an intense session.

It started off with me just being super anxious, but I eventually told C how I'd been using visualization exercises during the week to box things up and shelve them for our next session, but that I tended to then forget. It very naturally led into well... an exercise I wasn't expecting.

He invited me to take a box off my shelf. He asked me to describe it, and, I've never done this before -- it felt silly at first -- but he asked if I wanted to open it, asked if I wanted a knife to open it, said one appeared in my hand when I consented...walked me through cutting it open, looking inside...it was harder than I expected. I felt things I didn't expect to feel.

The box was my "S" box (all about S and my feelings there). We talked about the first time S sat next to me on the sofa. And, it led to me telling him that, when I'd reacted as I had with S on the sofa (I had an instinctual duck and cover response when S had moved a certain way), that the associated were that I was exaggerating things to get attention. C asked me whose voice that was, and I said my ex stepmom and possibly my dad...but then, shortly, I realized it was certainly my dad. This all connected into me talking about an incident when I was a child where my dad came into my therapy and, afterwards, exploded at me. I've never really recollected or spoken about the content, but suddenly it was playing in front of me again, and I told C I was remembering for the first time my dad yelling at me that I was exaggerating things to make him look bad.

C asked if I, adult me, wanted to step in to the scene and respond to my dad. I declined. Then, he asked me if I wanted him (C) to step into the scene and respond. I was caught off guard, and I hesitated...then eventually told him "I know this sounds silly, but I'm afraid if you respond, it will just make things worse. After all, that is what happened when my then-therapist stepped in at my next session -- I wound up pulled out of therapy with her."

Then, C asked if he could respond as if he were my father. I hesitated again and said "I don't know. I don't think I understand what that would look like." And he began..."it would look like me saying to 12-year-old you...'can you tell me what's bothering you?....I want to take care of you... (here I flinched a bit)...You're my little girl (and here I slammed my hands over my ears, curled into a ball on his sofa, and said "Stop!" ...which he did, of course).

Instantly, my thoughts were rushing to try to shut off the feelings. I was thinking..."how am I going to get out of this?" and "I just need to pull it together to survive this moment, and then I can escape." I've never been able to capture my "my emotions are a terrible threat to my safety" thoughts like that before.

We didn't have time to really process. I boxed everything back up, he invited me to leave it there in the office, but I declined. I told him I was likely to fall apart as soon as I left - he asked what that would look like, and I said I would cry. He asked what I would be thinking, and I said "I don't know. If I knew, I would be thinking it already, and I would fall apart here." He said "and you don't want to fall apart here." Which I confirmed and told him that I was having "I just need to survive this" thoughts. I got ready to go without any prompting and did leave.

I emailed 15 minutes later just saying "You're still there? We're still ok? Right?" And he responded almost immediately saying he's still here, and he's still ok with me, and asked if I was ok with how badly he wished he could protect me. To which I responded "I wish it too. It just also hurts."

I also texted S, because I was in that sort of after-a-shock state where you feel compelled to check on those who matter most to you.

I'm glad I see C again tomorrow, but am still really really unsettled right now. Like, I really want to call him...or...maybe...to just email and tell him how badly "little me" wants to just cling to him and be held and bury her face in his shoulder and hide. Perhaps I will. I don't know. My thoughts are all a mess. I'm a mix of want and fear/reserve. A mix of child, critic, and adult.