Today's session was heavy, but I came out of it feeling nice. I went in and started out talking about how crazy the past week and today have been... crazy is a nice change from how numb and depressed I was feeling a few weeks ago, so that's good, but there's been so much stress lately. I told her about how I found out I had asthma last week (after having an awful asthma attack), and how today I ran into a horrible ex-friend of mine, and other such shenanigans.

After that, we talked a little bit about handling conflict and power imbalances... I mentioned something about the power imbalance between my former abuser and me. She said that she didn't know much about that, since we've never really talked about my experiences with him... she said we could leave it if I wanted, or I could explain if I liked... I finally felt comfortable enough to open up about it. I went in slowly, kind of beating around the bush with some "backstory" of sorts, but all in all I told the story of two of the most traumatic years of my life in thirty minutes. The first time I ever told someone the entire story, I cried. Today, I felt so detached... T said that was normal, though. But she thanked me and validated me and told me that I was so resilient and brave. That getting through that took a lot of courage. It felt so good to hear that after years of being emotionally abused and emotionally neglected.

I thanked her in return and told her that my last therapist had not at all been as wonderful as her. When I told Ex-T (who also happened to be emotionally abusive, sadly) about my trauma and abuse about a year ago now, she told me that I needed to "stop acting like the victim". T was shocked. Her jaw literally dropped, and she went "Holy hell. That is the worst thing I've ever heard... the worst thing to say to someone after they told you that..." To see her react that way was so incredibly validating, and also eye opening. I had no idea how emotionally abusive and manipulative Ex-T was until very recently, and new T's reaction helped me to look at that a little more. T continues to remind me to take care of myself, and be mindful, and that I am resilient and brave. I'm thankful for those reminders. I'm thinking about asking her to write them down for me so I can paste them into my bullet journal and look at them when I have a bad day.