today's session sucked. I don't even know that I can properly explain it.

We wound up talking about "parts." I told him how S had really made me feel a lot of shame over the idea of even thinking of myself in different "parts," and so how reluctant I was to ever even speak that way. But, how impossible it also seems to be to truly communicate without talking about it that way.

C was talking about the different parts of me and said "you know how I feel about the little part. You know the feelings I have towards that part." And, that stuck in my mind. I was really uncomfortable asking, but I finally was able to write down "You said you have 'those feelings' (Daddy feelings/protective feelings) towards the little part, but does that mean you don't feel that way towards the rest of the parts?"

He said "no. I feel differently towards the other parts."

Guys, this left me gutted and spinning. I tried to explain to him, but it just seemed to get worse. He said he doesn't feel protective of adult me, and that is really really hurting me right now. I told him how much it hurts and frightens me to think that "my time is up" for anyone to feel protective towards me. He started talking about how "yes, it's painful for both of us to realize I can't ever be your Daddy, you can't ever be my little girl." But, I told him, no, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about adult me -- how I feel like I'm on my own now, children are more important, I approached this from every angle -- eventually literally saying "like if I were to get mugged, I'd be on my own." And "Don't adults protect one another?" To which he said "All the time," but didn't go further.

He eventually said "If we were walking down a street, and someone were to try to attack us, of course I would want to protect you. But the little part of you is the part I would most want to protect."

I eventually just said that I felt like he was talking about another person -- like some other person is who he would want to protect, not me. Maybe the *******ed parts talk was a horrible mistake, because I told him that I felt so much more disconnected now, he feels like a stranger, he feels unsafe. Which, of course, is not what he wants, nor what I want... but that's how we left it.

Oh, and then, at the very end, I asked him "is it a problem that so much of our therapy is focused on our relationship?" I was expecting an easy "no, it isn't a problem; so much of the work we are doing comes from our relationship" or something like that. Instead, he said "I don't know. To answer that, we'd have to go back to what we talked about last week, which is what are your goals in therapy?"

I totally shut down and basically just left at that point, because now I also feel like he's not OK with so much of my focus being on our relationship. And, yeah, logical me says "TMC, relationships aren't built primarily by talking about them; they are built primarily by experiencing them -- perhaps it's time to stop talking about the relationship and open another box, because that's when you felt most connected."

Except I trusted him before we did that, and now I've swung back to "he's unsafe." Or even "this isn't going to work; I give up."