possible. I never have any issues with my t about anything other than her lack of responsiveness or bare bones support when I'm in a crisis. But that's my biggest trigger!

While my t is gone, I'm supposed to be thinking about what direction I want to go in my therapy. I've already told her no more working with dissociated child parts or talking about childhood traumas. I know she doesn't like me saying that because she thinks it's necessary to do that in order for me to heal. But I told her that doing that work makes me dissociate, regress, and feel helpless and scared...I can't contain it when I leave...so if she can't support me between sessions when I need it, I'm not going to do the work.
Period. My coping skills just aren't enough when Pandora's box is opened.

So...what should I suggest we work on when my t returns? Going back to the DBT book we didn't finish (we were about 2/3 of the way done). Doing the Journaling for Anxiety book (which we barely started)? Something else? My goal is to do something that will keep me in my adult mind and hopefully make me stronger so that I can take care of my own internal scared child parts when I get triggered or dissociated. I don't know if that will be possible for me down the road. It isn't now. But relying on my t to do it for me when I can't isn't working.

Does anybody who has been following my recent threads have any good ideas about what my t and I could work on when she returns from her trip that might help me move forward and out of this repetitive rut with my t of needing too much support and it not being available?